Friday's tie (9/28) is another striking tie that - at least for me these days - doesn't hold up to a lot of words.  (Isaac Zelcer, silk, Italy)  And, I start October with a tie about which all I can say is "Carlos Tomasini," silk, I guess and nice gold with shimmering brocade.

A couple of entries ago, I included the Heart Sutra, a Buddhist text best known to many in the United States, for its being sung at the death of the old lama in the film Little Buddha.  It is a text very appropriate at the time of death, because it is very appropriate at any time of life, reminding us of the true meaning, perhaps lack of meaning, of life.

But, I use it as a memorial for a growing number of beings who have died recently.  There was Luciano Pavarotti.  It has been a bad time for opera legends lately.  Now, a memorial for Pavarotti (for whom I don't feel the personal loss that I felt at the death of Beverly Sills): Pavarotti performing with Stevie Wonder - here.  More recently, we've lost the mime Marcel Marceau, who visited my little Georgia undergraduate school eons ago (when I was an undergraduate, before mimes grew so scorned).  A man with a voice, a man without a voice, and they both leave such silence.

Then, I mourn two beings who were not human, Alex, the parrot.  The first night my parrot Dory lived with me, we watched Alex on television.  I told Dory that some day he would be on television.  Well, that hasn't happened, but Dory assures me, in his own words, that he is "a happy bird."

And, then, there is another...  the only one of these who have gone before that I actually knew.  Her name was Oreo, and she was a proud alumna of Southeastern Guide Dogs.  By the time I met her, Oreo was already retired, spending her days by the pool, while Eva, her two-legged teammate, and Eva's new four-legged teammate, Cara, went out every day to bring home the kibble.  Oreo had a long and, I am sure, happy life, the end of which has brought sadness to all of us who knew her.  Since Oreo was a good Southern Baptist, I'll back away from the Buddhist atmosphere of this entry to say, quoting Matthew 25:21, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant!"

Thinking back on those four losses, I feel as if the world is... as if the world does not need for me to say anything else.

There is no ignorance and there is no ending of ignorance
through to no aging and death and no ending of aging and death.
There is no suffering, no cause of suffering,
no cessation of suffering, and no path.
There is no wisdom or any attainment.

      Tuesday the 18th - MBP: New York - London - Tokyo (Italian silk, US)
      Wednesday the 19th - Florence & K., Inc. (imported silk)

When the Bodhisattva Avalokitesvara
was coursing in the deep Prajnaparamita,
he perceived that all five skandhas are empty,
thereby transcending all sufferings.
Sariputra, form is not other than emptiness
and emptiness not other than form.
form is precisely emptiness and emptiness precisely form.
So also are sensation, perception, volition and consciousness.
Sariputra, this voidness of all dharmas is not born, not destroyed,
not impure, not pure, does not increase or decrease.
In voidness there is not form,
and no sensation, perception, volition or consciousness:
no eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind;
no sight, sound, smell, taste, touch, thought;
there is no realm of the eye
all the way up to no realm of mental cognition.
There is no ignorance and there is no ending of ignorance
through to no aging and death and no ending of aging and death.
There is no suffering, no cause of suffering,
no cessation of suffering, and no path.
There is no wisdom or any attainment.
With nothing to attain, Bodhisattvas relying on Prajnaparamita
have no obstructions in their minds.
Having no obstructions, there is no fear
and departing far from confusion and imaginings,
they reach Ultimate Nirvana.
All past, present and future Buddhas,
relying on Prajnaparamita, attain Anuttara-Samyak-Sambodhi.
Therefore, know that Prajnaparamita is the great mantra of power,
the great mantra of wisdom, the supreme mantra
the unequaled mantra, which is able to remove all sufferings
It is real and not false.
Therefore, recite the mantra of Prajnaparamita:
Gate, Gate, Paragate, Parasamgate, Bodhi Svaha.