Home for Christmas

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

I am not a Christmassy person, but no spoilsport either and will always wish everyone a very Happy Christmas/ New Year, and mean it. 

As an agnostic,, I don't celebrate Christmas in any religious sense. As a poet with a strong sense of spirituality - that I take from nature - I enjoy taking stock of my life at this time of year, counting my blessings and glossing over numerous flaws in the status quo.

On Christmas Day, I like to be on my own (yes, really!) strolling down Memory Lane and re-living the GOOD times while allowing myself time to be sad for the bad times. I like to remember those I have loved and lost, again dwelling on happy times together while not attempting to stem any tears.

If I spend Christmas with anyone, I feel obliged to make an effort rather than quietly surrender to any feelings of sadness and let them pass of their own accord.  I am not a sad person. On the contrary, I am a very positive thinking, lively guy. No one, though, can be positive thinking and lively all the time so when I feel sad, I let myself BE sad, and the sadness quickly passes, invariably replaced by happy memories to which the positive thinking, lively, part of me can more easily relate and build upon. Christmas brings many sad memories rushing back; I need to let them rush past me so I can enjoy the many happy memories I have shared with those I may have loved and lost but who sustain me still. 

We hear about families and friends getting back together for Christmas...but poles apart again by New year's Day. Let us never forget that love is not (and never has been) just for Christmas or any other religious festival where it needs to make an appearance. Any love worth having is worth saving, even if that means having to agree to differ with loved ones and accepting that our differences don't make us different, just human...

New Year? Well that's a different story altogether, celebrating a whole twelve months ahead to enjoy with friends and rediscover the true meanings of peace, love, and joie de vivre...

HOME FOR CHRISTMAS 

I’d hear talk of Christmas,
and my heart would sink for memories
of so many lonely Christmases
since love walked out of my life and family
never understood

I’d hear carols at Christmas,
and my heart would skip a beat or two
for recalling happy Christmases
when love took centre-stage in my life,
nothing else mattered

Friends planning for Christmas,
with smiles on their faces for all the fun
of such joyous Christmases
as once I had, and never (quite) abandoned
by fate, chance, love…

Christmas Eve, everyone rushing
for last minute buys, and then back home,
ever hopeful of Christmas
fulfilling its promises of peace and goodwill
around a festive table

Me, I hear talk of Christmas,
and my heart leaps  just for remembering
our conspiring with Christmas,
we total strangers, one starry Christmas Eve
of rediscovering love

Copyright R. N. Taber 2015

Shaping up for Life

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

Many years ago, I confided in someone that I was gay but was scared of the consequences if I came out to family and friends. He simply commented, “Yes, well, just remember that body, mind and spirit only ever need to justify themselves to each other, no one else.’ I suspect that’s as good a benchmark for contentment if not happiness as I will find anywhere.

At the time, I thought it was a rather selfish approach to life. Looking back, however, (I will be 70 on the winter solstice) I can see only too clearly that it’s only during the relatively few times in my life when I have been really happy that mind, body and spirit have achieved the greater harmony.  While I am not unhappy now, I live alone and don’t have a partner, without whom any life-harmony is only ever likely to be a halfhearted affair. Life, though, is all about making the best rather then the worst of things and I think I do a pretty good job of that.

Now, anyone can (and will) judge us as and when they like, but no one but the self knows how far (or not) it achieves harmony between body, mind and spirit. We are the best judges of that, no one else, just as where there is discord…we need to at least try and do something about it.  For example, while I am not a religious person, the suggestion that ‘Blessed are the peace makers’ has a lot going for it.

Above all, life is about developing and building on a native, all-embracing capacity for love, in all its shapes and forms - as far as we are able  and others will let us) -  and that goes for each and every one of us, whatever our sex, sexuality, race, religion and, yes, age too.

SHAPING UP FOR LIFE

Scared of who I am,
trapped in conventions that birthed me,
locked in the mind of a child
competing with siblings and peers for love
I would keep, oh, so close…
(so much a part of me, no desire to lose)
yet, compelled to choose

Scared of who I am,
fretting over wet dreams and fantasies
born of a growing sexuality
suggesting (confirming) much I’d been told
regarding human relationships
since knee high…a lie…created to taunt me
about me sexual identity

Scared of who I was
until we met in a bar one wintry night,
and as we talked, grew closer,
till in the thick of everyday conversation
I felt the throbbing pulse
of mutual attraction coursing my body,
mind-talk consuming me

Scared of who I was,
until he touched my hand reassuringly
as if to calm my frantic spirit
with piano fingers taking me through
a haunting symphony,
flooding emptiness left by unspoken fears,
and drying unshed tears

Unashamed of being gay,
those other parts comprising my whole,
ganging up on me for centuries,
hating me, despising me, rejecting me,
leaving me confused, scared…
finally accepting of this only-human need
to share his bed 

Copyright R. N. Taber 2015

Breaking Out OR G-A-Y, Standing Up for Sexuality

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

A homophobic neighbour once snarled at me, ‘I hope all you gays get your just deserts.’

I hope so too … and may it include the freedom to fall in love and be loved in return by the person of our choice just as nature intended - for us all, whatever our ethnicity, sexuality, religion or, yes, age too.

BREAKING OUT or G-A-Y,  STANDING UP FOR SEXUALITY

Shedding shackles that bind,

leaving fear and suspicion behind,

getting the life we deserve, born free

to fall in love ...

Coming but into our identity,

nature’s gift of life and sexuality,

deaf to threats of those world cultures

clinging to its scriptures

Refuting legends of Creation

denying us any hope of salvation

for fearlessly and, oh, so passionately

embracing our sexuality

Taking on biased critics

misinterpreting the hieroglyphics

supposedly expressed in ancient theses

on living nemeses

Mending fences torn apart,

reclaiming territories of the heart

under attack by a (so) bigoted morality

sponsored by Society

Making a stand for humanity

against those calling for ‘propriety’

based on some so-called  ‘moral’ stance

that we cause offence

Shedding shackles that bind,

leaving fear and suspicion behind,

getting the life we deserve, born free

to fall in love …

Copyright R. N. Taber 2009