Snowstorm on December 27, 2012

 

Christmas Day 2023

 Plus 5C, like a fall day, priceless!

"the measure of a man . . ."

 

the measure of a man

are in his acts

of generosity, kindness,

and compassion--no other

measure exists, not accolades,

not wealth, not achievements;

only in what kindness

a man or woman

shows fellow humans,

animals, and the natural

world do we measure 

the value and meaning

of a person's life.

Christmas at St. Ignatius Church

Christmas at St. Ignatius of Loyola Church on West Broadway Avenue.

 

Morning walk to Meadowbrook Golf Course

 

"Montreal Lane Vision" by Tom Konyves

 

Tom Konyves, at his AM Productions in Vancouver, 1992

Tom Konyves and Stephen Morrissey, at a poetry reading in
Vancouver, 1991

A couple of clothespins later

another creak

the cat looks up

in heat: a sunbather looks down

in between the leafy branches

where the sparrow turns and spies its mate.

And it's these sparrows

who repeat all our thoughts

in their infernal dialogues

their gossip not meant for us

watching rainbuckets mirror

the stately Versailles. 

Published in Bite, volume 1, number 4;

Vancouver, 1988.

"Into the Mystic" by Van Morrison

 

From the Champlain Bridge, 2011

We were born before the wind
Also, younger than the sun
'Ere the bonnie boat was won
As we sailed into the mystic

Hark now, hear the sailors cry
Smell the sea and feel the sky
Let your soul and spirit fly
Into the mystic

Yeah, when that fog horn blows
I will be coming home
Yeah, when that fog horn blows
I wanna hear it
I don't have to fear it

And I wanna rock your gypsy soul
Just like way back in the days of old
Then magnificently we will float
Into the mystic

When that fog horn blows
You know I will be coming home
Yeah, when that fog horn whistle blows
I gotta hear it
I don't have to fear it

And I wanna rock your gypsy soul
Just like way back in the days of old
And together we will float
Into the mystic

Come on, girl

Too late to stop now

"Rave on, John Donne" by Van Morrison

 

John Donne, 1572 - 1631

Rave on John Donne, rave on thy Holy fool

Down through the weeks of ages

In the moss borne dark dank pools

Rave on, down through the industrial revolution

Empiricism, atomic and nuclear age

Rave on down through time and space down through the corridors

Rave on words on printed page

Rave on, you left us infinity

And well pressed pages torn to fade

Drive on with wild abandon

Uptempo, frenzied heels

Rave on, Walt Whitman, nose down in wet grass

Rave on fill the senses

On nature's bright green shady path

Rave on Omar Khayyam, Rave on Kahlil Gibran

Oh, what sweet wine we drinketh

The celebration will be held

We will partake the wine and break the Holy bread

Rave on let a man come out of Ireland

Rave on Mr. Yeats,

Rave on down through the Holy Rosey Cross

Rave on down through theosophy, and the Golden Dawn

Rave on through the writing of "A Vision"

Rave on, Rave on, Rave on, Rave on, Rave on, Rave on

Rave on John Donne, rave on thy Holy fool

Down through the weeks of ages

In the moss borne dark dank pools

Rave on, down though the industrial revolution

Empiricism, atomic and nuclear age

Rave on words on printed page

The state of Canada is not good

 

Average Canadians regretting what the country has become

Canada today is not what it used to be; we know that all is not well. Justin Trudeau seems to think everything is great, but just look around you and what do you see? In every city and town there are encampments of homeless people on roadsides and in city parks; food banks can't keep up with the number of people visiting them, even the employed visit food banks; average people can no longer afford to buy a home, some cannot afford to rent an apartment; the country is not united, Quebec inches closer to independence and Alberta has its own complaints about the federal government; hospitals are collapsing, we don’t have enough doctors or nurses; Justin has spent us into the highest national debt in our history, it’s in the hundreds of billions of dollars; immigration is at an all-time high (500K immigrants per year in 2021, 2022, and 2023) at a time when Canadian citizens can’t afford groceries or a place to live, many don’t have family doctors, and even the immigrants are leaving; what is going on? This is not the Canada in which I grew up, it is not even the Canada of 2014, the year before Justin was first elected. 

My family have always been Liberals and we've had several Members of Parliament in the family, all Liberals, and elected in Northumberland Riding, in New Brunswick; there was John Vereker Morrissy and his son Charles Morrissy, both were prominent local politicians in Newcastle (now Miramichi) who moved up to the Federal level. We were always supporters of the Liberal Party of Canada, and we were always social liberals, as are most Canadians. We were never conservatives; I listened to the liberal CBC, I voted Liberal, I loved Canada. That has ended since Justin Trudeau came to office.

When Justin was elected prime minister things began to deteriorate; it began in 2015 around the time when the CBC's woke bias became more apparent. But it turned out that Trudeau is a man with no moral compass for whom appearance is more important than intelligence, culture, or tradition; he has no culture, no traditions, no great intelligence and little education.This has been shown on many occasions; he's clever, he’s verbally clever, and he has money and influence behind him, he knows how to exploit a situation for his own benefit.

The state of Canada is not good; the old Canada is gone, and we're stuck with the mess that Justin has inflicted on the country. He is working to destroy our sense of being Canadians and our national unity, he doesn't believe in Canada, he doesn’t like Canada, he wants to throw out the old Canada, his allegiance is to diversity, gender, and wokeness, not to the needs and concerns of average Canadians. His aim is to replace traditions, our culture, our belief in who we are and our future, all for unproved politically correct ideas that will inevitably fail. Personally, I am doubtful we will ever recover from these years of Justin Trudeau; so far, he has worked to destroy the country. Is it any wonder that he is one of  the least popular prime ministers in Canada’s history? The only “sunny ways” Justin has left are in his imagination.

After the snowfall

Photographs taken on 06 December 2023.

First big snowfall of December

Today, heavy wet snow that sticks to the snow shovel, it takes some of us two shifts to get rid of this snow; begin at 7:30, take a rest, finish later this morning; but milder weather is forecast for later this week. It’s a monochromatic world out there, gone the flowers of summer, gone the garden of 2023.

Photographs taken on 4 December 2023. 

Of winter days to come

It was -6 C and felt like -12 when I took these photographs on November 24, it wasn't even winter, it was a first taste of winter but without snow. As you get older you wonder if you can take another winter; it will be like this, and colder, all of December, January, February, March, and the first days of April. Too much, too long, too cold.  

It is what we, in Canada, must endure.

"Wedged" by Joan Thornton

Hand/Grenade by Joan Thornton

                             

6   am

damp

in darkness

North Sea

slapping

on the rump

of 

Europe

In

Montreal

not 

so  far

we cannot

feel

that strain

as

Real

riot-

ous   im-

mediate

as

the States

whose sharp Spring

tremor

like 

a 

subterran-

ean

shiver

-- shifts

our centres

of

atten-

tion

        NOW  -far

out along

dark

borders

where

for miles

un-

easy

    migrants

perch

the ragged

edges

of

a storm

Thornton, Joan. Hand Grenade. Ottawa, The Golden Dog Press, 1973