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Category Archives "Poetry"

A new song in an old vein

April 29, 2011 By Chris Corrigan Community, Music, Poetry One Comment

As a traditional musician schooled primarily in the Celtic tradition, I am fond of traditional themes and devices for communicating messages.  On our home island right now there is a sometimes fierce debate occurring about the future of the Crown lands, that involves the possibility of creating a national park.  Today I was thinking about the complexities of the debate, and how it has seemed to me that those leading the opposition to the park are speaking on the one hand out of a concern for protecting something dear about our Island, but it has felt a little off to me.  Like a father who won’t let his daughter grow up.   That, it turns out is a a very old story, and so I made a little song today about our place, telling a little story that captures I think how I feel about the park, and the partnerships that we would enter into to make it possible.

the short answer is that, given everything, the option of establishing a national park on Bowen excites me.  While I have been carefully weighing the pros and cons, and while I could happily live with either option, I am increasingly finding many of the articulated reasons for voting no to such a future to be riddled with pessimism, fear and clingy attachment.  For me, a park offers Bowen a chance to be creative, interesting, beautiful and innovative in the way we move forward in the future.  And so, here is the song:

 

Come gather round you islanders, a story I will tell

About a gorgeous maiden within whose midst we dwell

Whose beauty and whose presence was coveted as well

By her negative and ever doting father.

 

“I raised you from a baby,” he was wont to say.

“I saved you when an evil man came to steal you away,

I preserved the beauty that is yours for you to wear today

And I’d do the same again in an instant.”

 

Now the maiden had her suitors, who came from far and near

And every one her father met left her home with fear.

They sought her hand in marriage but left her place in tears

And her father only ever issued no.

 

One day as she sat watching the latest suitor leave.

Her heart began to fail and her breath began to heave

She felt herself imprisoned and she began to grieve

For the fading of the promise of her beauty.

 

She went to search the country for a partner for her life

A stable man who loved her, and who would take her for his wife

Who would stay beside her through the victories and strife.

And she found him and she brought him back to father.

 

With deep suspicion in his heart he looked him up and down

He accused him of an evil plot to usurp his crown

He met the maiden’s one true love with a stony frown

And he issued forth a stern and solid no.

 

Now the maiden didn’t stand for this and she looked him in the eye.

Said she “it’s time you stood aside and hold your strident cries

This suitor will be with me long after you have died.

And I know I’ll finally come to life beside him.”

 

Her father had no answer for this surprising turn

He showed so little interest in what she’d come to learn

His anger boiled over and he became more stern

And demand that she prove to him she loved him.

 

She sat down by her father and took him by the hand

She broke it to him gently so he would understand

His overbearing attitude and selfish reprimands

No longer had a claim upon her choices

 

For if the maiden were to stay within her father’s range

Her future would be grim indeed for as the world changed

She would stay forever in her father’s gilded cage

And her life would wither down to nothing.

 

Islanders you’ve strongly heard the tales others tell

You’ve seen the paranoia of the coming living hell

But surely you must know that a maiden can live well

If her partner helps her build a life of beauty.

 

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Society is the still face

December 22, 2010 By Chris Corrigan Art of Harvesting, BC, Community, Facilitation, Improv, Poetry, World Cafe 2 Comments

Back in November, I worked with my mate Teresa Posakony on a two day gathering the object of which was to work to apply brain science to policy questions on the prevention of adverse childhood experiences.  On the first day I facilitated an Open Space event that brought together reserachers and brain scientists to discuss their findings and on the second day, we had panelists and Teresa ran a half day cafe to look at the implications of the research for policy making.  I composed a poem at the end of the day.

As a part of the experience, we were shown a powerful video of the still face experiment, a test to see how infants respond when their care givers break the connection with them.  It is very very powerful.  Here it is:

Later in the day one of the panelists, Jennifer Rodriguez, referred to this video by saying that collectively, “society is the still face” when it comes to our children and youth.

That was the hook I needed for the poem, which was also informed by the words I saw and heard during the cafe.  I read the poem and got a generous standing ovation.

Today I got an email from our clients which was sent by the researcher you see in the video, Dr. Ed. Tronick.  Dr. Tronick was responding to our client, who sent him the poem and the recording of me reading it:

I really am quite moved by the poem and your comment about how much impact it has.  When I began this work in my lab I had no idea that it might one day be so useful in getting children and families what they so desperately need.  I love the poem – I will get it up in my office somewhere, especially what it brings together and the rhythm of it.  Please tell Chris how much I appreciate it.  It is just amazing.  And more important than the SF or the poem is the work you and everyone at the conference are doing.

It is not enough to do work in the world without adding as much beauty as we can.  The power resides in the songs, the poems, the images that we use to capture our collective experiences and to throw a light on how important they are to us as human beings.

Enjoy the harvest.

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Twenty years of intense bliss

October 19, 2010 By Chris Corrigan Being, Poetry 2 Comments

October 19, 1990 in Peterborough, Ontario was a dark and cold autumn day with sleet falling and grim grey cloud.  The only light at all was the fact that I met my beloved partner Caitlin Frost that day.  Here is my anniversary poem for her.

On a sleet driven day
when the sky split into a million bits of darkness
and rained down on the groggy morning
I could never imagine
that what was falling
was me for you.

May you all know the love I have been lucky enough to be blessed with.

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The poem of our closing – Transition Nelson

May 21, 2010 By Chris Corrigan Poetry

It has become a standard practice for me now to make a slam poem from the words of opening or closing circles, as a way to reflect to a group something of it’s wholeness.  These poems are completely improvised, using the words of the participants as material.  There is a lot of reincorporation of people’s words in these poems which makes for a lovely reminder when I read it out and participants shift their awareness around the circle

A poem I wrote at the end of the Open Space for Transition Nelson.  One of our participants brought her two chickens to the event to look after them while she was away from her house.  On day two the chickens escaped, which explains one of the lines in this piece.

Practicality, courage

Where's the agenda?

Appreciative thanks

amazed it didn't tank

This scenario is a dream and it seems that

whatever happened, happened.

Woooo….

Gratitude is the attitude of rebirth

A reenergized connection, soft walk on the earth

Want to pass a torch but also linger on the porch of this

new house created by friendship

and the magic in the talk…

We gonna rock…

I'm already looking younger, cultivating the hunger

for transitioning, repositioning,

gestating and relating, digesting and reflecting

seeing what is born this morning

feeling what is important to raise

in these days of unity, community, in what is bigger than me.

I'm new to this place

but what a face you wear –

a community of angels who care.

It's open and I'm curious to see where it goes,

two feet, ten toes

I don't know, but somebody knows

and I feel direction, infection

a virus of creative work

the explosion of potential that stars from a spark,

light sparkling in the dark.

Thanks to the angels and the bees

and all that frees us to fly, respond to the calling

pick up those that are falling

and send them back in the air.

I'm more connected than ever before

walked through a door to a store full of knowledge  and inspiration

full of awe at the creation of what's going on –

knowing that together I can be strong enough

to live off the grid, draw on my own power,

this is the hour!

Even the chickens have become free!

It's hard to do this alone,

to clear a field full of stones,

to live a peace that is co-owned

bring a bell to the young,

three deep breaths,

words that rest lightly on the tongue

and hold the terror of action,

the commitment to a fraction of change

to a group that can rearrange the best of what we have –

time, ideas, muffins –

strange resources for a movement, but sustenance is a must for sustainability

so that's good.

So in the shadows of locally hewn wood

in a place free of shoulds,

I acknowledge the work we have done

and the potential of what is to come

life springing from ash,

passion leading to action,

a rekindled fire that burns off

guilt and fear.

Inspired –

our future starts here.

via The poem of our closing – Transition Nelson.

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The Days of Now

May 13, 2010 By Chris Corrigan Being, Open Space, Poetry

A poem by Ralph Copleman a longtime Open Space practitioner, posted this week on the OSLILST

The Days of Now

On the night before Now

we all clambored over

and greeted each other by the gateway.

Now came the first morning.

We opened for each other many conversations

and passed cups around the shining circle.

On the second of Now,

I could see a long way in people’s eyes

which cleared to let in the light.

On the third of Now,

everyone started dialing up tomorrows,

released laughter and embraced

every future Now with braided voices

and sweat-slicked arms.

Each night Now the sky

came down to join us,

like an animal testing the scents.

On the fourth of Now

we saw magic inside ourselves

and blew gently the embers in each other.

On the fifth day Now transformed

into pieces of hours and sounds.

There was baying and mirth

and sweet fresh rubbing of skin on skin.

The sixth of Now saw us

plain and fearful, thrilled and drawn

to each other in new forever dreams.

On the seventh of Now

we redrew all our lines,

filled all the hollows, as Now expected.

At last the night Now

draped velvet and quiet

as hushed we prepared our ascent.

This night is that night Now.

It has unquenchable questions

and the same different beginning.

On top of morning Now

and all through evening Now

we waxed and shined the circle again

sipped each other’s songs

and touched old and new alike.

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