Because the Arts District is our new neighborhood, I strolled on over to the Crow Collection of Asian Art to take in a little lunchtime culture. The museum has a group of Tibetan Buddhist monks from the Drepung Loseling Monastery constructing a mandala throughout this week. Those are millions of grains of sand that the monks are using to construct “the green Tara,” which, one of the monks explained to the 40 or so people gathered for a free noontime talk, is a “deity for accomplishment.”
Through meditation the monks cultivate an energy that they manifest into physical form through the sand, and “that energy has the potential to uproot all sufferings.” He left us with the impression that just viewing the mandala can make a person feel better.
They kicked off the talk with five of the monks chanting a prayer. That was glorious, like five harmonizing didgeridoos. They look to be about only half way finished with the mandala. They’ll be working on it the rest of the week — you can see more events coming up on the Crow Collection website.
On Sunday, they’ll dismantle the mandala to represent “the impermanence of all that exists.” (As someone who works in print journalism, I’m all too aware of impermanence.) They’ll then take the sand and dump it into Turtle Creek. But why Turtle Creek? Seems like the Trinity might be in greater need of a blessing.
