Zhaozhou's Why Don't You Finish It? (BCR 59)

KOAN:

A student asks Zhaozhou, “You’ve said that the Great Way is not difficult if you don’t pick and choose. As soon as someone thinks or speaks, we think that’s picking and choosing. So how can you help people?”
And Zhaozhou says, “Why don’t you finish the quotation?”
And the student says, “I only remember the poem up to here.”
Zhaozhou says “It’s only this: The Great Way is not difficult, if you just avoid picking and choosing.”

Xuedou’s Verse:

If you pour water into water,
it doesn’t get wetter;
wind blowing cannot enter.
The tiger prowls, the dragon walks,
ghosts howl, the spirits wail.

—Blue Cliff Record Case 59 (transl. John Tarrant & Joan Sutherland)