A Song Of The Earth

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._N._Taber

A straight friend once commented that sad as it is, bigotry is a fact of life and we just have to try and learn to live with it. I found myself thinking back to when I wrote today’s poem; it last appeared on the blog in 2010 so now is as good a time as any time perhaps to give it an airing.

I don’t agree with my friend. Bigotry is a fact not of life but of human nature, one of its worst failing no less, and we don’t have to try and learn to live with it at all. 

Surely, it’s better for everyone that we at least try and teach the arrogant bigots among us some humanity, not to mention some humility into the bargain? We are, after all, a common humanity regardless of any socio-cultural-religious differences; nor to the latter make us so different, only more human.

Oh, and why are the idealists among us constantly pit down for advocating peace on earth, goodwill to all, and an end to propagating stereotypes?

A SONG OF THE EARTH

If life’s journey never easy,

each uphill step we take

carries us closer to an eternity

that we, for ourselves, make

with every kind word spoken

to those worse off than us

yet are dead set against bigotry

and the more reason (surely?)

to be thankful for a better nature

than those whose life history

reads much like a dissertation

on the superiority of those

taking care to stay on the ‘right’

side of sexuality over any

who dare stray beyond the pale

of a convention invariably

bent on the misinterpretation

of all some of us say or do

True, in some parts of the world

laws allow us to be gay,

to live, let live and get married,

no matter what bigots say;

true, too, that sticks and stones

can break bones, but less so

that we are left unhurt by names

our so-called betters throw

though any scars we may well

choose not to show but strike

a stoic pose, prepare to battle on

for a way of love we believe in;

let them argue how the world turns

on certain ‘moral norms’

(opening up cans of worms unfit

for even its lower life-forms)

while the rest of us enjoy eternity

in Earth Mother’s arms

  

[From: On the Battlefields Of Love: poems by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2010]

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