Saturday, 29 June 2013

No Time for Tears OR Suddenly, it's Summer


Not one of my better poems today, but one of several adapted from pieces originally written as song lyrics, but never performed. Even so, it appeared in an anthology - The Truth from the Game, Poetry Now (Forward Press) 2003 - prior to my collection.

Many years ago, I aspired to writing a gay musical with a gay friend who can write music (I can’t) but our lives took drastically different turns at about the same time, and we drifted apart. The musical was never written. Years later, I tried to persuade another (straight) friend to help me.  [No chance!] Oh, well, maybe some dead ends are for the best...

Meanwhile, here’s wishing peace and happiness to we romantics everywhere, whatever our sexuality.

NO TIME FOR TEARS or SUDDENLY, IT'S SUMMER

Walking in darkness,
walking in pain,
I stumbled through life
seeking love in vain,
till one summer morning,
dew fresh and clear,
a fragrance of young roses
in the light, summer air
as we got chatting by and by
at a place near a river
where even the willows
forgot to cry

Laughing in sunshine,
winging with birds,
first time in a long time,
no loss for words;
heard grasshoppers singing
in dew fresh and clear,
a heady fragrance of roses 
in the light, summer air
as we got kissing by and by
at a place near a river
where even the willows
forgot to cry

Copyright R. N. Taber 2003; 2005; 2018

[Note: An earlier version of this poem appears under the title 'Ode to Summer' in  A Feeling for The Quickness Of Time by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2005; it was slightly but significantly revised in 2018.]

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