in the next line to the poem, the way we have it is when you assert that things are real, you miss their true reality. But to assert that things are void also misses reality. And Sheng yen brings up a story. He says, In the Song Dynasty, there was a famous Prime Minister by the name of Chang yen who was opposed to Buddhism. He wrote many essays purporting to refute Buddhism, and he would spend every evening pondering over how he could improve the essay he was then working on his wife, observing his obsessive involvement and struggle with his writing. Asked him, What are you doing? He said, Buddhism is really hateful, trying to prove there is no Buddha. His wife remarked, how strange, if you say there is no Buddha, why bother to refute the Buddha? It is as if you are throwing punches into empty space. This comment turned his mind around. He reflected, there may be something to Buddhism, after all, so he started studying Buddhism and became a well known, accomplished lay practitioner of chan. In fact, he had the same master as chan master da Wei, and that, of course, is Yuanwu, two of the great Tang Dynasty masters. And Sheng yen says, Thus, if you try to destroy something, you are still bound up by it. For instance, suppose you try to clear a blocked pipe by pushing another object into it. Whatever was originally in the pipe is pushed out, but the new object is now blocking the pipe. When you try to use existence to get rid of existence, you will always end up with existence. It's the problem with fighting negative thoughts, because we're fighting them with negative thoughts. We don't like them, they're causing damage. Have to find a different way, don't we? Sheng yen says, when you throw something away, it's gone. But does it cease to exist in local terms, yes. In the broader picture, however, that's not the case on this earth. No matter how hard you try to throw anything away, it will stay somewhere on this earth. There's a Chinese novel called Monkey. The hero is a super monkey who is so powerful that he can travel a distance of 180,000 miles in one summer. Salt. In the story, he was journey, journeying to the Western paradise of Amitabha. To on the way, he came to a tall to upon five tall mountain peaks. He figured it would take one leap to get to the other side. First he took a rest, urinating in that spot, then he somersaulted over the mountains. After he landed, he noticed a funny smell. He thought some shameless monkey must have taken a leak here. Actually, he had never gotten to the other side of the mountains. He had just somersaulted back to the original spot. The five mountains in the story symbolize the five skandhas with wind within which sentient beings are trapped. Many people know about the five skandhas, but not everyone. This is part of the Buddha's original teaching that existence is composed of five heaps, or five composites, five bundles, and they are roughly form, feeling, perception, Mental Formations and Consciousness.