From Graham – Roger’s close
friend (and tipsy cameraman)
With the burgeoning of spring comes a renewed joie de vivre. As nature’s pulse
quickens, sunlight streams into my small flat, warming the skin like Apollo’s sensual
kiss. Outside an ensemble of sparrows sing their odes to joy as grey squirrels
frolic in the sway of radiant daffodils.
I descend three flights of stairs clutching a selection of
nuts and grains. Awaiting me, in lofty foliage, an array beady eyes ogling me
expectantly. An excited twitter erupts. Magpies cawing, pigeons cooing and the
trills of sparrows. At the shrubbery I set out a bird-buffet. A squirrel
scampers up to me and I throw him a husked peanut which he grasps like a trophy.
He’s joined by a magpie, then a flurry of feeding to a stirring chorale of
birdsong.
I return to my apartment happier, elevated somehow... My daily
ritual feels sacred and imbued with symbolism. Some traditions believe birds to
be messengers of the divine. All I know is that the illusion of separation
falls away and I’m at one with nature, the universe... Offline, but connected.
Roger and I discovered the sublime joys of bird-feeding
during the Covid pandemic lockdown in 2020. He’d festoon his kitchen window
ledge with breadcrumbs and be amused by the argy-bargy of gobbling pigeons. (London
pigeons aren’t known for their social graces.)
We explored other avenues to alleviate those gloomy lockdown
blues. Our daily ‘whinge-therapy’ phone sessions played a major role in
maintaining both morale and sanity. (How I miss them.) I suspect Roger had a
checklist of gripes which unerringly ended with a whodunnit. A gripping saga
featuring Detective Inspector Taber - hot on the heels of a dastardly dumpster desperado
abusing a recycling bin.
Then of course we were utterly enthralled by the enduring
mystery of toilet roll shortages here in the UK. Panic buying - with toilet
paper tumbling off supermarket shelves like roly-poly lemmings. Who was
stockpiling and why - a conspiracy? Did coronavirus cause one to sprout an
extra pair of buttocks? Or were there hordes of marauding bog-roll bandits wiping
out supplies? Or was it being commandeered to mop-up the rising deluge of bullsh*t
from a familiar Downing Street residence? A stream of consciousness is one
thing - but this…!?
Rog and I certainly let our wildest imaginings run riot.
Sorry, my preamble turned into a pre-ramble. I meant to
offer an upbeat commentary on renewal and springtime but rather went off at a
tangent! I enclose two of poems on a spring theme.
* * *
NEVER GIVE UP ON SPRING
Once there was a time
it seemed like winter every day,
only a watery sunshine
streaking a sky that’s leaden grey
life barely worth living,
past and present unforgiving,
catching me out
in what I took to be a loneliness
of old age as I’d read about
in novels, rarely taking notice,
forgetting the roots
of fiction lie in such harsh reality
as now had me in its grip,
leaving me to fret that only much
the same lay ahead, cruel
twist of fate by any other name,
delivering me into a spiral
of a leaden, grey depression wherein
I could see no hope of rescue
till into that shadowy place you came,
bringing light, warmth, and joy,
sending a long winter of the heart
into a feisty, overdue spring,
lending even its shadows a touch
of wry humour so alleviating
the burden of my distress that I could
make space for a happiness
of which neither age, sex, culture,
creed or sexuality may justly
claim a monopoly since everyone
has a right (fate?) to be as you
make me, finally (blissfully) content
to let unfriendly ghosts lie,
cease berating a rose for either its thorns
or the nurture of spring rain,
but dry my tears, and live, love, laugh,
feel young at heart again…
Though society find a reason to mark
its gay lovers, be sure our season will long,
outlive theirs, and even when life
is a burden that’s grey and unforgiving,
never give up on spring
Copyright R. N. Taber 2012
* * *
SPRING, RITES OF PASSAGE
As a new leaf on a sad oak,
find a mind-body-spirit regenerating
greener centuries
As new buds on a rose bush
find all animal senses coming on heat
after a wintry frost
As new petals on a daffodil,
find emotions rising above their flaws
on a robin’s wings
As driftwood on home shores,
find young potential needing to be put
to better use than this
As seeds on a southern wind,
find life forces placing time and space
on a learning curve
As pilgrims to raison d’être,
find ghosts dead set on helping us live.
let live, have a voice
As fairy tales to a child’s mind,
find ancient legends wringing metaphors
from contemporaneity
As singing wires to cloth ears,
find rebel green campaigners messaging
the Earth’s naysayers
As ashes to ashes, dust to dust
find art and science reading the last rites
over tablets of stone
Copyright R N. Taber 2019. From an upcoming collection; Addressing the Art of Being Human.
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