In recent years, Joseph Goldstein has made poetry a part of his practice. In this, he joins many other Buddhist teachers and practitioners who turned to the language of poetry to express their experience and wisdom and to help others along the path.
In this conversation, Joseph Goldstein and William Edelglass, BCBS Director of Studies, explored the practice of poetry by inquiring into poetry as a practice of attention, of giving voice to our own experience and insights, of resting in what Joseph, in one of his poems, calls the “love of my lonely hours.”
To complement this conversation, we invite you to read this interview with Joseph on how poetry has become an element of his practice. The interview, originally published in the fall 2023 issue of Tricycle and republished by permission in the BCBS Insight Journal, includes a selection of his poems. We also invite you to read William’s Insight Journal Spring 2020 article, “When I Could Do Nothing’: Buddhism and the Practice of Poetry in a Time of Pandemic.”
