In December 2025 Tricycle Magazine published a haiku Stephen wrote as an Honorable Mention in their Haiku Challenge. Bela and Stephen wrote a blog about it. Later that month Discovery Publisher accepted the novel The Zen Time Traveler for publication this June. The publisher surprised Stephen by including eleven sumi-e (Japanese brush and ink) illustrations as part of the book. The editor had read the Tricycle haiku and decided that a gourd would make a nice closing image. Here’s the original illustration:
When Stephen saw the image, he had the idea of translating the haiku into Japanese kanji. One often sees Japanese and Chinese paintings with a combination of image and text. Stephen asked Master Instructor of Shintaido Masashi Minagawa, who is also a renowned calligrapher, if he would be willing to do a translation and the kanji for it. He agreed, and produced this stunning poetry as an image:
Minagawa-sensei’s identifying red chop is in the lower left. But Minagawa-sensei had gone beyond, as Shintaido practitioners and especially teachers are wont to do. On the right side of the image he also wrote a title in Chinese characters saying because The haiku and sumi-e reminded him of the ninth of the Ten Oxherding story in Zen Buddhism…”returning to the beginning and going back to the source.”
The Ten Oxherding pictures are well-known (to many Buddhists); a set of images, with accompanying poems depicting the progression of a person through the stages of enlightenment, with the Ox as a metaphor. The design team at Discovery Publisher loved this addition, found the poem that accompanies the ninth Oxherding picture, “Return to the Origin,” and added it on the facing page making it the final image in the book:
What a wonderful collaboration between Minagawa-sensei, the design team at Discovery Publisher, and Stephen!
Stephen and Bela are excited about the coming publication of The Zen Time Traveler, and hope you will enjoy it as much as Stephen has reveled in the writing and production of the book.
We’ll be hosting a book launch party for the publication of The Zen Time Traveler on Sunday, July 12th, from 2:00-4:00 p.m. at the Engaged Mindfulness Institute (formerly the Shintaido Farm), 595B River Road in Deerfield, Massachusetts. Please mark your calendars. More information to follow.
Thanks!