Category Archives: bush walking

February 16, 2021 · 4:30 pm

Which Way? – prose by Paul Vincent Cannon

At dVerse Kim is hosting Prosery with an invitation to use a line from the poem ‘The Song of Wandering Aengus’ by William Butler Yeats. The line is: “I went out to the hazel wood, because a fire was in my head.”

dVerse Poets – Prosery

Photo: found at juggernautmc.com

“We have to get used to the idea that at the most important crossroads in our life there are no signs.” Ernest Hemingway.

Which Way?

I wanted to take time with my old friends who were welling up in my chest. Where to in my life now, seemed to be the most pressing question stirring my emotions. I sought the pilgrims trail, so I went out to the hazel wood, because a fire was in my head and heart. Eventually the walk began to clear my head, and then I came to a crossroad, which I received as a question. What now, do I turn at either side or go on, or even stay where I am? What does this mean for me? The Irish gave a word for this, trasna or crossing place, to cross over. It means choosing a move. This fire in me has brought me to a turning point, and I mean to go on. So, which way will I choose, which path will I take?

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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January 14, 2021 · 3:12 pm

Below The Culture Line – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: Black Cockatoo Reserve, Mundaring

“Without stories, the land turns to real estate.” Mark Abley 

Below The Culture Line

When time was local the land had a story
rich in the beautiful greys of paradox,
carefully nurtured in mutual surrender,
we touched under the pulsing canopy.

Rich in the beautiful greys of paradox
we slipped below the culture line,
we touched under the pulsing canopy,
a language unspoken so openly felt.

We slipped below the culture line,
searching ourselves for beginnings,
a language unspoken so openly felt
as to be present in each other.

Searching ourselves for beginnings,
carefully nurtured in mutual surrender
as to be present in each other,
when time was local the land had a story.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Note: The concept of time shifted in the mid 1800s to a broader sense of time as universal, prior to that time was local.

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January 1, 2021 · 1:40 pm

Need Never Be Answered – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: Taken at Tnorala Nature Reserve near Gosses Bluff, Namatjira Drive, NT.

“Only from the heart can you touch the sky.” Rumi

Need Never Be Answered 

Did you nourish the moment in you,
have you understood the stir of the
east wind and caress of the indifferent 
ocean or touched the inestimable sky,
even when it darkens and the secret 
ceremonies draw us to sacred 
connection, keeping alive the questions
that live under our skin and need never
be answered, or we would silence our
deep quest and miss all that is present,
all that is wise, in the whispers of trees.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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December 31, 2020 · 2:30 pm

Unquenchable – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: vividlife.me

“There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind.” C.S. Lewis

Unquenchable

Unquenchable
this song on my lips,
the jive in my hips,
a line of thought,
an idea, at once authentic,
the very vision of reality,
a fork in the trail,
opening a way through the
deliberate hiddenness of
our deepest self, who waits
for this moment to sing
and dance the life trail
from the voice of my heart.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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December 14, 2020 · 3:08 pm

Fragments Of Delight – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: taken on the Jarrah Loop walk near Marranup Ford.

“It brought me to a new understanding of how, unless you’re connected with the land, you’re not really connected with yourself or the nation.” Joan Kirner

Fragments Of Delight

Aleatory fragments floating, spiralling,
dancing downwards as dry rain falling
softly, tenderly touching encounters
until resting, finally, alongs earth's way,
nature's carpet strewn together as
perfectly formed tapestries are, and
crackling underfoot as a gentle sonata,
releasing such a euphoria of eucalyptus 
to fill the senses as to be overcome,
and as I sat beneath it all marvelling,
my breath slowed, speeding my delight
in resting in this place, in this moment.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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December 9, 2020 · 3:57 pm

An Adventus – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

At dVerse Laura has invited us to choose from eight lines taken from mystic poets and use the line in a poem, perhaps even a form of octave. dVerse Poets – Poetics – Stepping off the Sidewalk

I have chosen the line: “Coming, going, the waterbirds don’t leave a trace.” Dogen who lived in Kyoto in 13th century Japan, and who became a Buddhist monk who was also a writer, poet, philosopher and the founder of Soto Zen.

Photo: Bunbury wetlands, two black swans passing by.

“The lack of mystery in our modern life is our downfall and our poverty.” Dietrich Bonhoeffer

An Adventus

Dappled ripples processed the roughed vestibule of my heart,
an adventitious solace arising in its perpetuated simplicity,
I traced a map in the parchment of my mind of 
all the comings and goings of sentient beings,
an adventus, unsurprisingly surprising, my breath was
captured by the wind of time and carried along for a span and,
knowing that, coming, going, the waterbirds don't leave a trace,
these quiet feathered gods, ever mercurial, are messengers of hope.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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December 7, 2020 · 1:57 pm

Even In This Fierce Place – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: Old Southbourne Farm, Bakers Hill

“When the wind blows the grass bends.” Confucius

Even In this Fierce Place 

I love the way the wind brushes the dry grass,
and when I tread its tired winter youth
it crackles like a fire, sending shards into the air,
and not to wanting to be forgotten, it gifts me
with burs and seeds to adorn my socks at once
firmly attached for immortality, that cycle of
life where it dies, yet it lives again, even in 
this fierce place of parched soil, and I take
heart that shall rise again like a phoenix
from the ash of this desiccated season.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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December 2, 2020 · 3:57 pm

Travelling In The Wilderness – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

At dVerse, Sarah is hosting Poetics and has asked us to choose one of her selected titles for a poem.

dVerse Poets – Poetics – Travels in the Wild

Photo: Eyre Highway, a side trail.

“The wilderness holds answers to more questions than we have yet learned to ask.” Nancy Newhall

Travelling In The Wilderness 

I transcended my compass,
feeling my way through the travail
of twixt and twain, learning not to 
hold my breath as the trail became
uncertain of itself as it meandered 
through the scenes and acts of my
stage as a collect of vagaries, testimony
to an amorphous life melded with 
lace wings and stringy-bark, and all
manner of slivery, silent coves as
irruption of mind in a mindless world
of discontinued annals, such is the way
of this wilderness road of discovery.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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November 24, 2020 · 4:06 pm

To Feel Again – a Haibun by Paul Vincent Cannon

At dVerse Kim is hosting Haibun Monday, inviting us to to write about our sense of wonder. dVerse Poets – Haibun Monday

Photo: Grass Tree (Xanthorrhoea), State forest, Mundaring.

“I go to nature to be soothed and healed, and to have my senses put in order.” John Burroughs

To Feel Again

Here in this place there is a sense of hope. To feel nature making her own way with a lush offering is a sensual privilege, to see to touch, to feel, to taste. The divinest of lovers. She is there, waiting, unmarried, mistress to no one. Waiting for all to come and sit alongside her charming soothe.

There is life in this place like no other. Even in that rotting humous, especially there, there is an abundance of life bursting before my eyes. Even in the dry rustling carpet, tenants and squatters alike come to feast, to produce life and to surrender it.

This is a place to be, just that, to be, to feel again, to be me, to be one of, one with, this crowd. Here I can connect, be grounded once more.

Where the grass tree grows
comes spring looking at me
I fly like feathers

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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November 23, 2020 · 3:24 pm

Beyond – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: State Forest, Mundaring.

“If you go into a far, far forest and get very quiet, you’ll come to understand that you’re connected with everything.” Alan Watts

Beyond

The forest edges to newness and I want to 
run into it, roll, sit, walk stand in it,
embody the quiet growth as the dry 
relinquishes to life renewed, breathing
after breath too long held, to fill my 
senses to an ecstasy beyond the big O
as every sound, smell and sensation
rushes through my desiccated soul,
till finally, overcome, I want to sleep
with her silence.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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