I heard of Kobutsu Kevin Malone through an inmate at Woodburne
Correctional. He came up to me near the end of a workshop there, handed me Kobutsu's
card and told me he was someone I should talk to. He was gruff on the phone,
but I later found him to be surprisingly jovial and warm in person -- "a
two hundred and fifty pound Irishman with a shaved head" as he later described
himself to me. We met on a beautiful early spring day at the sparsely-furnished
townhome in suburban New Jersey that he shares with his wife and two children.
Kobutsu is a Rinzai Zen Buddhist priest. He teaches Zen in Sing Sing, a maximum
security prison in New York. He was also the spiritual advisor to Frankie Parker,
an inmate executed by the State of Arkansas on August 8, 1996. He told me that
he volunteers in prisons because, "I get something very special out
of it. I go on Monday evenings after work. I may have gotten up at 5 am and
been on the road by 6. It's often hard to drag myself to the prison but it may
be the only time I get to sit in a particular week. I find that I am appreciated
in there. Appreciated because I am not a guard, not a threat, and have no axe
to grind. You can feel their gratitude."
Then he thought for a moment and said, "I have always lived on
the borderline. I know a lot of criminals and have an affinity and understanding
of them." When I asked him if he had ever done time himself, he told
me that he had been incarcerated for two weeks in the D.C. jail when he was
18, and that he had been raped. "I know what goes along with prisons,"
he said.
Kevin's interest in Buddhism grew out of his involvement, in the sixties,
with psychedelics and consciousness expansion. Years later, after a divorce
and mid-life crisis, he took refuge in a Buddhist monastery where a good friend
was the head monk and vice-abbot. While there he reaffirmed his commitment to
Zen. "I came to the realization that in order to maintain my own sanity
and peace of mind, I had to be of assistance to somebody somewhere. It was a
life and death kind of thing."
I asked Kobutsu what his first prison sessions were like. "The
first time I was inside Sing Sing, some inmates asked me to set up an outside
corporation, get a post office box, and put an ad in the newspaper so that people
would send in money. You are in prison. What can you do? You occupy space. You
pass the time. You manipulate. You con. That is part of it. So I said to them
`I'm here to teach zazen meditation. The rest of this crap -- forget it. I'm
not interested.' The group immediately shrank from eight to one....Nevertheless,
I've had more trouble from guards than I've ever had from inmates. Do I want
negative things said about that? No. I'm not stupid. But the prison system is
ineffective. Eighty-five percent of inmates are there for drug-related offenses.
If the laws were changed so that the profit margin was taken out of the business,
we'd have a lot of empty prisons. The other 15%, who are in for violent offenses,
need to be educated. Show them how to read and write....
"In the beginning, I'd go in and sit quietly for two hours and then say
hello and leave. We'd sit on ratty old blankets swiped from the laundry. It
was pretty bad. The floor was filthy. The blankets got our butts off the floor
and our knees on the mat, but cushions are a lot better. Eventually I asked
the administration if I could bring some cushions in. I sent them pictures of
what we wanted. They refused saying that they were articles of worship and we
were not a religious group.' I told them, `We don't worship the things, we sit
on them.' `Well, you are not a religious group.' Next question, `How do we become
a religious group?' `You have to have a sufficient number of men.' `What is
a sufficient number?' `We'll let you know when you reach it.'
"The group grew to five inmates. For months, I tried to convince the administration
to let me bring in proper cushions. I started out as the quiet, unassuming Buddhist
practitioner. When that didn't work, we started preparing a lawsuit. Shortly
thereafter we were notified that we were now a recognized religious group, and
that yes we could have our cushions. With donated money we bought ten zafus
-- the round sitting cushions -- and ten zabutons, the padded floor mats that
go under the zafus. They allowed the black zafus, but they were concerned that
the inmates might use the black fabric from the zabutons to escape at night.
When I asked what colors were acceptable, they said there are none, but there
are a bunch of unacceptable colors. Black, blue, grey, anything resembling the
color of the guards clothes, anything orange resembling the SWAT team uniform
was prohibited. The only thing the inmates are allowed to wear are these green,
industrial-type clothes with elastic waste-bands. So now we have a very unique
Zen-do with green zabutons. Who cares? They are a nice green. Touch of the Irish.
And as time went on, we asked for other things and we eventually got what we
asked for. So it worked well."
When I asked Kobutsu how he defined Zen, and about the role
of sitting meditation in Zen practice, he gave me a suitably vague answer.
"I am still trying to figure Zen out. Above all else, Zen is about sitting
practice -- not talking about sitting practice....Our Buddhist studies class
in Sing Sing is a lot more popular than the sitting practice sessions. The practice
sessions are difficult to do. It hurts. It's painful. No one likes being uncomfortable."
I asked Kobutsu if discomfort adds value to practice. His response:
"Discomfort goes with the territory. From a Zen perspective being able
to withdraw and observe discomfort from a distance is empowering. No matter
how we approach the teachings, we think that we have the spiritual path all
figured out. We think that life should be about abundance and truth and beauty
and peace. We will live happily ever after. That preconceived idea is sooner
or later confronted when you do zazen....Spirituality has to be de-mystified.
Take out the magic. Take out the wishful thinking. Remove it. Get rid of it.
Concentrate on breath."
I asked Kobutsu what he says to inmates when they first walk into a practice
session. "`Sit down. Shut up. Keep still. Count your breath.' No matter
who they are, what they say, or what they've done. `Sit down. Shut up. Keep
still. Count your breath from one to ten. One...two...three...four...' At around
three or four a stray thought comes along. `What am I doing here? My left leg
is falling asleep. My butt hurts. My back hurts. How can these other people
sitting in the zen-do do this? Oh, oh. I am supposed to be counting my breath.'
A beginner may go through this ten thousand times. Those distractions help us
gain an understanding of the functioning of the mind, of the nature of the problem.
"Someone starting out does that for maybe a month. Maybe six months. Maybe
a year. At some point, I'll say `Follow your breathing. Do everything you do
when you count your breath but don't use numbers.' The process is difficult
to clearly identify, but breathing and counting ties up the intellectual working
of the brain. It's a method of moving through the Buddha mind. All these practices
are about waking up. Focusing. Creating openness. Spaciousness.
"Sooner or later we are able to stand back somewhat from our thoughts and
recognize thought forms as they arise in the mind. We start to see the spaciousness
between ourselves and our thoughts. We watch the thoughts rise and then leave
by themselves. Spontaneously. We don't necessarily have to do anything at all
except step back. Eventually we notice that our thought forms are like boxcars
in a train. There is a boxcar, space, a boxcar and a space. Over time, the mechanism
of spontaneous thought generation actually slows down and we see the space between
the thoughts. This is our initial perception of the Buddha mind. In fact, it
has been there all along."
When I asked Kobutsu if there is particular value to zazen in prison --
if stepping back and watching and waiting for the space between the thoughts
has significance for people who act impulsively and violently. His answer surprised
me a little.
"I don't know. I appreciate where your question is coming from, but any
value, from a Buddhist perspective, is a side-effect. It is probably not a good
idea to come into the practice thinking that you will reap some preconceived
benefit such as becoming less violent. You might get one individual who starts
doing zazen and confronts some serious psychological issues that have been buried
and suppressed. During the zazen practice, these could come up. It could even
produce a violent response. I don't know."
When I asked Kobutsu why inmates get interested in Zen, he answered:
"In the beginning, the motivations are not always noble. Many just want
to be different. To be a somebody. `I am going to do this because it's weird.'
or `I am going to do this because the administration probably doesn't like it.'
For others, Zen is monastic. They have time on their hands. Their food, shelter,
clothing and medical care are all provided. The dental work they get isn't great,
but it's better than I get. So prison can be a good opportunity for practice.
There are people in there seriously interested in change.
"As time goes on, Zen can be a factor in change. Practice has been described
by a Tibetan teacher as the wearing out of an old pair of shoes. Wearing the
soles thin. Wearing through ego and delusion. You may approach Zen thinking
that you are going to become enlightened, become a great teacher and have fantastic
powers that people will respect. Doing the practice, you come to realize that
you don't give a damn whether people respect you or not. You really don't want
to be a great teacher. What you want is to be helpful. To be of assistance.
You wear through your initial set of notions and come to understand that fundamentally
you are a benevolent entity -- a Boddhisattva -- one who has surrendered his
own enlightenment, postponed his own enlightenment, for the benefit of others.
It is sort of a second stage practice. The initial stage involving breathing,
concentration, the tethered mind ultimately results in the Boddhisattva path,
the path of being of assistance. And it is not a simple-minded compassion. It
is real compassion.
"What's the difference between real and simple-minded compassion?"
"Simple-minded compassion would be like saying: `From my high spiritual
plane I am going to look down and offer wisdom to all of these poor creatures
and bring them up to my level.' True compassion comes from recognizing that
we all have the same problems. It's not that I have overcome my problems and
now I am going to help you with yours. It's more like we both have a problem.
There is no division between your problems and my problems. It's all our problem."
Frankie Parker
In March 1996 Kobutsu received a letter from an inmate on death row in Arkansas.
The inmate, Frankie Parker, was awaiting his execution, then scheduled for May
29th, 1996. He had just received a copy of the Gateway Journal, a newsletter
published by Kobutsu. Parker's letter didn't ask for anything, which surprised
Kobutsu. In fact, the letter contained these lines, "My deluded ignorance
will cause my death....What I have coming in May is simply what I have due."
In November 1984, Frankie, an army veteran, shot and killed his in-laws
and wounded two others, including a police officer, during a drinking and cocaine
free-basing spree. He was later to describe himself, when he arrived on death
row, as "a mad and mean and very cruel inmate." He was put in "the
Hole" for abusive language. While there, a disgruntled guard threw him
a copy of the Dhammapada (a Buddhist holy book) when he asked for a Bible,
the only book officially allowed in "the Hole." Over the next two
years, Frankie read a number of books on Buddhism, became a practicing Buddhist
and finally, four days before he was executed, an ordained monk. He tried to
live a life that embodied compassion.
Kobutsu describes Parker as an excellent teacher in prison. "He had a major
calming influence on death row. Many people respected him highly. Even guards
would bow to him." So many inmates and guards wanted to testify at
his clemency hearing that prison officials are reported to have put a limit
on the number. The Dalai Lama, Mario Cuomo, and many others wrote the Governor
of Arkansas asking that Frankie's sentence be commuted to life imprisonment.
The execution was postponed by Governor Guy Tucker, but for reasons related
to his own trial and subsequent conviction for Whitewater-related crimes.
When the new governor, a Baptist minister, took office on July 15, 1996, almost
immediately he moved Frankie's execution up from September 17 to August 8. Executions,
especially of "Buddhist devil-worshipers," generate votes. Kobutsu
spent the week prior to the first scheduled date, May 29, and the four days
prior to August 8 with Frankie Parker as his spiritual advisor, and was present
at the execution.
In his publication, Gateway Journal, Kobutsu described Frankie's final
few minutes of life: "At 8:47 I was told to prepare for the arrival
of the `tie-down team....' The `team' arrived at 8:50. The men who poured into
the `quiet cell' area were big, dressed in black body armor, black helmets with
face shields and black boots. Two of them arrived brandishing large, full body
riot shields with the letters `POLICE' emblazoned across them. We continued
chanting together, `I take refuge in the Buddha. I take refuge in the Dharma,
I take refuge in the Sangha...' (Sangha is a Buddhist community). Jusan (Parker)
`assumed the position' at the back wall of his cell. They entered the cell,
men with shields covered him from each side, others chained his legs, wrapped
chain around his waist, cuffed his hands and locked the handcuffs in front to
the chain. `I take refuge in the Buddha, I take refuge in the Dharma, I take
refuge in the Sangha....'
"We were guided into the short hallway that comprised `the last mile.'
The hall was lined with men dressed in black wearing helmets and boots, the
hall itself was no more than 15 feet long. We approached our `shrine,' it was
a cardboard box, covered with a piece of felt on which rested a small brass
Buddha figure. Our chanting continued, we turned to face the Buddha and bowed
once. We bowed in reverence for the awakened state of mind that manifests in
all beings. We took four more steps and were halted by the men in command. We
had arranged to be able to bow to each other three times and to embrace before
he entered the `death chamber.' I turned around to face Jusan, we were still
chanting. We bowed three times, one for the Buddha, one for the Dharma and one
for the Sangha. We stopped chanting, the next few seconds was `our time.' I
looked directly into his face, I saw a single tear glisten as it rolled from
his right eye down his cheek. I could see every pore of his skin, each individual
hair in his goatee, the colors of those hairs in a salt and pepper mix. I saw
his wonderful smile, I could feel waves of tremendous gratitude pour from his
heart. Time stopped...There was only Jusan and Kobutsu, two old friends saying
good-by at the end of the road. No one else was present in all creation at that
moment, time dilated to an infinite degree...we are still there, saying good-by,
forever....
"We embraced, he whispered in my ear, `I love you my brother. Thank you
so much.' I took one step backward and we did an `unauthorized' bow to each
other, as we bowed our foreheads touched. The impact of forehead on forehead
was the last contact we made. It was shocking to me...yet incredibly apropos.
It was 8:51 pm, real-time, our chanting resumed, `I take refuge in the Buddha,
I take refuge in the Dharma, I take refuge in the Sangha...' The men at my sides
quickly ushered me out a side door, as Jusan was propelled into the `death chamber'.
When I stepped outside, I saw the waiting hearse, I felt totally empty. I was
brought around the small `death house' building to the entrance of the viewing
room' at the top of a short flight of steps. After a brief delay, I was allowed
in....
"At 9:01 the curtains abruptly opened and there was an intense visual shock
as the bright light of the `death chamber,' with its clinically white walls
and furnishings flooded into the `viewing room.' To my left in the `death chamber,'
Jusan was restrained to a gurney, both arms tied to supports extending diagonally
from the gurney. His head was held in place and prevented from moving by two
vertical planes and a forehead strap. He remained perfectly still, he kept his
eyes closed. According to Warden Reed, the last thing that Jusan saw was a picture
of the Buddha held by his executioner, the Director of the Department of Correctional
Services, Mr. Larry Norris. Warden Reed said that before the curtains opened
Mr. Norris showed Jusan the picture, he closed his eyes and nodded to indicate
that he had seen the picture.
"At the rear of the `death gurney' there were two intravenous solution
stands each with a plastic IV bag containing liquids, it was not clear that
these bags contained the poison or were physiological saline to maintain the
IV line entering Jusan's right arm....Mr. Larry Norris stood behind Jusan, dressed
in a dark business suit, and wearing a headset equipped with a microphone. On
the wall was a large digital clock that displayed the time in bright red numerals.
To his right was the `one-way' mirror, behind which sat the two anonymous executioners,
isolated from each other. These people actually push the buttons to start the
flow of poison into the veins of the helpless human being strapped to the table....the
coroner has pronounced Sifu William Parker dead at 9:04 pm...." The
death certificate, issued by the State of Arkansas Department of Health indicated
that the cause of death was "Homicide."
After the execution, the warden said to Kobutsu: "I think you helped
us immensely in keeping him so calm." Kobutsu responded, "Let's
get this straight. My being there was not for your benefit. It was for his benefit.
I did not assist in calming him down for you. That was for him. From my perspective
this is murder. This is wrong." The warden then said, "Well,
it's the law." This is an excerpt from Frankie's final statement:
"I pray that others who have committed heinous crimes may find the small
light that I have kindled an inspiration, and spread the flame of compassion
to illuminate the entire universe, so that all beings may realize the fundamental
compassionate nature that resides in all of us."
The next morning Kobutsu went over to the crematorium and conducted the
death rites -- the blessing and incensing of the body. He opened the box and
removed Jusan's Rakusu and his beads, and lifted Jusan's head. "I
saw all the purple contusions produced by the drugs in the death process. His
body was so cold. Then he was put in the oven and we chanted and bowed and burned
incense as the body was cremated. From there we went to a radio station and
did an hour on the air. People calling in were so abusive that the lady answering
the phone quit for the day. People showed up at the radio station and pounded
on the door trying to get at me. Liz (Kobutsu's wife) and I got out
of there as quickly as we could. After that, I went alone down to Tucker, the
death row facility, to meet with three other inmates. I was allowed by the warden
to walk the entire row. I walked from cell to cell and met and shook hands with
each inmate."
I asked Kobutsu what he says to others who are performing the role of spiritual
advisor when they seek advice. "Be there one hundred percent for the
inmate. Be prepared to be run over by a freight train. Part of you will die
with him. If you are a prison chaplain, find another pastor, minister, a priest,
a nun, a rabbi, a monk because you are working for the people doing the killing.
Find someone else....Part of your duty after witnessing something like this
is to carry the memory of the executed inmate with you, and to speak out. You
can't do that if you are an employee."
After the execution, I asked Kobutsu how the experience affected his life.
"I watched Frankie Parker die and I watched America die in my heart. I
watched my country commit murder. Whether he was a good or bad human being or
whatever, they strapped a helpless human being to a table and killed him. Every
single death row inmate is a human being. We can't lose sight of that. No matter
what they've done. Killing is the problem, not the solution."
Would you be the spiritual advisor to another inmate, I asked, "I
don't know. The execution still impacts me in many different ways, and on many
different levels: psychologically, emotionally. It has also been difficult financially.
We ran up huge phone bills calling people all over the world asking for support
for Jusan. We flew down there twice and stayed in a hotel. We sent out mailings.
My assets are basically an old beat up car and a couple boxes of tools. Some
junky furniture. The toll of this work was considerable, not only financially
but also psychologically. But if another inmate asked, I would do it. I don't
think I could refuse. "
I then asked Kobutsu about the Buddhist position on killing people. His
answer: "We take precepts, the first of which is that all life is
sacred. So this Zen Buddhist does not kill. I am quite capable of being violent
and killing but I consciously choose not to. I had a choice to stand next to
my friend during his execution, and I made that choice. The last few minutes
of his life were carried on in an extremely graceful and serene manner. We did
the best we could with what we had to work with, which is all any of us can
do at any time. The death part, well, you know, worrying about that isn't going
to help anything here and now. Am I worried about going to heaven or hell? No.
I've been enough heaven and enough hell here on earth to know that I have to
deal with the present."
On January 8, 1997 the State of Arkansas executed three men in the same
night. An aide to the Governor said "as long as we had two, you might as
well put three in there." Another said three executions were "cheaper
and more beneficial." A spokeswoman for the Department of Corrections said:
"The money isn't a significant factor. It is the emotional toll on everyone
involved. Better one night of tension in the prison than three."
When I asked Kobutsu if we could learn anything from his experience, he
said: "Turn off the television. Get off your butt and out of your
rut. Do something to help people. Everybody. It doesn't have to be prison work.
It can be any one of a million things. Go work in a shelter, go work in a food
bank. For a couple of hours a week volunteer as a literacy tutor. Volunteer
in a nursing home. Do it because it is good. That's enough."
