Perennial Intimacies
I touched the earth of your soul with gentleness,
as you touched mine
a bed of passion unfenced,
and together we sowed a myriad seeds
where bloom perennial intimacies of love.
©Paul Cannon
Paul,
pvcann.com
Tag Archives: soul
Perennial Intimacies
Filed under Five Lines, life, love, poetry, romance
Our Peregrinations
Amble On …
Deepdene, between Hamelin Bay and the Augusta lighthouse, the water worn rock is a fabulous site as you come around the bend on the Cape to Cape Track.
Our Peregrinations
Once you said we should go
out beyond the cliffs,
down to the beach
and restore our senses.
We strolled,
clambered,
seeking.
All the while rejoicing.
We dared to tread seaweed
al dente, or crisp.
Feasted on moist salt air,
and drank in the shimmer of the sea.
We skirted the edges of foamy wash,
then paddled,
immersing,
retreating once again.
We laughed,
we traded soul.
Invited to each other,
surrendered.
That afternoon along the shore
we navigated love,
immersing, never retreating,
washed, found, and whole.
©Paul Cannon
Paul,
pvcann.com
My Lissome Soul
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
Filed under creativity, dance, Haiku, quote
Elaborate Masks
An elaborate Renaissance Ball Mask. The masks were elaborate, but so was the ruse, an attempt to create mystery and tension, the possiblility of romance or illicit liasion. The masquerade was a feature of carnival season of 15th century Europe. In time masks became works of art. They were made of diferent materials, and bejeweled, like the one in the photo.
The masks we put on every day are not bejeweled, but they are clever, intricate, and very elaborate. If you want to read an early understanding the human mask, then Shakespeare is the one to read, and in particular, the ‘Taming of the Shrew.’ Psychologically, masks are a form of protection, we tend to mask anger, grief, anxiety, fear, a sense of failure, feeling like a fraud, needing to be the hero, the great intellect, and so on.
I have worked with people who use humour to mask what they perceive in themselves as a lack of sophistication. Others have thrown around biting sarcasm in order to keep others at bay. Some it is fear of success, so they play the incompetent. I have had the experience of never really knowing someone, at a funeral once I heard so much about someone I thought I knew, only to discover they had protected so much of their lives from public scrutiny, a compartmentalising. On another ocassion, when I was going through a difficult time, some said “I thought you had it all together” (like, really!!).
If we’re angry we may resort to condemnation, if we are grieving we might project happiness or amusement, anything but what we’re really feeling. That might be important at certain points in our lives, a boundary. But when it becomes avoidance, deception, fear, then we risk burying our true selves and others may never really know us. Even to the point that well entrenched masks become who we are. The question is, what are we trying to hide and why?
Jung developed the idea of the persona, the person we wanted others to know as ourselves, but not our true self.
I love this unattributed quote: “She threw away all of her masks, and put on her soul.”
That says it all. To dispense with the lie, the deception, which is really self-deception at best, the fear, and embrace our true selves, the raw self, the truly beautiful self. Created, bejeweled physical masks can be creations of great beauty. But the one who lives their true self, nothing could be more beautiful. We often use the phrase “warts and all”, meaning even our less good parts can be seen, our less succesful, less socially acceptable selves can be seen, yet this is healthy. The first step on the road of recovery is to know that we are never going to be perfect. And once we let go the ego, then masks become redundant because there is nothing to protect.
To put on our soul is to let go and find the juice of our lives and let that flow.
When we put on our soul, we are truly beautiful.
Hiding in layers the weapons of deception my real is naked ©Paul Cannon
Paul,
pvcann.com
Filed under art, creativity, Haiku, history, life, love, mindfulness, poetry, psychology, quote
Explore
One of my shots of Jindalee (Giles Breakaway). The Great Central Road and the roads that intersect it, the places along the way, have well and truly been traversed over two hundred years of exploration, mineral exploration, pastoral leases and tourism. But for us (Lyn, Su, Geoff) it was a time of exploration – it was the first time we’d been out there. As I looked out across to the east of the breakaway, I wondered what visual and geographic delights lay beyond. I was happy to camp for a time and explore the breakaway, and even happier to drive on into our unknown and see what was up ahead.
That has been my life up to this moment, that inner exploration. For me there is always that interesting intersection of living in the present moment, savouring the past for the treasure it has yielded, and looking to the next step, yearning to grow, to be more fully present, more in the experience, less attached to the material. Keeping the balance is the key, learning to love the past without clinging to it, rejoicing in the real now, and embodying the tension of possibility in tomorrow without trying to make it happen. I have worked hard at begining to let go the past, and I don’t always plan tomorrow, in fact, it is often said of me that I like to live in chaos – creative chaos I might add! Progress, though I smile, it comes with age and experience. Yet one must attend, be aware. Even so, it is still a great achievement when I can just be in the present moment, and today, for a time, was just one of those moments. It always takes my breath away, and I am grateful for it.
I am one of life’s explorers, a soul on a journey of self discovery. I hope you are too.
Paul,
pvcann.com
Filed under bush walking, Country, environment, life, mindfulness, nature, self-development, Spirituality
Assay Love
I say, I never thought I’d write an essay about assay!
Coober Pedy, South Australia, the opal capital of the world. More than enough assaying going on to determine the quality of the rock and ore turned up.
That’s easy these days, assaying is well provided for with pleanty of laboratories vying for work in the mining industry.
But how do you assay love? Is it a look, a movement, a scent, a kiss, a touch, a word?
The lab of love is to experience the liminal, to hear the heart, to know its beat, to feel it, and to gaze into the soul of the other. The proof therein is the gaze returned, the love enjoined, the pulse of love reciprocated. Love is only ever real if you give it and receive it. The real proof of love is how you live it.
I ached for you, my gaze held you in my eyes, the proof was your lips ©Paul
pvcann.com
Disobey
Disobey is my middle name. I wasn’t born to follow inane laws and trifling regualtions. I was born for love, passion, and creativity. I hated the institution of school, yet I really loved learning. So I bunked off, or as we say here, I wagged most of my upper school. Mental health days too were importnat in my early work life. I wasn’t keen on the institution of the church either (which is deeply ironic), but I subverted that at every turn and still do when opportunity arises to be creative with it. I couldn’t tolerate School Army Cadets, I couldn’t take it seriously and they were glad when I left. I did love Scouts, but hated the constrained process, I lasted the longest there and learned a lot, but in the end I left because I really couldn’t sing national anthems or dib, dib as we were supposed to say. My mother was always horrified that I would break rules in general ( I still do) like parking the wrong way round or worse, much worse (a tale for another time). Street racing in Perth in 70s, such fun! Life is not monochromatic, it is not cookie cutter sameness, it is not doormat living, or institutional slavery. Life is authenticity, honouring the inner being, the inner child too, and our creative bent. Just be, and if that means disobeying from time to time, then do, it’s good for the soul.
Paul
pvcann.com
Filed under life
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