The verdant sea of lush green and pink, as everlastings burst forth in their annual declaration of spring. Datjoin reserve on the Burakin-Wialki Road today.
Ah, spring, such seduction, such beauty,
a carpet of vibrant surprise.
At your invitation
I traced your rain gouged furrows,
I fell in love with you and
caressed your beauty as I
lay in your lush and verdant places,
never once averting my eyes.
©Paul Vincent Cannon
Paul,
pvacann.com
On the road to Jindalee, one of many places where a breakaway occurs creating sharp contrasts in colour and texture.
To listen for the sound where there is none,
save for the elegance of birdsong,
nature’s grand opera.
Or a whistling breeze, when it can be bothered
to sigh along the gullies and through the trees.
The smell of eucalyptus, like laundry day,
nanna removing stains the old way.
Dust in my nostrils as my soles kiss the earth,
the crunch of grit,
and that dry feel of summer’s arrival.
The familiar buzz of flies,
a bead of sweat
released from winter’s cold cell.
And, overwhelmed by a sense of joy,
wanting to tell everyone,
I exclaim, again,
to no one in particular,
“I have no words!”
Just the silent liturgy of feeling,
An anamnesis of joy,
of a past now present once more.
©Paul Cannon
Paul,
pvcann.com
Filed under bush walking, Country, nature, poetry, seasons
Photo: https://c.pxhere.com
We started somewhere,
though we started everywhere.
No point can be pinned,
it was a conversation,
a look,
a smile,
words,
a place.
Seasons were our canvass,
and we painted ourselves slow.
Keeping every detail,
a record of our life
in love,
in trust,
in sickness
and in health.
Eros and Aphrodite sometimes came for tea.
And though we stumbled in their shadows,
our sighs smudged the heavens
with abstract utterance,
of caress,
of lips,
of eyes,
of that fleeting synthesis.
We’ve enjoyed so many, many things,
our needs were very few.
Time has gathered us more closely now,
our youth is more within.
Still we paint our canvass,
as life invites us through,
and my only expectation is
I’ll paint this road with you.
©Paul Cannon
Paul,
pvcann.com
Savoir Vivre
Arabica claims my soul,
and I fold into myself.
Nursing, caressing ceramic,
contours of the mind explored,
a joie de vivre.
Pleasure fills and shutters me,
with a kind disregard for all.
Shuffling The Daily, scraping chairs,
pling and clicking banished,
My visa is for mellow ground.
Grief, a presence felt, “How was that?”
But how could I explain?
Ambrosia? Words inadequate.
A meditation slowly unfolding.
“Perfect.” I said.
The spell now broken I come ashore,
leaving kairos, chronos pulling
its quotients ever draining.
But I,
I prefer seasons out of time.
©Paul Cannon
Paul,
pvcann.com
Filed under life, meditation, mindfulness, poetry, seasons, Spirituality
The Blackwood River, winter is here.
July,
you camped at my window.
The constant patter of your tears
blurring, intangible,
drawing me to uncertanity.
Yearning,
longing,
the ache of melancholy,
grey clouds,
heavy laden.
Tears born of sadness,
become streams of redemption.
Washed earth
melting,
becoming.
July,
I opened my window
and bathed in your wellspring.
You drank my darkness,
I swallowed your love.
©Paul Cannon
Paul,
pvcann.com
When the bush comes alive it is with fervour! The colour is rich and varied, the smell is glorious, the hum of insects and the sound of birds is divine. We are currently in winter here, this was taken a few years ago in spring in the eastern wheatbelt after the rains had been the best for a number of years. Hoping the rains are good this year so that we get a repeat of these wildflowers.
Seasons come and go, in order, and generally predictable. But our personal inner seasons are nothing like that. I’ve had long internal winters which have given rise to colourful, intense springs of growth. I’ve had long summers of basking in joy and contentment. I’ve had autumns where transition and change have prepared me body, mind and soul for new experiences. They never come in order, they are never fixed in duration, they are unpredictable. If they were, then life would be dull.
Our inner seasons are indicative of our lived reality, the stuff of relationships, love, joy, pain. It is the complexity of body, mind and soul as a receptor of a multiplicity of experiences. It is gift and loss. It is the giddyness of aspiration, and the sober nature of graft and heft. It is our senses open and engaged. None are negative. Winter is essential, a season of withdrawing, waiting, refreshing, washing, grieving gives way to spring. Winter waters spring. As we befriend our inner winters, we become wiser, integrated, stronger for the journey. Without rain there is no blossom, no juice. As we rejoice in our summers we store up memories that give back to us over a lifetime. Each season is lived and embodied, a respository of awareness. Nothing is lost. Each one gives me fervour, fervour for life, love and purpose.
Currently I’m in an autumnal time of reflection and revision and I’m seeking that next step into spring. I wonder where you are at?
dark clouds surround the rain falls inside of me cherry blossom glows ©Paul Cannon
Paul,
pvcann.com
Filed under bush walking, Haiku, life, mindfulness, nature, seasons
Yet another winter storm was coming, hot on the heels of the first of the season, the waves were really pounding all along the shore. Thankfully the strong winds had pushed the first lot through to the wheat-belt. The dark, rain leaden clouds were a wonderfull counterpoint for the sunset, accentuating the colour.
Nature never ceases to amaze me, whether it be the thought of galaxies beyond, our own solar system, or that part of the earth where I live, there is always something to marvel at from the most simple to the really complex. Colour, texture, smell, sound, taste, it’s all there.
We are dependent on nature, we need food and water for starters, oxygen, resources.
But I think we can be interdependent. As we live into the environment, we can manage our carbon footprint, manage our extraction and usage of both finite resources and renewables. We can help to establish regrowth of vegetation, and help repair after disasters, we can return some land to native vegetation, and we can value add what we harvest or remove, there is no limit to what we can positively do in this relationship.
Nature heals, forest bathing, meditating in the open, natural medicines, audio and visual pleasure, olfactory stimulus like petrichor, touch, the sun on skin, the wind around me. My mind is stimulated too, so much to learn, so much adventure, so much to reflect on. Just to be in nature is a wonderful experience for me.
I feel an affinity, a closeness, with nature. I love the feel of sand and rock, and they tell their own story. The streams, rivers and ocean speak, sing, and invade the senses. Eucalyptus like a balm. Dolphins and birds communicating. Sunrise and sunset drawing awe and emotion. I feel whole in nature, I heal better in nature, body, mind and soul. I feel at peace, and am often content in nature. Nature is always conversing, always reaching out to me. And I get perspective, I am part of something bigger than myself, that in itself is medicine for the soul. It’s not about me, it’s not just about everyone, it’s about everything, every relationship of nature.
Paul,
pvcann.com
Filed under beach, environment, life, mindfulness, nature, seasons
The paperbarks (Melaleuca – one of the 300 Myrtaceae family) are shedding a little later this year. Another theme of winter is shedding. Some animals shed a summer coat in order to prepare for winter, many plants shed their blooms and slow down in some part, some of our birds fly elsewhere for the winter though we get visitors from other shores. We, perhaps, can live unaware of our own needs. What do we need to shed in order to prepare? Mind you, the converse is also something that we need to attend to, what do we need to gather in, soak up, put on in order to prepare? Self care and nurture are fundamental to well being, body mind and soul. For me the continuity of writing and meditation are part of that nurture. How about you?
“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.” Albert Camus
Paul,
pvcann.com
Filed under bush walking, environment, life, meditation, music, nature, quote, seasons
The last days of autumn, and the beauty of river and cloud along the Blackwood.
The days are shorter now as autumn gives way to winter. I am grateful for the change in season even though I don’t like the cold, somehow nature needs this, I tell my self, but I know deep down that I need it too. But there is an impact that the seasonal change makes known as SAD (an auspicious aconym) or Seasonal Affective Disorder.
As winter progresses it is quite normal to feel tired and unmotivated, it is a form of the ‘blues’ but it now has a name – SAD. I think it’s probably an ancient hibernation process we are fighting, but that’s just a witsful guess, perhaps a latent desire to sleep in and ignore the cold air. However, exercise, dietary changes, sleep, meditation and a change in habit can recharge and motivate us. To do something different rather than force a summer routine into a winter context might be truly barking up the wrong tree. I note that several local young men are still clinging to shorts, t-shirt and thongs, and even though this week it has dropped to 3 degrees overnight, they are hanging on to summer as if to say, nature won’t force me to change. Yeah, right! It will.
SAD is best embraced and refocussed, a reframing of inner thought and responding energy, and to make friends with the season, and to live into it mindfully.
Paul,
pvcann.com
Filed under beach, bush walking, life, mindfulness, nature, seasons
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