Category Archives: Spirituality

January 13, 2021 · 1:23 pm

And I Float – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

VJs Weekly Challenge – What pulls on your soul?

Photo: pixabay.com

“You are an aperture through which the universe is looking at and exploring itself.” Alan Watts

And I Float

Where the wild iris blooms by itself,
in the deep forest of my unmask,
where my heart runs white water,
my mind surrenders to gladsome song.

In the deep forest of my unmask
all attachment falls to the ground,
my mind surrenders to gladsome song,
and I float as a peace dove sails.

All attachment falls to the ground,
its redemption uncertain in this humous,
and I float as a peace dove sails,
a feathered turtle in the sands of time.

Its redemption uncertain in this humous
where my heart runs white water,
a feathered turtle in the sands of time
where the wild iris blooms by itself.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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January 3, 2021 · 2:47 pm

Those Who Are Awake -a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: soulvibe.com

“You were born with wings, why prefer to crawl through life?” Rumi

Those Who Are Awake

Awareness comes to those who are awake,
to those who refuse to be imprisoned to
beliefs and the rightness of certain actions,
and to those who have befriended death.

To those who refuse to be imprisoned to,
by the expectations of popular diatribes,
to those who have befriended death
and who stare down life's insoluble foibles.

By the expectations of popular diatribes
one could live one's inner darkness,
and who stare down life's insoluble foibles,
are those who are uncertain winners.

One could live one's inner darkness,
beliefs and the rightness of certain actions
are those who are uncertain winners,
awareness comes to those who are awake.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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December 29, 2020 · 6:53 am

Rituals – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: shutterstock.com

“…. by participating in a ritual, participating in the myth, you are being, as it were, put in accord with that wisdom, which is the wisdom inherent within you anyhow. Your consciousness is being re-minded of the wisdom of your own life. I think ritual is terribly important.” Joseph Campbell 

Rituals

The sacred rituals of my day
arise with some herbal tea and 
a greeting of some feathered friends
while garden wandering to rejoice in
yesterdays hard, loving work,
a meal to prepare with tender
zen-like intention with each move,
then stilling down at days end,
ancient viviers, wine in hand,
recounting the day's treasures,
storing them in each other to
savour and sift at leisure, these 
are the sacred rituals of my day.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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October 27, 2020 · 2:31 am

The Keening – Haibun by Paul Vincent Cannon

Frank at dVerse is hosting Haibun Monday and the theme is Happy Halloween. dVerse Poets – Haibun – Happy Halloween

Photo: favim.com

“I can see lights in the distance trembling in the dark cloak of night. Candles and lanterns are dancing, dancing a waltz on All Souls Night.” Lorena Mckennitt

The Keening

Moving, yet completely still within herself as night pressed in gently around her, she stopped in a felt moment and stood in what seemed a right place of heart. Her bare feet connecting the hallowed ground, she raised her arms to the stars and danced in saintly solace, this way and that. She keened for love departed, for all her loves departed. She keened for the unknown. As the stars passed her voice softened to a love song, for all the faces now present as she had re-membered them. Her eyes opened with morning warmth and a garland of dew.

Hidden beyond stars
love remembered in thinness
as lotus shines.


 ©Paul Vincent Cannon


Note: the ancient Celts always believed that the spirit world interacted in special moments in "thin" places, the place between the secular and the spirit world was thin, touchable, knowable. Most often these thin places were in groves. Celtic Christians carried this into their own theological world view.

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October 15, 2020 · 3:44 pm

Darkness – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: pixabay.com

“You can’t study the darkness by flooding it with light.” Edward Abbey

Darkness

Have you known those deep ecstasies having
ventured into that impenetrable darkness
which shines its light for a path beyond
the stolid middle towards the wild, beckoning, 
fringes of everything where the rays of darkness
illumine mystery's sweet reversal,
vesting you in raiment of understanding
that has no possible words only sighs?

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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October 5, 2020 · 2:28 pm

Alleluias Of Love – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: earthsky.org

“Follow your inner moonlight; don’t hide the madness.” Allen Ginsberg

Alleluias Of Love

Moon dreamed in my moments
the essence of my being,
nurturing the opening of a generous
fissure where the well-spring of life
overflowed and soul words erupted
like a river of ecstasy rising up from
my centre to greet the world with 
alleluias of love.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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October 4, 2020 · 4:36 pm

Present – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: Ormiston Gorge, NT

“From out of all the many particulars comes oneness, and out of oneness comes all the many particulars.” Heraclitus

Present

I sat in paradox and
watched my consolations
wash through me as water
runs through fingers in a 
nothingness of interiority,
a mystical, infused experience
that left me lighter and present
to myself in the lee of my desire
that once dark cloud now
dispersed.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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September 21, 2020 · 4:06 pm

Waiting – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: Hardy Inlet looking up to the mouth of the Blackwood River, Augusta.

“Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart. Who looks outside dreams. Who looks inside, awakens.” Carl Jung

Waiting

I no longer seek myself as I did
in those familiar places of
tired satisfaction and now
wholly abandoned to an
indifference to the 
paths and patterns that 
brought me to this once
hallowed mask of imagined
meaning made in endless
passionate clinging to the 
squawking of gulls,
until I floated off into a 
spaciousness that knows no
bounds, an inner sanctum
of patient waiting.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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September 17, 2020 · 2:30 pm

Of Threads – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Image: tomorrowstarted.com

“Breathe and let be.” Jon Cabat-Zinn

Of Threads

The point at which the
moment disappeared
is lost to me,
all that lingers is the feeling
of threads slipping, loosing, 
releasing me into a floating
drift in a space between
where I stretched out across
the sky so lightly that the stars
passed through me as
intangible procession,
and as the last thread unwound
I found myself beyond myself, 
I found myself true.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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September 1, 2020 · 3:48 pm

Alive – a poem by Paul Vincent Cannon

Photo: pixabay.com.

“We must let go of the life we have planned, so as to accept the one that is waiting for us.” Joseph Campbell

Alive

Words fall like cold rain
from darkened opinions and the 
closed minds of guessing crowds
of discontent, who all along
skated the surface of books
hidden from the zest of life,
unable to recieve what is happening,
but for those who have shed their skin
and opened the eyes and ears of their heart,
everything is alive with the 
fire of doves and angels.

©Paul Vincent Cannon

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