Yang-Yang-Rén-Yang
The yang breath feeds things from underneath.
All of them shoot through the earth and climb.
1
They send up an unmixed heart.
The chisel-edge is blunted off it.
What stops cutting can be kept close.
2
Rising with no root under it.
It means to climb as far as heaven.
The valley is still down in the gorge.
3
Out of the dark valley,
up into the crown of the tree.
It knows which way the good grain lies.
4
Climbing, and not upright.
Rootless, and flowering anyway.
The name is trusted and the name is empty.
5
The crane cries and lifts from the deep marsh.
It builds no staircase to heaven.
What raises it was already inside.
6
He comes up into the hall
with his coat on backwards and his skirt on top.
The court says nothing at all.
7
Up onto the tottering terrace,
and someone sets a beam beneath it.
The prop is as strong as the fall.
8
Up to the high dangerous place,
and someone takes an axe to the ladder.
The people below are already gone.
9
He roosts on the burnt-over field.
First nothing, and afterward a footing.
The ground was waiting to be found.
THE IMAGE
An elegant white crane soaring effortlessly upward from river marshlands toward the celestial clouds, supported by deep golden root veins in the earth and rising misty air currents.
THE COMMENTARY
Something wants to rise. Growth, advancement, recognition, mastery, or a new level of responsibility may be possible, but the oracle asks you to distinguish genuine ascent from mere elevation.
What rises well is supported from underneath. Roots, inner capacity, accumulated skill, and sound relationships matter more than appearances of height. A position gained without these may look impressive while remaining dangerously unstable.
Do not force the climb simply because a higher place is available. Some advancement happens naturally when what is inside has matured enough to lift itself. Other advancement depends on props, titles, or ladders that can disappear. Ascent therefore asks both whether you can rise and whether what rises with you is substantial enough to remain there.
This figure is one of 81 in Taixuanjing for Today, a book by Joe Perez that renders Yang Xiong’s Canon of Supreme Mystery in original verse, with expanded commentary, essays, and full instructions for casting the oracle yourself.