Category Archives: quote

October 5, 2018 · 1:59 am

Living The Questions

Vacillate – word of the Day

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Straight ahead or turn left? (Frost’s poem comes to mind again Robert Frost – The Road Not Taken ). In the end it may not, but then again it might be a good choice! If only I could decide. One of the many tracks to walk or ride in Borannup Forest.

“Love says ‘I am everything.’ Wisdom says ‘I am nothing.’ Between the two, my life flows.”    Nisargadatta Maharaj.

Living The Questions

As I sat and inhaled the morning’s brew,
I mused that not all was slings and arrows,
nor was there a troubled sea to ponder,
just a vague sense that the horizon was unclear
and that life really is a series of questions
rather than a series of decisions,
for decisions only lead to more questions,
and the cycle endlessly repeats.
I am more resolved to this now
than my younger self,
to sit with the tension between two points,
to savour, to weigh, to wait, to play.
The joy is in the anticipation,
s lovers would agree,
not always in the resolution.
As I sit sipping my morning brew
I recognise I’ve come to enjoy the pleasures
of perhaps, of maybe, or let’s wait and see,
to see all sides,
and to play all characters,
till my circle has enlarged,
and there is no singularity,
no monochrome,
in fact, no circle at all,
simply the experience of
the beauty and the vagaries of life,
and to live the questions.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul,

pvcann.com

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September 19, 2018 · 2:47 pm

The Clock Has Tocked

Exemplary – Word of the Day

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Rachel Carson (1907 – 64) (Photo: post-gazette.com) Carson was a marine scientist whose most known public work was “Silent Spring” (1962), a clarion call for humanity to address their impact on nature. In particular, Silent Spring is an investigation into pesticides. Carson wrote: “They should not be called “insecticides” but “biocides.” Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, p. 189.

“We stand now where two roads diverge. But unlike the roads in Robert Frost’s familiar poem , they are not equally fair. The road we have long been travelling is deceptively easy, a smooth superhighway on which we progress with great speed, but at its end lies disaster. The other fork of the road – the one less travelled by – offers our last, our only chance to reach a destination that assures the preservation of the earth.” Rachel Carson, Silent Spring p. 277.

Carson was an exemplar of both environmental awareness and activism as a scientist and writer.

 

The Clock Has Tocked

The old grandfather clock in the hallway is ticking,
but there’s no one to note the passing of the hour,
they’re everywhere else in this big old house,
in rooms of self,
halls of bustle,
where the carpets are dusty and threadbare,
the varnish no longer present to the wood,
and the paint so sallow.
Things should have been fixed long ago,
but our will wasn’t urgent to the task.
Grandad’s monocle popped when the quotes came in,
and we gave up,
preferring the pleasured, anaesthetised life.
Had we ventured to the hallway,
and listened closely,
we’d have known that the clock had tocked its last.
The eleventh hour cried to us,
but we mocked its melodrama,
and bargained that Chronos would let us slide,
and all the while our house is falling,
falling down upon us.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

Paul,

pvcann.com

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July 27, 2018 · 3:06 pm

The Beginning’s Never As Important

Placate – Word of the Day

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Photo: histclo.com

Neville Chamberlain (1869 – 1940) British Prime Minister 1937 – 1940, whose name is synonymous with appeasement. His first attempt was to keep Britain out of the Spanish Civil War in the hope of winning favour with Italy. His second was an attempt to buy favour with Italy in order to sway them from German influence, by recognising Italian sovereignty over Ethiopa. His third attempt was over three trips to Germany in an attempt to stop Hitler invading the rest of Czechoslovakia, caving in to most of Hitler’s demands. However, at the same time he escalated British military spending, production, and training, while forming alliances and pacts, notably with Poland, so, he wasn’t completely innactive in preparation.

Chamberlain’s main modus operandi was in trying to placate Hitler and Mussolini in order to prevent a major war in Europe. The famous moment was when he gave a speech, while waving the agreement with Hitler to honour the sovereignty of Czechoslovakia, speaking of “Peace with honour” a line he borrowed from Benjamin Disraeli, and “Peace for our time” (which is invariably misquoted as “Peace in our Time”). But history shows that Chamberlain’s policy of appeasement failed miserably, as Winston Churchill had predicted.

 

The Beginning’s Never As Important

I’m not sure where it began,
though you always say that doesn’t matter.
The beginning’s never as important as the end.

But my my mouth threw words like bullets on concrete,
hard, indiscriminate wounds
that imperilled our very being.

I tried to trace the history of the world,
and you retreated to foreign climes.
“I’m out of here if that’s how it is!”

I stared at the floor, my honour defended,
truth the ego’s demand.
While an ocean of tears formed a gulf between us.

The shadows grew long as the clock struck an hour.
Like metal on metal,
my nerves all jangled and churned.

In the embers of light I glimsed your face,
your cheekbones, your eyes, seemed soft.
I sank in your ocean and surrendered myself.

You welcomed me ashore,
embracing a long, lost friend.
And we dressed each other’s wounds.

“I feel so … when you … I do too, I’m sorry I …”
History resolved, the future imperative,
the beginning’s never as important as the end.

©Paul Cannon

 

Paul,

pvcann.com

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July 22, 2018 · 4:30 pm

Celebrating the Incomplete

Esthete -Word of the Day

Also spelt as Aesthete

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Image: thatcreativefeeling.com

Desiring to study the Way of Tea, Sen no Rikyu went to the tea-master Takeeno Joo who set Rikyu the task of tending the garden as a test. Rikyu cleaned to perfection, but before presenting his work to Joo, he shook a cherry tree, causing some blossom to fall to the ground. A little imperfection being the perfect ground. Thus began his journey into returning the tea ceremony and everything associated to its former simplicity.

It is said that the Japanese revere Rikyu as one who understood the aesthetic known as wabi-sabi. Wabi-sabi emerged in the 15th century as a reaction to the aesthetic of very formal and ornate and extravagant art and design of that time. Wabi-sabi is “focussed on the acceptance of impermanence or transcience.” It speaks of “a readiness to accept things as they are.” Or, finding the beauty within imperfections.

Wabi symbolises rustic beauty and quietness, simplicity and quietness. It can also refer to flaws, quirks and abnormalities that occur during production, e.g. pottery, or, as in the case of Rikyu, the blossom disrupting the otherwise perfect garden.

Sabi refers to things whose beauty can only come with age, like weathered timber, green copper, rusted tin. Sabi is said to evoke a sombre feeling very much like autumn.

Wabi-sabi is said to be honest, authentic, organic, modest, incomplete, and where nature, even nature’s corosive power, is celebrated.

Ref: britannica.com, dt.pepperdine.edu (Richard Martin).

How refreshing! I really warm to this aesthetic, and how much we need to embrace it today. Wabi-sabi simplicity could be the antidote to our materialistic, throw-away, plasticised way of living. An acceptance of life as it is. More than cloth bags and organic soap (important as these things are) we/all living things need a modern aesthetic equivalent to wabi-sabi. More imperfection and less sculptured fruit and veg. More authenticity and less keeping up with the Jones’. More incomplete, and evoking a sense of the real. Celebrating nature by engaging nature’s needs. Being organic in every way from relationships, to lifestyle, to purchasing. Accepting things as they are from people to the cosmos. Living with our flaws (shadow aware). How refreshing. I yearn for a bit of Rikyu in all of us.

 

I Love the Flaw in You

Dead center,
on the mantlepiece,
my truest work
as yet.

Soft clay now hard as nails,
its beauty is its cleft.
Its radiance not celadon,
a muddy glaze its skin.

She sits proudly among the celebrated,
offended by their pretence –
perfect, slick, and mass produced,
with images of empire now dead.

As I contemplate my minimum,
I know she goes with me.
The others to the Op-Shop,
or some other recycle path.

This ugly piece of earth,
this imperfect lustred pot,
speaks, shouts, to me of real life,
and how to cope with love.

©Paul Cannon

 

Paul,

pvcann.com

 

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July 8, 2018 · 3:10 pm

My Lissome Soul

Lissome – Word of the Day

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Dame Margot Fonteyn (1919 – 1991) a truly graceful ballerina. James Monahan (Fonteyn, A Study Of The Ballerina In Her Setting) referred to her as delicate and feline. She had an illustrious career dancing with the Royal Ballet. Sir Robert Helpman and Rudolf Nureyev were two of her outstanding dance partners, Nureyev became her sole (indeed, her soul) partner for most of her latter career, and they became very close friends. In a PBS documentary (1990) Nureyev commented that he and Fonteyn danced with “one body, one soul.”

I never saw Fonteyn live, that would have been amazing, but I was at least able to see her recorded performances. She moved with grace and soul and, at times (as in Swan Lake), her movement is itself a meditation, mesmerising.

O to move through life the same, that with the dance of life I might move mindfully and gracefully and with outstanding journey friends of one body, one soul. That my soul be lissome, albeit unburdened, unshackled and free, a meditation.

in my lissome soul
I danced life's curves
like floating blossom

©Paul Cannon

Paul,

pvcann.com

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July 7, 2018 · 2:50 pm

Gregarious – Word of the Day

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Corellas flock together, gregarious by nature, foraging, bathing, flying, playing, they love being together, even when roosting for the night. It is rare to see a lone one and there’s an apparent sadness when one dies. Many animals are gregarious by nature, humans especially, whether introverted or extroverted.

You can be introverted and gregarious too, just in smaller doses, as author Karen Armstrong puts it: “I like silence; I’m a gregarious loner and without the solitude, I lose my gregariousness.”  As author Susan Cain says: “To be introverted is to be concerned about how you respond to stimulation, especially social stimulation.”  Or as poet Norman MacCaig once said: “I’m very gregarious, but I love being in the hills on my own.”  As an extrovert I can still relate to that.

The cost is different. Introverts will feel drained after much social stimulus, whereas, while extroverts my feel tired, they will thrive on social stimulus. But both will become vulnerable because there is always a risk in social interaction to the self. We as a human community thrive better when we have social interaction, when we work together, when we can make friends, work in teams, and when we can walk alongside one another. We just need to appreciate each other’s needs more accutely in the area of personality. To be introverted is not a negative pathology, I should know I live with a household of introverts, and I get reminded. We’re all gregarious, just differently wired.

The video below of Susan Cain speaking from the perspective of an introvert may seem long at 19 minutes, but it is well worth a look.

 

We're in full swing
you withdraw, I re-engage
elementary

©Paul Cannon

Paul,

pvcann.com

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July 3, 2018 · 2:24 pm

Take Courage

Exposure – Word of the DayIMG_0134.jpg

Augusta, the town jetty, and Blackwood River rising.

Fortunately we had raincoats and we knew the rain was coming, but nonetheless, with the wind whipping the rain along, and the cold air pressing in, we felt more than a little exposed. But, because we were prepared we enjoyed the walk. The tide was very high as predicted by the Weather Bureau. There was also a lot of flow from up-river after three major rain bearing fronts have been through and local flooding was expected. You can’t tell from the photo but the timber decking of the jetty looked as if it was floating as the water was touching the underside. We haven’t seen it like that for a while.

Weather exposure can be very serious, hypothermia or sunstroke, the risks are great if you’re not prepared. Preparation means covering up, sunblock, hats, raincoats, warm clothes, appropriate footwear. So that whatever the weather we put on what is necessary to be comfortable and to protect ourselves. However, we know not to wear winter gear in summer and vice versa, and usually we’re good at that.

We’re not so good with emotional exposure. We’re trained, or we train ourselves, to overprotect, and sometimes we wear the wrong emotional gear, like using the mask of happiness to cover depression, or the mask of confidence to cover fear. Rarely do we let others in, we become invulnerable, strong, a veritable fortress. Yet the best possible way forward, the only true way to wholeness is to trust others with our inner world. Of course, it goes without saying, you don’t grab a megaphone and announce your life to the world, but there are people in our lives we can talk to, take off our masks, and be vulnerable with.

As Brene Brown has said many times, in our society vulnerablity, to be exposed, is to be seen as weak. Brown counters this with “vulnerability is our greatest measure of courage.” Brown defines vulnerability as “uncertainty, risk and emotional exposure.” It is an opening of the self to another, whereby empathy becomes the healing counterpoint or the supportive staging point, depending on what we are going through. Brown’s research is thorough, and in it she discovered that every courageous act was underpinned by vulnerability. That tells me that we can only really flourish when we are able to speak our truth and take off our masks and be real with others, then we are whole and not just pieces or segments. The fortress life may serve us well but to really floursih we need to let the drawbridge down from time to time, otherwise we not only defend ourselves against the outsider, we imprison ourselves from the world. I’d rather be open than be a captive! Take courage.

cherry tree winter bare
cold has stunted many new buds
the wild branch has fruit

©Paul Cannon

Paul,

pvcann.com

 

 

 

 

 

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July 1, 2018 · 1:53 pm

Unscheduled Schedule

Serendipity – Word of the Day

 

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Sarge Bay, Augusta, storm coming in.

Chaos Theory would say that for every apparent moment of chaos there’s an underlying pattern. Science would say that serendipity is logically explainable. Calvinists would err towards a predestination, others destiny and fate. Some confuse it with spontenaity, perhaps serendipity is spontenaity but I think it is something different, for me serendipity has no particular agency.

Storms come and go, they appear random, we know that for every element of nature there is an action, reaction process, there is an explanation. Storms appear because they are a reaction to pressure fronts meeting, here it is usually cold front meets warm front, winds and rains ensue. A reliable pattern attested to by the weather reports. But perhaps the timing, the position, the intensity are more random.

When we lived on the farm, we would often look out across the valley and watch a rainbearing front coming in from the west, it would drop maybe 1 – 2 inches on our place, yet a property down the road might be dry – nothing. The next time we might get nothing and the property down the road might get 1 – 2 inches. Rain is patchy at best, never consistent across a front. Rain may be patterned by the pressure system, but within that pattern there are random moments where rain doesn’t fall equally, where the wind squalls vary, where hail is inconsistent. A normal abnormality! Thunder and lightning would be another example.

Storms aside, love is perhaps the greatest example. Not withstanding hormones, the what, who and when of love are serendipitous. Love, true love, is interrupted planning, disrupted expectation, blindsided hope, deranged logic.

“When love becomes logical, it dies. When affection is timed, it no longer exists. When bliss is scheduled, no after-thought can bring it back. Now is the only time for serendipity, for synchronicity, for joy.” (Amy Larson/AmyJalepeno.com) All the romcoms, TV shows like Friends, are testimony to serendipity, that the best laid plans all come undone every time, and the unplanned becomes the real. Perhaps love itself is serendipity. I like to think so.

“She was forever unexpected and I was drunk on that about her.” Atticus Finch in ‘To Kill A Mocking Bird.’ (Harper Lee)

snow covers the ground
stark are the barren branches
one blossom smiling

©Paul Cannon

Paul,

pvcann.com

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June 30, 2018 · 3:54 pm

Half the Sky

Emphatically – Word of the Day

Cheryl Wudunn speaks at TED on Half the Sky. Wudunn is co-author with husband Nicholas Kristof of the book Half The Sky Turning Oppression Into Opportunity For Women Worldwide and they are founders of the Half The Sky Movement .

Wudunn, an experienced journalist and the first Asian-American reporter to win a Pulitzer-Prize, has written powerfully about the plight of women and girls in the world today as a result of modern slavery and sex trafficking. Sex trafficking is insidious, and other forms of slavery equally so. There are a number of harrowing documentaries and movies that deal with the subject, the testimony before the US Senate by Ashton Kutcher is brief, graphic and disturbing, as well as passionate. Often conservative groups point the finger at the porn industry, and while I have no doubt it goes on under cover, I beleive that the real culprits are organised crime, prostitution (especially where drugs are used to create an indebtedness), and predominantly – countries whose laws are lax or where such crime can be easily hidden, even encouraged.

Wudunn points out that though there may some closeness in the ideal of male/female being 50/50 in the world, it not true that power and security for women is equal. There are many fact books and expose docos available, but fewer resources on what can actually be done, Half the Sky is one such resource.

The other resource is men! If men don’t add their voice to this critical issue then we simply accede to the status quo, and we are not owning that there is a problem. What clothing labels do you buy, how do you behave at home, at work, how do you treat women? We cannot turn a blind eye to the fact that men are directly responsible for trafficking, the evidence is there, but those who stay quiet or turn away are also part of the problem.

Wudunn encourages everyone to do something about this issue, to firstly become aware, then to take action, even if that is only contributing to charitable work, lobbying, writing, whatever you can do – then do it. But do not do nothing! To quote Edmund Burke (or was it Charles Aked?) again: “The only thing necesary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” (I’m going to leave that gender specific). There’s always more we can do, must do!

sweet, sweet cherry
the bees will enable us
fruit for all the world

©Paul Cannon

Paul,

pvcann.com

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June 29, 2018 · 3:19 pm

I like Your Angle

Obtuse – Word of the Day

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Photo: decophobia.com/prodimg/marcelbreuer-knoll-bauhaus-chaise-lounge-chair(1).jpg an obtuse angle if ever I saw one, and indeed, geometry was critical to Bauhaus thinking.

 

In 2019 Germany will celebrate 100 years of the Bauhaus. The Bauhaus school of design, a modernist movement,  began in Weimar in 1919, so immediately post WWl. It moved to Dessau in 1925, and in 1933 the NAZI regime forced it to close, citing that it was an enclave of communism. It lasted fourteen years in Germany, then as the NAZIs forced it to close the leaders of the movement took their ideas to other countries. Its influence has continued to the very moment, finding expression in art, design and architecture all over the world.

Bauhaus translated means  house construction, so it was The House of Construction. As a movement it completely transformed art, design and architecture. It was an attempt to reunite art and manufacturing, to reintroduce in manufacturing and construction an aesthetic, a form married to art, and quality. It was an arts and craft approach. Their belief was “Less is more.” Those who joined were known as – Master of Form.

There are three identifiable principles in Bauhaus:

  1. As Ludwig Mies van der Rohe said “Honesty to construction, death to decoration.” Form follows function is rule one.
  2. Typography was important: Bauhaus was instrumental in changing typography thinking – they used simple clean and lean sans serif fonts, they began to use text wrapping around objects, using text vertically and diagonally as well as horizontally. Words simply and clearly put communicate meaning.
  3. Geometry is supreme: simple geometry was the order of Bauhaus achieving a minimalist style. Hence the chair in the photo above.

Bauhaus boasted a collective whose names are now famous: Paul Klee, Wassily Kandinsky, Joseph Albers, Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, Walter Gropius (the founder), Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Marcel Breuer (whose designed the chair as shown above), Carl Fieger, Anni Albers, Johannes Itten, and Herbert Bayer. Student Eliot Noyes went on to develop the corporate identity of IBM. Some 1,250 students went through the Bauhaus School and they took its principles across the world, no small feat.

What I love about Bauhaus is its freedom of thought, it wasn’t governed by executives or shareholders, it wasn’t sponsored by governments, it initially had no commercial traction (that came later), the movers and shakers of Bauhaus were simply committed to their craft and its form. I think that’s why it became popular later on, they had integrity and they stuck with what they believed even when they were all separated by the events in Germany. Even the National Socialists couldn’t stop them.

Life, I think, is about experiencing as much as we can in the time we have, and making our contribution too. But at our core I also think that one of the keys to success is staying true to self and staying the course on what is key for us, going the distance, that’s my angle, but its not obtuse! It can be powerful to live what you believe.

Paul Klee’s painting: “Castle and Sun”

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the tree is tangled
weed and vine overrun it
but the buds will bloom

©Paul Cannon

Paul,

pvcann.com

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