http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R._N._Taber
For many years, I tried to think of myself as an agnostic because I could not get my head around the idea of a personified God. At the same time, I found myself developing a very close relationship with the natural world that was of a very spiritual nature.
In (much) later years, I would discover and identify with Pantheism. In my early 60’s by now, I was finally able to relate to the sheer poetry of a spirituality in me that I never found in either the Christianity in which I was raised of any other of the world’s religions.
At long last, I feel comfortable with a sense of spirituality, less of an outsider for subscribing to no religion, while continuing to nurture a sense of purpose in life that, for many years, had eluded me except in so far as to put it down to poetic whim.
As to whether or not I am a good poet is less relevant than how poetry brings me closer and closer to nature even though I rarely even get to its glorious landscapes now due to mobility problems. On my wall, I have a painting of woodlands I used to explore as a child growing up in Kent. I often take imaginary strolls in that painting, recapture a spirit of halcyon days that has never (quite) left me even during the worst moments in my life.
Pantheists believe that God is nature rather than its creator, which may well explain a Poetry of Spirituality that has always seen me through good and bad times, taken me to the proverbial Edge and back time and again.
I reason not the need; that a spiritual need in me is answered in this way is enough to keep me looking on the bright(er) side of life, its pitfalls notwithstanding..
The words of a vicar's wife, a work colleague who told me she enjoyed working with me and was sorry I would go to hell (for being gay, I presume?) lost the power to hurt me long ago.
If God is nature, could that be why nature does not discriminate in the way many humans (still) do?
L-I-F-E, POEMS FOR EVERY OCCASION
There are trees whose leaves
speak with the voices of poets, reciting summers,
autumns, even lonely winters
when only robins likely to linger long enough
to promise such regeneration as may yet get to see
its poets live and let live
There are birds come to nest
and teach their young such poetry of their home-tree
as will see them through its seasons,
encourage them to explore both heavens above,
and earth below, get to know what it takes for kith, kin
and poetry to survive
There are poets whose hearts
are given freely to an Earth Mother, anxious to be
put through the very motions
of each season as it comes, share the joys
we take in life, and such sorrow as sure to follow death
as birdsong on human ears
There has always been poetry
as close to nature as human nature, anxious to see
them working in such harmony
as gives conservation and preservation of species
due priority, whatever it takes to be sure Earth’s poetry
is more than a rehearsal
Rehearsal for what, who knows? A good start may well be
to listen and learn more from (all) life-poetry...?
Copyright R. N. Taber 2021
[Note: This post-poem also appears on my general poetry blog today.] RNT
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