http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._N._Taber
Now, a reader asks if I will repeat the links to (a) my poetry reading on the 4th plinth in Trafalgar Square back in July 2009 as part of Antony Gormley’s One & Other ‘live sculpture’ project and (b) my YouTube video of the Princess Diana Memorial Fountain in Hyde Park; they are:
http://www.webarchive.org.uk/wayback/archive/20100223121732/oneandother.co.uk/participants/Roger_T [NB: Sept 19, 2019 - The British Library has confirmed the video is no longer available as it was incompatible with a new IT system, However, it still exists and BL hope to reinstate it and make it available to the public again at some future date.] RNT
For the Princess Diana Memorial, go to my YouTube channel:
Meanwhile...
Tragically for their friends and loved ones, many people have died during the current Covid-19 pandemic. A friend once asked how I coped with the death of my partner years ago. His own partner had just died and he was in pieces. I had only a brief time with mine, less than two years before he was killed in a car accident, while they had enjoyed nearly twenty years together; it makes no difference, the hurt is no less.
Having lost various people to whom I have been close over the years, I could only repeat what I have said on the blog many times, that moving on doesn’t mean leaving anyone behind. Trite, maybe, but true; my partner, my mother and other loved ones long dead remain a much-treasured comfort and inspiration. My mother died 40+ years ago, yet I feel as close to her in mind-body-spirit as I ever did, and count her among my favourite ghosts who revisit me time and again.
Whatever our socio-cultural-religious mindset, we can but move on after the deaths of loved ones while remain a part of our lives albeit in a posthumous just a we will when it is our turn to leave this world. Across the whole spectrum of that human consciousness we call history or (especially) family history, there is no leaving anyone behind; such is the continuum of life forces, not life as we know it, true, but a continuum no less. I have been called irreligious - at the very least - for this point of view, especially when I suggest it offers an all-embracing spirituality, but the human spirit is common to all of us and does not rely on (any) religion to manifest itself in whatever mysterious ways it chooses and with which we, in turn, choose to engage.
Only for you, as immortal a song
Only for you such beautiful words
Only for you, my heart is mending,
Moving on across the landscape of time;
Copyright R. N. Taber 2005, 2019
[Note: This poem also appears on my general poetry blog today. Not a gay-interest poem? Maybe not, but since when did love ever prioritise one human being over another? Sadly, I need to prioritise for much of the time as feedback suggests relatively few gay readers visit both blogs. An earlier version of this poem appears under the title 'Moving On' in A Feeling for the Quickness of Time by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2005]
The poem below first appeared on the blogs in 2011.
Now, a reader asks if I will repeat the links to (a) my poetry reading on the 4th plinth in Trafalgar Square back in July 2009 as part of Antony Gormley’s One & Other ‘live sculpture’ project and (b) my YouTube video of the Princess Diana Memorial Fountain in Hyde Park; they are:
http://www.webarchive.org.uk/wayback/archive/20100223121732/oneandother.co.uk/participants/Roger_T [NB: Sept 19, 2019 - The British Library has confirmed the video is no longer available as it was incompatible with a new IT system, However, it still exists and BL hope to reinstate it and make it available to the public again at some future date.] RNT
For the Princess Diana Memorial, go to my YouTube channel:
Meanwhile...
Tragically for their friends and loved ones, many people have died during the current Covid-19 pandemic. A friend once asked how I coped with the death of my partner years ago. His own partner had just died and he was in pieces. I had only a brief time with mine, less than two years before he was killed in a car accident, while they had enjoyed nearly twenty years together; it makes no difference, the hurt is no less.
Having lost various people to whom I have been close over the years, I could only repeat what I have said on the blog many times, that moving on doesn’t mean leaving anyone behind. Trite, maybe, but true; my partner, my mother and other loved ones long dead remain a much-treasured comfort and inspiration. My mother died 40+ years ago, yet I feel as close to her in mind-body-spirit as I ever did, and count her among my favourite ghosts who revisit me time and again.
Whatever our socio-cultural-religious mindset, we can but move on after the deaths of loved ones while remain a part of our lives albeit in a posthumous just a we will when it is our turn to leave this world. Across the whole spectrum of that human consciousness we call history or (especially) family history, there is no leaving anyone behind; such is the continuum of life forces, not life as we know it, true, but a continuum no less. I have been called irreligious - at the very least - for this point of view, especially when I suggest it offers an all-embracing spirituality, but the human spirit is common to all of us and does not rely on (any) religion to manifest itself in whatever mysterious ways it chooses and with which we, in turn, choose to engage.
YOU-ME-US, MOVING ON or LIFE FORCES, CUSTOM MADE
Only for you, as immortal a song
as any human heart of may compose;
a hymn to a love, rich and strong,
as the fragrance of summer in a rose
Only for you such beautiful words
as any human heart can hope to write,
echoes in a wind, the song of a bird
an awakening of petals to dawn's light
Only for you, my heart is mending,
for recalling our promise to move on;
come love again, ours never ending,
much like lifelines on leaves evergreen
Moving on across the landscape of time;
my life, a love song, your death, a poem
Copyright R. N. Taber 2005, 2019
[Note: This poem also appears on my general poetry blog today. Not a gay-interest poem? Maybe not, but since when did love ever prioritise one human being over another? Sadly, I need to prioritise for much of the time as feedback suggests relatively few gay readers visit both blogs. An earlier version of this poem appears under the title 'Moving On' in A Feeling for the Quickness of Time by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2005]
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