Category Archives: politics

Love Wins Out – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

“World belongs to humanity, not this leader, that leader or that king or prince or religious leader.” Dalai Lama

Love Wins Out

The separation of peoples,
the division of colours,
the disappearance of culture,
the incarceration of peoples,
the eruption of concrete walls,
the ranking of right religious views,
the diminishing of political views,
the eradication of human rights,
the ending of the individual,
the destruction of community,
all have been tried,
all have,
in the long term,
ultimately failed
the power of love and connection.


Copyright 2023 ©️Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®️

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Filed under Free Verse, injustice, life, love, mindfulness, poem, politics, protest, quote

On Loop – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

“Today a story is not told it’s sold.” Amit Abraham

On Loop

We saddled,
mounted the lie,
stall eight,
all others were empty,
starter's gun sounds,
and we're off;
round and round we went,
round and round we went,
on loop,
repeat,
same on every channel,
precision flogging,
framing,
hypnosis,
until we believe
that all is well,
if we believe.


Copyright 2023 ©️Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®️ 

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It Wasn’t Me (Even When It Was) – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Image: theguardian.com

And so this horrible and grizzly affair continues to be exposed. The behaviour of politicians and public servants appearing before the commission has been to deny and claim no knowledge of events, meetings, people, decisions etc. Galling, but expected given the enormity of the legal implications. Not bad for a degree and upwards to $325,000.00 AUS per annum

“The easiest way to solve a problem is to deny it exists.” Isaac Asimov

It Wasn't Me (Even When It Was)

Sorry
what was the question?
Could you repeat the question?
I don't understand,
say it again please;
cough,
blink,
fidget,
silence,
Drinking all the water,
looking down.
I can't answer that,
I don't know,
I can't recall,
I don't remember.
Yes, it says that, but I don't know what it means.
I was there (but clearly I wasn't there),
I wrote it, yes, but I can't tell you about that,
someone else sent it,
I'm not sure,
but my recollection is ....
I can tell you
it wasn't me.


Copyright 2023 ©️Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®️ 

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Bastardry – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Image: robodebt.royalcommission.gov.au

Note: this poem is a result of my blood boiling over from years of federal govt inaction (Until the recent change of govt and the implementation of the Royal commission) over unjust and unfair treatment of welfare recipients. Robo debt is an online process of debt recovery by a govt dept from welfare recipients deemed to be overpaid or who are not entitled to payments. The process used an averaging system. It might seem to be a storm in a tea cup until you realise that this process was prosecuted fully against the most vulnerable people in Australia and that the averaging was a false process, it took one off payments or fluctuations in income as regular and averaged that as annual income and calculated a debt on that basis. So that a welfare recipient who might have claimed unemployment or part time employment under the threshold and welfare to top up, who declared a cash job of $80.00 was deemed as earning $2, 000.00 and should repay that amount against their welfare received. This meant that the Dept. viewed this as either infringing reporting, falsely declaring, or at the very least owing the govt. The debt didn’t exist but no one in the previous government was bothered. The Commission is in full flow and a picture is emerging of error and misdirection, which has deeply affected people’s lives. The findings will evolve to recommendations for govt to take action, and the way will become clear for those affected to take legal action. Little joy for those whose family members took their lives in response to overwhelming pressure and loss of hope, and those whose mental health was wrecked.

Govt and debt is a slippery slope – the full federal court ruled in 1984 that the dept – Centrelink, bore the onus to prove debt and not the recipient.

“The reason that robo-debt is an issue for law and lawyers is a simple one. It is because the debts do not exist in law.” Professor of Law Terry Carney AO in the Legal Studies Journal 1.8.19

Bastardry 

How does $80.00 become $2, 000?
That's really good interest, 
magic you might say,
where can I get that?
But no, this is not your bank or 
your retirement fund director calling
with this fantastic news.

The question revolves around that
iniquitous and devious method called
income averaging for welfare recipients,
a smoothing (sic) in some parlance,
an online compliance process,
targets must be met, 
the budget must swell.

As a result,
if you did earn $80.00 once off
it was imagined by
the government no less
in a sweet Uriah Heep glaze,
that you were in fact earning weekly,
at least fortnightly, over a year of
your pain encrusted desperate life.

It didn't matter that you weren't in fact earning,
this nightmare held you in its drenched talons
as guilty until proven guilty,
the travesty,
priest as judge and executioner,
no redemption,
no voice,
no hope,
just an endless suicide.



Copyright 2023 ©Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®️ 

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Now To Sing A New Song – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: Maruf_Rahman at pixabay.com Flood in Bangladesh

“With considerable justice, Bangladesh’s leading climate scientist says that ‘These migrants should have the right to move to the countries from which all these greenhouses are coming.'” Noam Chomsky

Now To Sing A New Song

Walking ever so softly across life
listening to the voices of trees
asking us to live for all things,
these are important questions
interwoven,
predicate, 
subject,
object,
action,
follows a pattern,
ends with dilated hesitations,
why should I inhabit more than necessary,
consuming my neighbours?
I weep for the anthropic scene,
time to change our view of 
recalcitrant history,
never to repeat,
now to sing a new song.


Copyright 2023 ©Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®️ 

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The Myth Of The Good Politician – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

#2022 November PAD Chapbook Challenge

Day 19 19.11.22

Prompt: Write a poem about The Myth of [blank]

The Myth Of The Good Politician 

My vote, my vote
for a good politician,
morally outraged,
definitely sincere,
a revolutionary,
maverick,
savvy intellectual,
underdog,
survivor,
empathic leader,
caring (of course),
historic voice,
visionary,
collaborative player,
inclusive,
a legend,
there's bound to be one out there
I just haven't found them yet,
but if you know where they are,
please let me know so that 
I can pinch their face and
make sure they're real.


Copyright 2022 ©Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®️ 

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Hey You – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

At dVerse Sanaa is hosting Poetics with an invitation to write a poem in the style of the Beat Generation.

dVerse Poets – Poetics – Allen Ginsberg and the Beat Generation

Photo: found at climatesavior.com

“Once constituted, capital reproduces itself faster than output increases. The past devours the future.” Thomas Piketty

Hey You

Were you a true believer, ever,
selling your sanity to the screeches of
those unhinged saxophone doors,
trusting those hollow voices to 
pledge your vote for the repeat robbery
every four years of soulless lies,
buried in factory drudge and mortgage blues,
ammunition pin-cushions for those cowards
of mealy morals for the circuit generation,
held as forever infants in the corral of
dumbliness in a pinata world awaiting,
unconsciously of course, the beating stick
to spew those candy brains
on stained streets of harrow,
bleeding with anguish at the revelations
in newsprint voices alight across a
million regretful ears now strained,
holding virginal shock, asking
who knew, not wanting to know,
not ever, who destroyed  the dream of
landfill and plastic obsolescence that
sparkled like summer with cheap hopes
we could sweat for in eulogies of
ill-health for codependents whose
bass line was dirged with fear,
that all would be lost,
and it was all completely lost,
in that cul-de-sac of avarice that
drove the freight train that ran over us,
spilling our philosophies of doggerel dollars
for homeless rainbows where I still see you,
sitting, waiting for the tooth fairy to turn 
that crank once more for old time's sake
with the same excitement as finding a 
toy in the cereal packet.


Copyright 2022 ©Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®️ 

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How Can It Be – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange leaves Westminster Magistrates Court in London, Britain January 13, 2020. REUTERS/Henry Nicholls

“Once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizens and creates a country where everyone lives in fear.” Harry S. Truman

How Can It Be?

How can it be that the one who dared to tell 
what needed to be told, should always be told,
is the one who must be sacrificed for breaking
the rules of the most splendid game,
the game where we pretend that we don't 
know that we know?

Why must one person be vilified that others
may be dignified in their ethical lying and 
strategic misinformation that protects their
power and presumed authority that looks
very much like corporate narcissism on the
rampage, creating and consuming their 
victims with impunity and disdain?

How can it be that we let them?


Copyright 2022 ©Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®️ 

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The Moment -a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: plasticsoupfoundation.org

“A very faustian choice is upon us: whether to accept our corrosive and risky behaviour as the unavoidable price of population and economic growth, or to take stock of ourselves and search for a new environmental ethic.” E.O. Wilson

The Moment

The moment between asking and answering a question
is the moment of significant weight waiting to shift,
one way or another to fall or to rise, to the left or the right,
and in the moment identifying our own game of denial.

Is the moment of significant weight waiting to shift 
merely a trope of the human imaginative longing,
one way or another to fall or to rise, to the left or the right,
or is it perhaps a significant axial irruption in our midst?

Merely a trope of the human imaginative longing,
suggesting that there is no salvific moment beyond dreams,
or is it perhaps a significant axial irruption in our midst,
at best our childish myths deserted our desperate need.

Suggesting that there is no salvific moment beyond dreams,
one way or another to fall or to rise, to the left or the right,
at best our childish myths deserted our desperate need,
the moment between asking and answering a question.


Copyright 2022 ©Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®️ 

19 Comments

Filed under awareness, ecology, Economics, environment, life, nature, Pantoum, poem, politics, quote

The Piggery – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Image: found on pinterest.com

“The “they all do it” excuse isn’t good enough any more.” Michael Pascoe

The Piggery

Trotters in the trough,
snort, snort, snort,
wallow in the scoff,
bought, bought, bought.

Snout in the truffles,
slurp, slurp, slurp,
ever blind snuffles,
burp, burp, burp.

Pigging on the treats,
rort, rort, rort,
sucking the public teat,
sought, sought, sought.

Oinkers in the mud,
squeak, squeak, squeak,
supping all your blood,
bleak, bleak, bleak. 


Copyright 2022 ©Paul Vincent Cannon
All Rights Reserved ®️

24 Comments

Filed under Economics, Free Verse, injustice, poem, politics, quote