Zen Koans
The Fireplace Records
Case 49 - Case 100
By Mike Garofalo
Koans, Comments, Remarks, Pointers 1 - 50
By Mike Garofalo
Note: Cases 1-50 are typically longer prose webpages with
questions, statements, koans, stories, dialogues, and poems.
These 50 'Koan'
Cases include extensive Commentary, notes,
asides, books, classics, and links. A Case = A Chapter.
Beginning with Case 51, my Chapters become very brief remarks,
poems, questions, koans, and onions. I provide no commentary
after Case 50.
After Case 50, the Chapters are more like those
in The Whole World is a Single Flower by Zen Master Seung Sahn
(1927-2004).
Express Your Idea of the Number 5
Master Koin asked Monk Dogen
"Express your idea of the number 5?"
Dogen raised his five fingers.
"Very good, that's a good hand," said Koin.
Both raised five fingers and laughed.
Koin held up
his right hand;
Dogen held up
his left hand---
mirror images
Master Dogen 1200-1253 Japan
The Fireplace Records
Zen Koans by Mike Garofalo
What is the Meaning of Mu?
"What is the meaning of Mu?"
Asked the perplexed monk.
Master Duksan slapped the monk!
"Stop asking vague questions.
Go write a poem about a pond."
Wake Up! Live Right!
Make your philosophy
Insightful poetry.
Speak beautifully,
Think creatively.
---Master Duksan,
a pond, or the pond---?"
He dared to think.
Imagined or real?
He did not speak.
Zen Koans: The Fireplace Record #50
By Mike Garofalo
Subject Index to 1,975 Zen Buddhist Koans
These Dear Friends of the Buddha Mind
I never
grasped emptiness
or hiked around Mt. Sumeru,
or patted Chao-chou's dog,
or teased Nansen's cat,
blocked the Bodhidharma's uppercut,
or slept in Han Shan's dirty hut,
or borrowed Wendy Johnson's garden rake
or rode the Ox through the Gateless Gate,
or solved any of Rinzai's riddles,
I never, ever
suffered the Great Doubt,
looked for sticks in Yun-men's crapper,
or broke Tassajara bread with Shunryu Suzuki,
or minded the flapping flag for Hui-neng the sage,
or heard Jiyu-Kennett move her whisk in Mt. Shasta's shade,
or chanted on Mt. Tamalpais with Whalen, Ginsberg and Snyder,
or saw Dogen's True Eye open just a little bit wider.
I never did.
Nope, never!
Not in 55 lifetimes.
Yet, it seems like I did.
Yep, dayinanddayout,
appearances notwithstanding,
Reality appeared just So.
This I know:
Their Heritage
Is in my Heart,
Their Myths mine,
These Dear Friends of the Buddha Mind.
The Case of the Fly in the Kitchen
You say that the world is everything
that is the case.
What would it be like
if it were not?
What's not the case? Plenty! Case Closed!
When nothing the case?
Seems a mistake.
Like a reductio ad absurdam clam bake,
When nobody came,
early or late.
Or, it's not the case that the world
is everything that is the case.
What? Strange? A fly buzzing in a bottle.
That "Fish fly to Seattle" is not the case
still tells us something about the world we make.
Or, is it that not everything
in the world is the case.
That suggestion
that's learning towards truth
in some comforting familiar manner
Appeals to my communal action words, and
My idiosyncratic individual voice in time.
Was it:
Was it the case once in the past or not?
Is it now the case or not?
Will it ever be the case or not?
Was everything ever the case? Ever?
We enjoyed those playful games:
wrestling with hypothetical cases,
find the imaginary treasure chest,
watching the film detective solve the case,
Until they broke the lock on her case.
a case
the case
one case
many cases
close case
Thou Are Not That
"You are That."
i am not That,
but part of That am i
and i a bit of That,
for the time-being
for awhile, for a lifetime,
while That changes.
"That Thou Art."
Thou are not That,
except "That" as understood
as idea, as assumed, as imagined;
as i
think i am, believe i am, wish i was;
while That changes what i am,
or will be
"That" is elusive, expanding to
the edge of the Big Everything,
at either end of the inside of infinity...
that is the way that That is.
Not like this piece of popcorn on the tip of my tongue.
Become a Stronger Swimmer
If one sees me in forms,
If one seeks me in sounds,
He practices a misleading way.
He cannot see the essence of creeds:
All conditioned creeds
are like dreams, illusions, bubbles, shadows,
like dew drops and a lightning flash:
contemplate them thus.
Creeds and doctrines are like a raft
to carry one to the other shore,
and then to relinquish.
Neither cling to the raft forever,
or reject it when drowning.
Even better,
become a stronger swimmer.
The Fireplace Records Case #55
https://mpgtaijiquan.blogspot.com/2026/02/wittgenstein-supposedly-said.html
Wittgenstein Supposedly Said
suppose somebody says
suppose one wanted to ask
people will say
you may answer
someone says to me
you may say
suppose it were asked
one might ask
it will be said
suppose he might say
subjuctive mood swings
no one would say
there is a tendency
when do we say
we are inclined to say
Look at it this way
Compare it to this and not to that
More pictures, fewer muddles
Contrast with something similiar
Change your point of view
The Fireplace Records Case #56
https://mpgtaijiquan.blogspot.com/2026/02/cutting-through-wind.html
Cutting Through the Wind
Mayoku walked around his old Daoist friend,
Shifu Miao Zhang, three times and then thumped
his staff on the ground. Miao Zhang stood up,
walked around Mayoku once, tapped his cane three
times on the wall, and said "The power of the wind
can topple trees and is gone by morning.
My cane
can cut through the wind."
The Fireplace Records Case #57
https://mpgtaijiquan.blogspot.com/2026/02/shifu-miao-zhang-takes-walk.html
Shifu Miao Zhang Takes a Walk
Toju Zenchu brandished his staff before Daoist
Shifu Miao Zhang and challenged him "Miao
Zhang, speak and you get whacked with Nanten's
staff. Do not speak and you still get whacked with
Nanten's staff." Shifu Zhang stood up quickly,
lifted his cane strongly in defense, and quietly
said, "Yunmen's shit stick stinks and Nanten's
staff is cracked! I am leaving now to take my
evening walk. Goodbye."
The Fireplace Records Case #58
https://mpgtaijiquan.blogspot.com/2026/02/mt-adams-emerges-in-west.html
Mt. Adams Emerges in the West
"Master Yellow-Bitterroot Mountain asked me,
'What is the meaning of Old Pahto emerging in the West?'
I lifted my cane and placed it in my mouth, saying nothing.
Later, zany Zen liar that I am, I wrote:
"No minds, no dharmas. No-mind, much Dharma."
Meetings with Master Chang San-Feng
The Firplace Records Case #59
The Firplace Records Case #60
The Firplace Records Case #61
25 Steps and Beyond: Collected Works
At the Edges of the West, Volume 1
Highway 101 and Hwy 1: Pacific Coast
At the Edges of the West, Volume 2
Highway 99 and Interstate 5
Poetry Research by Mike Garofalo
Mike Garofalo lives in Vancouver, Washington.
He worked for 50 years in city and county
public
libraries, and in elementary
schools.
He graduated with
degrees in
philosophy,
library science, and education. He has been
a web publisher since 1998.
25 Steps and Beyond: Collected Works
This document was last edited, revised,
reformatted, added to, relinked,
changed, improved, or modified
by Mike Garofalo
on February 25, 2026.