Throughout the summer of 1981, one year before his death, Zen Master Taisen Deshimaru, the modern-day Bodhidharma, translated and commented on forty-seven Eiheikoroku poems by Master Dogen. These Chinese-inspired poems mark the brilliant birth of classic Japanese poetry and are just as much messages of awakening. Like a good-bye gift, the legacy of Deshimaru turned out to be these poems of initiation, which for a long time remained secret in Japan, reserved for shiho students.
