Category Archives: Philosophy/Theology

September 7, 2022 · 2:40 pm

Beyond This Moment – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

At dVerse Mish is hosting poetics with an invitation to write a poem using three words or more from a selection. My choices are: Orenda (mystical force), Querencia (place from where strength is drawn) and Isolophilia (preference fro solitude).

dVerse Poets - Poetics - There's a word for that

"They simply never understand, do they, that sometimes solitude is one of the most beautiful things on earth?" Charles Bukowski


Beyond This Moment

Orenda 
down the slopes of 
mountain minds and
valley redoubts of no intention, 
comes opportunity,
that moment of desire,
a la querencia, 
the turning of soul for home
in a quietude of frame,
longing in sighs for an end to
rivers of noise while
rejoicing in shivers of gaze,
a patient isolophilia that sits
so lightly it slips easily past
our defences and undoes 
the palisades of the heart,
inviting dreams and other worlds.


Copyright 2022 ©Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®️

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May 15, 2022 · 3:50 pm

I Have A Question – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: fsHH at pixabay.com

“People have always wanted answers to the big questions.” Stephen Hawking

I Have A Question

You lit the candle and said the words,
you turned six times and stirred the dust,
you drank the bitter herbs and danced,
calmness descended, peace emanated,
perhaps it is the repetition in dark times
that helps, but are these rituals marking 
time, a deja vu that holds a pattern, are 
they a tourniquet that restricts any forward
flow, or do they protect you from falling to
the past, or do they imprison you in 
disintegrated worlds?


Copyright 2022 ©Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®

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January 25, 2022 · 10:56 pm

To Live – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

At dVerse Linda is hosting Poetics with an invitation to use a line (choice of eight lines) from a James Harrison poem as an epigraph.

dVerse Poets – Poetics – Songs of Unreason

Image: Tumisu at pixabay.com

“I don’t know what happens after death but I’ll have to chance it.” from ‘Desert Snow” by Jim Harrison

To Live

So many the schemes of fall,
whose tentacles sliver and snare
the unwitting, hapless traveller 
looking for meaning, while 
insuring, forestalling, the one
dark door of mystery beyond 
all knowing, even of a simple 
kind, and whose edge dominates
even the philosopher's mind;
seeds fall and seasons process
down the hall of time, but I'll
not invest in any scheme,
the reveal can only be lived.


Copyright 2022 ©Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®

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August 4, 2020 · 12:51 pm

Dancing Days Will Come – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: Sunrise over the Blackwood, Augusta.

“We must always change, renew, rejuvenate ourselves; otherwise we harden.” Goethe

Dancing Days Will Come

Today I cannot
remain in the subtle mask
that has adopted an
acceptable contentment that
that covers a multitude of
juiceless moments,
an angst in a cloud of 
unknowing, but today I am
knowing the haze in which
I dwell is ever bound in
the imprint of every breath,
yet, like a moth to a flame,
I am drawn continually to
the inviting shimmer of light
on my horizon that is shouting
depression days are over,
dancing days will flourish
deep within the well of my soul.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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May 2, 2020 · 2:51 pm

Release From Prism – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

RDP Saturday – Identity

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Photo: pixabay.com

 

“I am aware that I am less than some people prefer me to be, but most people are unaware that I am so much more than what they see.”  Douglas Pagels

Release From Prism

By what prism am I,
that uneven self of self,
a composite of conventional norms,
or the spaces of my daily habits,
layers of false true selves
a rare glimpse of the who
I am and am not,
never really defined, though
partially admitted nine to five,
but ever incomplete,
arriving at myself time and again,
to change would be to risk the
imperfection of the who
I am becoming.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul, pvcann.com

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March 29, 2020 · 4:07 pm

This Sacred Ground – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

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Photo: Flat Rock, along the Blackwood River.

“Your sacred space is where you can find yourself over and over again.”   Joseph Campbell

 

This Sacred Ground

The fruit of adolescence recaptured
that old reckless abandon,
a fearless letting go returned
as I came across the first stone,
I was moved, overcome, and I cast
myself upon the sweet-smelling earth,
kicking off my shoes in a Moses moment,
daring to touch this sacred ground
the very core of me.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul, pvcann.com

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October 26, 2019 · 3:53 pm

How I React – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Word of the Day – Karma

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Photo: freepik.com

 

“This body, full of faults, has yet one great quality: Whatever it encounters in this temporal life depends upon one’s actions.”  Nargarjuna

How I React

You said words which cannot be undone
and in the simple math of cause and effect
how I reacted determined my pain and
gave grounds for yours
should you choose to nurture it so,
but in the end we chose to
hold that space and
find a balanced view,
sowing forgiveness and reaping love,
then suddenly finding that
the words had gone,
as if a thunderstorm had
watered the earth and passed over
without event.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul, pvcann.com

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August 6, 2019 · 4:41 pm

Belief – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Belief – VJs Weekly ChallengeIMG_1214.jpeg

Photo: Uluru at sunset, a calm and peaceful place, an ancient place, a deeply spiritual place.

“belief, like love, must be voluntary.”  John Updike

Belief

Of orthodoxy there is no real centre
except of ink on paper
where imagination dies
a thousand deaths
in a rut of doctrines and dogmas
that pierce the heart
and erase the future,
imprisoning vision,
punishing hope,
and yet we are all heterodox
bringing our creative spice
to the great universal stew,
an ever changing recipe.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul, pvcann.com

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March 6, 2019 · 1:45 pm

The Miscellany Of Seasons – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

dVerse Poets – Poets Pub

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Photo: Borannup Forest, an autumnal hue.

 

The Miscellany Of Seasons

I sat in the sun
as summer gave way to autumn while
I listened to the earth’s perambulation
as Solomon waxed lyrical
about all manner of things binary,
I drifted off at some point
becoming more aware of
how things blend and meld
how discontinuity and dissonance
are ever turning in my days
and how perennial experience can be
in the cycles of life,
most especially when we think we’re done
with all of that stuff,
I was struck by the miscellany of seasons
and how nature turns up
without Gregorian appointment
in a kairosian space
where all is awakening
and where peace with everything
is never too late.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

 

Note: Καιρος (Kairos) is a Greek word from ancient times that carries the meaning of opportune time, more specifically in Jewish and Christian thinking it carries the meaning of God’s timing. I have bent the word to make kairosian.

Paul, pvcan.com

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September 13, 2018 · 2:57 pm

Divine Humour

Peddler – Word of the Day

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Source: flickr.com  A street peddler in Istanbul.

 

Divine Humour

The smell of sulphur fills the air,
bell, book and candle won’t help you now,
the devil incarnate roams the streets,
seductively peddling false hope, old ways, more tax.
Been like that since the ancient of days laughed and said
“Let them try democracy.”

©Paul Vincent Cannon

 

Paul,

pvcann.com

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