February Koan and Step 2

It's February tomorrow, and with it comes sitting with Step 2 and the following koan. It may seem wordy to you but it isn't.  Whatever part(s) of this koan stick to you, it's the whole koan and all of Step 2.

Step 2:  Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

Koan: Lingyun was wandering in the mountains and became lost in his walking. He rounded a bend and saw peach blossoms on the other side of the valley. This sight awakened him and he wrote this poem:

For thirty years I searched for a master swordsman.
How many times did the leaves fall
and the branches break into bud?
But from the moment I saw the peach blossoms,
I’ve had no doubts.

Centuries later the Japanese teacher Keizan responded with his own poem:

The village peach blossoms didn’t know
their own crimson
but still they freed Lingyun
from all his doubts.

Bill K.