Does the bell come to you or you to the bell?

From the shore
the sound of the bell
approaches like the wake
of a big boat.

It envelops, it washes -
wet and smiling - dive right in!
When the sound stops,
ask where did it go?
Is the sound gone or the listener?

The sound of the bell
arose from the silence
and then it disappeared,
absorbed back into the silence.

When the monk asks “What is that sound?”
The second monk replies “The sound of a snake eating a frog.”

With no beginning and no end,
vast and wonderful,
the silence contains
the snake, the frog,
the two monks,
the sound of the bell,
you and me.