Category Archives: Farm

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

18 Comments

Filed under bush walking, Country, Farm, Free Verse, grief, life, nature, poem, quote

Tagged as , ,

November 4, 2020 · 3:08 pm

Emerging – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

At dVerse Sanaa is hosting Poetics with an invitation to write about November, which in the north is Autumn while in the south is Spring.

dVerse Poets – Poetics

Photo: ‘Southbourne’ farm, Bakers Hill, the drive to the shearing shed.

“Can words describe the fragrance of the very breath of spring?” Neltje Blanchan

Emerging

Velvet cinnamon nights,
swirl-tongued around feelings
twined with gilt laden stubble
in halo vested fields where
warmth seeps into my bones,
restoring the ravages of winter's
scars once again, nested with 
feathered joy and such vaulted
awakening as if chrysalis like,
taking first breaths in a new
scape novembered almost, 
but not quite as before,
emerging adventitiously 
as no other.


©Paul Vincent Cannon

45 Comments

Filed under awareness, bush walking, Country, Farm, Free Verse, life, nature, poem, quote

Tagged as , , , , ,

August 26, 2020 · 3:18 pm

The Very Fruit – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Rosemarie at dVerse has invited us to write a poem using the word wheat, or any of its derivatives. dVerse Poets – Poetics – Wheat

Photo: wa.gov.au Combine harvester working a wheat paddock in Western Australia.

“In the very end of harvest, scarcity and want shall shun you; Cere’s blessing so is on you.” Ceres – ‘The Tempest’ Act 1V Scene 1 – William Shakespeare

The Very Fruit

Mungo hummed a tune as he circled
the paddock in steely revolutions,
a sacrifice to the gods as the
whirling blades cut swathe after
swathe of golden denison, 
the very fruit of Ceres hips,
sown broad in ripe April's arms
detined to crust his lips
with loaf and brew along
that old Friday fertility rite,
and Mungo hummed a tune.

©Paul Vincent Cannon


Notes: 
Denison is a wheat strain used in parts of W.A.
Ceres is the Roman goddess of the growth of food plants.

58 Comments

Filed under Farm, farming, Free Verse, life, Mythology, nature, poem, quote

Tagged as , , , ,

May 23, 2020 · 3:31 pm

All In A Moment – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

r0_306_3264_2142_w1200_h678_fmax

Photo: northerndailyreader.com.au

 

“The wind whispered secrets in its own incomprehensible way.”  Tracy Rees

All In A Moment

I noticed the way
the wind whipped across the paddock,
barley dancing playfully,
swaying this way and that,
at once catching the light,
now becoming shadows,
swirling, bowing, rising
to the applause of the stringybark
and squeaked approval of mudlarks,
all in a moment,
as if just for me.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul, pvcann.com

30 Comments

Filed under bush walking, Country, Farm, Free Verse, nature, poem, quote

Tagged as , ,

May 14, 2020 · 1:28 pm

Never Forgotten – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

VJs Weekly Challenge – Bits And Pieces

5880823acb9212de7d4c7f8194ebb859

Photo: found on pinterest.com

“Leftovers in their less visible form are called memories stored in the refrigerator of the mind and the cupboard of the heart.”  Thomas Fuller

Never Forgotten

That one moment where you create time
when there isn’t time and you dare to
venture to the cupboard,
to the draw full of
silvered memories,
the symbols of a life in a
house of histories,
restored to mind and yet,
never forgotten,
rubber seals and old matches,
that old separator spanner,
a marble, a pen, a tack,
candles for birthdays,
the rest are nameless now,
these bits and pieces of a
resurrection.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul, pvcann.com

31 Comments

Filed under Farm, Free Verse, history, life, poem, quote

Tagged as , , , ,

February 2, 2020 · 2:53 pm

Every Time – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

RDP Sunday – Masterpiece

Tree13.jpg

Photo: from hyperactivz.com and the story “Forty Years Ago This Man Planted A
Tree That Created Amazing Opportunities For His Island” by Lauren Fazackarly –  The Story of Jadav Payeng who began planting trees at sixteen and is still going.

Please note: this is only one story, there are several stories from all over the world of people doing similar feats to greater or lesser extent.

 

“Society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they will never sit in.”  Greek Proverb

Every Time

He settled in the dust of his soul,
the sun beating down and
mocking his every effort
drawing his moisture to his brow,
and yet every day he rose and
without fail, made his way
to his field of dreams
that barren canvas of life’s struggles,
of course, without knowing,
passers-by smiled their condescension,
to them he was an eccentric farmer,
while in his own mind he was an
investment banker, and adventurer, a rebel,
and every time he planted a tree he knew
he was painting a masterpiece
whose abstract nature only he could explain.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul, pvcann.com

33 Comments

Filed under Country, environment, Farm, farming, Forest, life, love, mindfulness, nature, poem, quote

Tagged as , , , ,

October 27, 2019 · 2:52 pm

The Old Farm Gate – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

b1b9d0ee6d4003c9f371e4d70bac1405.jpg

Photo: Farm gate – found on Pinterest

“Men are not so much the keepers of herds as herds are the keepers of men.”  Henry David Thoreau

The old Farm Gate

I leaned on the old gate as I was wont to do,
and it seemed a good thing,
the gate offered no objection
rather, a welcome to reflect as I
leaned and looked out at all that was before me,
in the dry of the day the rust
like barnacles clung to the wizened steel,
but some flaked and powdered
and I felt its roughness
a reminder of the many winters it has endured
since it was hung in less complicated times
when boundaries were respected and a
gate was merely a choice of
coming or going, to be in or out,
this gate might not make another hundred
but for now it has more stories to tell.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul, pvcann.com

32 Comments

Filed under Country, Farm, farming, Free Verse, life, poem, quote

Tagged as , ,

September 19, 2019 · 3:02 pm

Helpless – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

 

th.jpeg

Photo: mattheyeslaw.com

 

“stab the body and it heals, but injure the heart and the wound lasts for  ever.”  Mineko Iwasaki

 

Helpless

And you,
will you too take what is not yours
and steal away that which was mine,
and only mine to give,
rendering my giving impotent
and my rights void,
to assume my place
and take my breath as yours
the very pulse of my life
taken for granted,
your laughter echoing in
the chill of my mind,
and the applause of onlookers
so satisfied as
I lay helpless to prevent you.

 

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul, pvcann.com

39 Comments

Filed under environment, Farm, Uncategorized

Tagged as , , ,

August 17, 2019 · 3:06 pm

Sooner -a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

 

couple-937771_1280.jpg

Photo: pixabay.com

 

“Dancing is a perpendicular expression of a horizontal desire.”  George Bernard Shaw

Sooner

Perhaps it was the wine
or the small of your back
we left the terrace behind,
your eyes drank my soul
while we waltzed in the shed
our laughter turning to sigh
and sooner, not later,
the long summer grass
caressed our shuddering whole.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul, pvcann.com

15 Comments

Filed under Country, dance, Farm, Free Verse, love, poem, Quadrille, quote, romance

Tagged as , , ,

August 7, 2019 · 1:53 pm

Good Friends – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

dVerse Poets – Poetics – Purifying The Mind

IMG_0885.jpeg

Photo: The breakaway at Jindalee, so still and quiet.

 

“Since all is empty, all is possible.”  Nāgārjuna

Good Friends

I was a younger man then
when I wrestled the kraken of nemesism
and made friends with silence and stillness,
almost by accident it seemed
leaning on the strainer post
looking out across the paddock
at the sunset painting itself,
and everything melted
just fell away,
leaving me light of heart,
ever since
my friends have stayed the course
in various guises,
and wherever I am they are there
a welcome balm
for my cosmogyral mind.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

 

Paul, pvcann.com

28 Comments

Filed under bush walking, Country, Farm, Free Verse, life, meditation, mindfulness, poem, quote, Uncategorized