A book of poems by
Leonard Cohen.
In the early 1980s I learned that Cohen was studying Rinzai Zen under Sasaki Joshu roshi. I was interested to see how this might be expressed both explicitly and implicitly in the work of a Western poet. In reading this and many other volumes of his poetry and his two novels, there is a line from "Death of a Ladies' Man" that always surfaces when I think of Leonard Cohen:
"Sitting in the bath tub
watching my cock float."
Mind you, I like the man and in fact have since exchanged correspondence a few times.
Since the beginning of his career he has consistently used Judeo-Christian and sometimes Buddhist imagery and romanticism to get girls. With consistent success.
Late last year, Cohen left the Mount Baldy Zen Center in California where he had been living together with ordained Zen monastics for several years.
He's on the loose again.