Cyclone Nargis

Let the grace of our humanity behold the cyclone devastation in Burma. I recall hearing of 351 deaths reported on the day Nargis hit the coastal low lands eight days ago. Today they are estimating 60,000 dead and another million in danger. Who can fathom what poison exists in such murky waters after so many days have passed in this tropical clime? A military junta bent on isolating their travesties from the civilized world. Such unwarranted conduct can only manifest itself as an antipathy of all that is within us. ‘Tis so sad so many lives are in the control of a small group of potbellied creeps in uniform with contrived glitter on their hats.
I have a small point of reference in this area of the world with my volunteer work in Vietnam, business in Thailand, and recently a brief stay in Cambodia. Yet I have a stronger engagement with my witness of Buddhism throughout Asia and Indonesia. From touching the hand of Buddha at Borobudor in Java to my blessed bell in Guangzhou, I have given them my reverence but humility has damned these hallowed beings.
Three weeks ago His Holiness the Dalai Lama came to our area. My daughter and I witness his readings and the magnificence of his presence. For me it may have been being a part of today in the midst of the Tibetan protest over the China occupation as well as the then Rangoon political dissidence from Buddhist monks.
I can fumble through any of the one hundred odd prophesies recited that day by His Holiness.
Either within or likewise without,
Or somewhere in between the two,
The conquerors have never found the mind:
So the mind has the nature of an illusion.
Given such a precipice we in the West can only look on in angst over what they perceive as an illusion.