"Buddha Patriarch!"
"Your disciple pays his respects to the Buddha Patriarch..."
Elder Jinchi lay prostrate, his forehead pressed to the warm golden ground. For a long time, he did not raise his head.
He had lived for two hundred years.
From a young novice to the abbot of Guanyin Zen Temple, he had spent his life chanting sutras and worshipping Buddha.
Everyone who met him called him devout, and he believed he was devout too.
When the first light of dawn entered the hall each day, he was already kneeling on his cushion. When the last lamp went out each night, he was still reciting his final sutra.
He collected scriptures, Buddhist treasures, anything connected to Buddha. He thought they might bring him a little closer.
But he had never seen Buddha with his own eyes.
Now he had!!
He knelt at Buddha's feet, so close he could feel the warm, reassuring presence radiating from him.
He buried his face against the backs of his hands.
A little golden light seeped between his fingers. His breath warmed his hands, pulsing with his heartbeat as if to prove he was still alive.
And every moment now felt like the closest he had ever come to becoming a Buddha.
Buddha did not respond to him.
When he spoke, his voice trembled.
Once more, he said respectfully, "Your disciple Jinchi pays his respects to the Buddha Patriarch."
He bowed so low that his back was nearly parallel to the ground.
He did not dare look up. His eyes stayed on the small patch of ground before him, golden and smooth, with nothing on it. Still, he dared not look anywhere else.
He feared that raising his head would be an offense, that his gaze would defile this sacred place. He also feared he