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\begin{verse}
\emph{<NAME>}

You were a fountain of cool stream water\\
in the square of a dusty town,\\
and you were the source of that stream\\
on a high unseen peak.\\
You were, <NAME>, that mountain itself,\\
unmoved but variously seen.

<NAME>, you were never one person,\\
you were always the same.\\
You were the child laughing\\
at the Emperor's new clothes,\\
and ours.\\
You were a demand to be awake,\\
the mirror of our faults, ruthlessly kind.

<NAME>, you were the essence of our texts,\\
the leader of our practice,\\
the proof of its results.\\
You were a blazing bonfire\\
on a windy bone-chilled night,\\
how we miss you!

<NAME>, you were the sturdy stone bridge\\
we had dreamed of.\\
You were as at ease\\
in the present\\
as if it were your own ancestral land.

\end{verse}

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\begin{verse}

<NAME>, you were the bright full moon\\
that we sometimes obscured with clouds.\\
You were as kind as only you could be.\\
You were hard as granite,\\
as tough as nails,\\
as soft as butter\\
and as sharp as a razor.

<NAME>, you were a freshly dripping lotus\\
in a world of plastic flowers.\\
Not once did you lead us astray.\\
You were a lighthouse for our flimsy rafts\\
on the heaving sea.

<NAME>,\\
you are beyond my words of praise\\
and all description.\\
Humbly I place my head beneath your feet.

-- Buang
\end{verse}

