Come, Springtime OR Let there be Light

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

A new reader has emailed to say, “… it’s all very well to wax poetically about hope, but when life takes a turn for the worse and there is no one to lend a helping hand, hope is inclined to fade like spring mist.” An appropriate analogy, if I may say so, given that once the mist fades, it is still springtime. 

Regular readers will know that I went into freefall some 40+ years ago and remained in the throes of a nervous breakdown for nearly four years. I did have some much-valued support from several people, and staring to write again proved very therapeutic, but I saw no future for myself, the chances of getting another job remote. I joined a local support group, which helped me re-learn how to connect with people; this, in turn, helped me recover a degree of self-confidence. 

Chance took me to a charity that helped people get back to work who, for whatever reason, considered themselves to be unemployable; within months, I was working again, albeit on a trial basis which later became permanent. 

They still haunt me, those years, and always will, but in a good way; they inspire me just as they have done throughout the pandemic and as I grow old(er). I am 75 now, and having to contend with various health issues that get me down sometimes. There are many people out there who are a LOT worse off than me, though, so I try to take each day as it comes, just glad to be alive even if my quality of life is less than I would like. 

A teacher at my old school some 60+ years ago once commented that our limitations should not be seen as restricting us but as challenges, inspiring us to overcome them, each in his or her own time and way.

The blog archives are accessible from the right hand side of any blog page and ew readers are welcome to explore them; hopefully you will fine some poems  you like, bearing in mind the immortal words of Abraham Lincoln:

You can please some of the people some of the time, all of the people some of the time, some of the people all of the time, but you can never please all of the people all of the time.

COME, SPRINGTIME or LET THERE BE LIGHT 

Once, darkness and cold,
as if winter had refused to surrender
to yet another spring;
with all the intensity of an impending doom,
it had me wandering
a maze of tunnels as lost and alone
as children waking at night, too scared even to cry,
too young to reason why 

Now, a glimmer of light
has me heading that way with a surge
of hope in my heart
offering all mind-body-spirit a potential lifeline,
reasons to dream
that had long since all but died, buried alive
under mixed emotions barely allowing room to move
or space to draw breath 

Yet, making slow progress,
every step as if my feet are unwilling
to chance arriving
at much the same awful place as had failed me
once already,
but for a yearning in me to see kinder heavens
smiling on us than have angry echoes of weepy ghosts
bringing us to our knees

Now, let there be light. Children of the Earth awakening
to the return of spring

Copyright R. N. Taber, 2021

[Note: In response to the reader who has just e-mailed me, no this is not a kenning; kennings comprise three stanzas of nine lines + a couplet; and, yes, this post-poem also appears on my gay-interest poetry blog today.] RNT

 

 

 

Life Force, Second to None

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

It is news to no one that feel-good factors comes in many shapes and forms; romantic or otherwise, for a person, an activity, whatever … a life force second to none, always on hand in the Here-and-Now  to cheer and sustain us through thick and thin.

Yesterday was Remembrance Sunday here in the UK, a time to remember our debt of gratitude to the members of the armed forces who died in the two World Wars and later conflicts; in our minds also, inevitably this year, those across the world who have died fighting a very different kind of war, a very different kind of enemy, the Covid-19 coronavirus.

Someone's death is invariably someone else's tragedy too; remembrance  is one of the many faces of Grief, yes,  ut also a celebration of those who, for many of us, remain a 'living' inspiration.

LIFE FORCE, SECOND TO NONE

World, all but on its knees,
sickness and death paying home visits
just about everywhere …
No change there but for its assuming
the mantle of a coronavirus
striking a greater fear in us for its ability
to catch us unawares
snatch us from family and friends, no time
even for precious goodbyes 

Hospitals overrun with cases,
doctors and nurses working all hours
to save lives, risking theirs,
while reassuring anxious relatives
or having to break
the very news they have been dreading,
yet little time for such tears
as compounding fears confronting humanity
with its own vulnerability 

Battles fought, survivors recalling
loved ones lost with such mixed feelings
as remembrance inspires
love alone able to temper both pain
and grief, lifting hearts
with happy memories, the likes of which may
well never come again
yet enough to sustain a sense of joie de vivre
that, if we let it, lasts forever

Find any human heart’s capacity for endurance
sustained by love’s Spirit of Remembrance

Copyright R. N Taber 2020

[Note: This post-poem also appears on my general poetry blog today.] RNT

Waking Up to Life

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

One of the (many) problems of living with prostate cancer and being treated with hormone therapy (Zoladex) is that its success depends on keeping testosterone at bay. 

Most of the time, I have no sexual urges so am relatively content. Every so often, though, a rush of testosterone creates the urges while failing to address bodily functions anywhere near adequately. (In other words, I can barely get an erection, if at all!) Being sensually rather than sexually active is even more frustrating than being without a regular partner, given that there are usually brief encounters to be had if you know where to go. Knowing where to go, but well aware it would be a complete waste of time, however, now that can be soul-destroying. 

Oh well, I just have to keep looking on the bright side of life and be thankful that (75 soon) I am still here to tell the sorry tale. Stay positive, I am always telling people so I guess I need to practise what I preach! (I do, mostly, but now and again I allow myself to lapse into whinge-mode…)

Not in any wasteland, though, not me, not any more. There is more to life than wanting what we can't have; we just have to find ways of making the most of what is available to us and, no, that doesn't mean having to settle for less. The human condition is incredibly adaptable to its circumstances, just as the human spirit can rise above even the worst life throws at us ... if we let it.

What's done is done, and gone. No one gets their time over again, neither the good parts nor the bad. What we can do, though, each and every one of us, regardless of any socio-cultural-religious or other forces working for or against us, is start looking ahead, resolve to make the most not only of what we have, but who we are in a Here-and-Now that has the potential to let us play not only as constructive a role in our past-present-future as any personae we may have previously adopted, but all the more so for a positive thinking mindset.

WAKING UP TO LIFE

Overslept,
dreams preventing deep sleeping,
or eyes opening,
taking m places I'd rather not go
but can't stay away
because they are an integral part
of my history

Overslept,
revisiting brief, intimate encounters
(high hopes dashed)
that promised everything, but left me
stranded in a wasteland,
worse off than ever for misreading
not seizing the day

Overslept,
cuddling up to a pillow, surrendering
to the surreal,
long enough to leave all emotion spent
on fuelling imagination 
into meeting more pro-active demands,
body stalling 

Waking up,
faces on the ceiling floating wry smiles
for a sleepy-head
sick of taking each day as it comes, only
to be left stranded
on some lonely wasteland without a clue,
body on stand-by

Getting up,
resolving not to include a dead yesterday
in my calculations,
no more truck with illusion and delusion
needs must get real, start
exchanging negatives for positives by way
of mind-body-spirit 

Starting over,
(finally) getting to grips with life as it is,
people as they are,
learning to laugh again (even at myself)
finding silver linings
wherever I look, no going by any text book, 
and all the better for it

Copyright R. N. Taber 2018; 2020

(Note: This poem also appears on both poetry blogs today given that issues it raises  may well affect us at some point in our lives, regardless of  ethnicity, culture, gender, sexual persuasion or, yes, growing old...] RNT

Sunlight on a Country Churchyard OR Memo from Apollo

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

Another new poem today, just when I didn’t think I had another poem in me … and not for the first time either. No, not a gay-interest poem as such, but worth remembering perhaps that Apollo was reputed to be bisexual.

The coronavirus has been with us for months now and there are signs Covid-19 that the stress is taking its toll on everyone. Lately, I have heard the following statements from different people along the lines that “I really can’t take any more …” and “I sometimes wake up in the morning and wish I was dead …”  I know the feeling, I really do; I will be 75 later this year, live alone and hormone therapy for my prostate cancer affects my thought processes as well as my memory with the effect that, among other things, I panic easily.

A few months ago, my best friend Graham and I visited a certain village in Essex for the first time; it is a charming place. I was feeling tired and low at the time, but the village itself manifested such a delightful atmosphere that it cheered me immensely. We needed to take a footpath through the local churchyard; a whispering in the trees could easily have been voices of the dead urging me to be glad just to be alive and make the most of each day as it comes.

I had been feeling depressed. Suddenly, I felt altogether different, mood lifting and various life forces (including creative forces) coming into play; all mind-body-spirit, regenerating.

Needless to say, we have returned to the same village several times since.

That is how I came to write the poem; hopefully readers will take heart from it, as I did; even as I was writing it; I was back in the village, far away from that dark place the coronavirus had dumped me in.

SUNLIGHT ON A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD or MEMO FROM APOLLO

Summoned by a breeze

to enter a country churchyard

while simply passing by;

pausing for thought, agreeing to comply

without quite knowing why,

yet sensing an urgency, pounding

at all sense and sensibility

as if some human spirit had chosen me

to set it free

Following feisty leaves

fallen from proud oaks forming

a Guard of Honour

on either side of a gravel path from gate

to church door,

urged by whisperings I cannot explain

to take a right turn,

wander among the graves

until (finally) called upon to stop, look, listen

and pay attention

My eyes, they are drawn

to a headstone nearby, its wording

ravaged by time,

yet I can just make out dates below a name

and parts of a poem

more critical of than favouring a person

Death dared presume

to steal away a good few years before their time,

so reads the poem

Highlighted by brilliant rays

of sunshine chasing dark clouds above,

the poem is as if rewritten

all words (and meaning) made clear and plain

to a certain someone

grown as war weary of life as with time,

death almost welcome

Apollo now whispering in my ear, “Rise and Shine”

for the grave is mine

In a blaze of light, love and glory

Apollo goes on his way, as I awake at dawn

from a hazy, crazy dream,

no less scary than beautiful, as meant to frighten

as reassure, enlighten

by way of a mind-body-spirit not yet given

its all, to why no time

like the Here-and Now to enter nature’s own view,

nurture a whole life through

I reached up for my diary on an oaken bedside shelf

and wrote, “Lost and Found, one true self … “

Copyright R.N. Taber 2020

G-A-Y, Love Songs

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

Today's poem first appeared on the blog in 2014.

Whenever spring homes in on us, it can often seem that we are emerging from a winter of the heart. 

So ...roll on spring, by which time the Covid-19 pandemic will, hopefully, be well and truly on the wane here in the UK and around the world, sufficiently at least to let us get on with our lives with a degree of normality as comparable with pre-pandemic conditions as possible. Meanwhile, we can but take each day as it comes, trusting nature's healing spirit of renewal - along with human nature's flair for positive thinking - to work their magic.

Below, find an early poem, written some 40+ years ago while I was still recovering from a severe nervous breakdown and had returned to writing as the best form of creative therapy I know. I was a psychological mess at the time, not least over my sexuality. Having been in and out of the closet for years, I was confused about the best course of action likely to see me recover and return to mainstream life and society.

Now, it’s bad enough that we don’t always listen to what people (or nature) tell us even when they have our best interests at heart; worse still, we don’t always listen to ourselves. We may well not want to hear what we are being told, but there comes a time when turning a deaf ear to certain deeper truths and challenges has to stop.

Some 40+ years ago, I had all but lost faith in everything, especially myself ... until a still, small, voice helped me reconcile with both nature and human nature, constantly reminding and reassuring me that seeking encouragement, reassurance, and inspiration in both - especially the former - can do wonders for healing self-esteem and self-confidence. Even so, while the experience of a nervous breakdown left me with a strong sense of spirituality, it is not surprising, perhaps, that Pantheism is as close as I come to bonding with any sense of religion.

The trick is to listen to whatever that still, small voice within us has to say

G-A-Y, LOVE SONGS 

I asked of a rose in springtime,

will love ever come my way?

Its petals, they stayed closed to me,

no word did I hear it say

I asked of a rose in summer,

why does love stay away?

Though it opened up its heart to me,

not a word did it I hear it say

I asked of a rose in autumn,

why love but passes me by?

Yet, even with its sweet, dying breath,

it would not tell me why

I flushed out a rose in winter,

(in Earth Mother’s arms it slept) 

began to cry and begged to know why

this icon of love, its secrets kept

It was Earth Mother answered me

with each snowflake that fell,

‘Oh, never ask why love passes you by

or pass you by, it surely will…’

I passed by a rose another season,

gave myself to you the same day

just for hearing it open its heart to me,

a love song, proud and gay

Copyright R. N. Taber 2014, 2020

Single, and Growing Old OR As Good as it Gets

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

Readers sometimes contact me and ask me how I manage to stay positive. So am posting this poem by way of reply. I will be 75 later this year, need a walking stick following a bad fall in 2011 and  have prostate cancer which has been treated with hormone therapy, also since 2011, so am constantly needing use the loo, plus I have some arthritis in my bad leg and in my neck.

I have done battle with depression all my life, even as a child. It may well be a complete stranger to many people having to contend with the physical, emotional and economic consequences of the Covid-19 corinaavirus, but it and I are old adversaries. 

For years, I lost more battles with the BIG D than I won until a GP said he had no problem with patients who suffered from depression staying on an antidepressant; in the past, I had taken them until I felt better and then come off them... until the next time. What works for one person may well not work for another, of course, but I tried this approach and have not had a serious bout of depression since. 

Regular readers will know that, looking back to early January, I can now see that I had all the symptoms of what was almost certainly a milder version of the C-19 virus even if it did not feel 'mild' at the time. But it was winter, the time of colds and flu and there was little if any talk of a pandemic then. I simply put it down to a bad cold and stayed indoors. Yes, I am finding the C-19 pandemic very hard to deal with on a daily basis, but mostly due to the necessity for social distancing, not seeing friends and having to avoid public transport (I don't have car) especially as I live alone. 

Obviously, there are many people a lot worse off than me, but I can empathise with anyone who has difficulty trying to look on the bright side of life.  Growing old, for start, is definitely no picnic, but it’s only fair to point out that the same can be said of life in general. Some people in some parts of the world have a relatively easy life compared with those in other parts; some individuals appear to sail through life where others constantly find themselves swimming against an unremitting tide.

“How do you cope?” I once asked a young disabled friend some years ago. “Mind over matter,” he replied, “Think good, feel good,” he added with wry grin, and this from someone in pain 24/7. It was sound advice, and I make a point of following it. 

On bad days, the love of those closest to me, past and present, helps me through any pain and subsequent, frustration, depression ... whatever. I only wish I had done likewise back in 1979 before I suffered a mental breakdown and attempted suicide. Even so, I am convinced it was love that saved me then, and sustains me now, even though I live alone and have no partner. (I only had a partner for a short time, and that was many years ago although our feelings for each other continue to sustain me just as they did before he was killed in a road accident abroad.) As a result of my suicide attempt, I was unconscious for a good 35 hours, and I seem to recall his and my mother's voice calling me back. Both, long dead. Call it a fantasy if you like, but even the doctors said I am lucky to be alive ...

“The positive thinker sees the invisible, feels the intangible, and achieves the impossible.”
– Winston Churchill, My Early Life, (1874-1904)   

SINGLE, AND GROWING OLD or AS GOOD AS IT GETS

Can’t get out and about

too easily now, a walking stick
needing to take the strain

when the rest of me lets me down,
and that’s as good as it gets

Can’t hear or see as well

as I could not so very long ago

but hearing aids and specs

get me by (now, wherever did I put

the darn things...?

New technology remains

a mystery not designed for old folks

who struggle to master

even the basics, a failing memory

chasing P-I-N or password

Growing old, no easy task,

gets harder by the day, yet a feeling

for life, love. and nature

inspires, and more than gets me by, 

cur for mind-body-spirit 

I draw upon all the love
that has seen me through the years
(in all its shapes and forms)
until it all but mends this poor frame,
and that's as good as it gets

Copyright R. N. Taber 2018; 2020

[Note: This post/ poem also appears on my general poetry blog today.] RNT

Facing up to Life

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

The poems on my general poetry blog address anyone and everyone who enjoys poetry, regardless of  who or where they are in the world. I write up a separate gay-interest poetry blog as well because I am a gay man and recognise that many people might not be interested. Interest works both ways, of course, and feedback suggests that few readers of this blog dip into my general blog (although I have posted poems of particular interest to LGBT folks there from time to time,) A friend of one such reader has asked me to post today's entry on the latter here as well. So, here goes ...:.

Like many if not most of us, I am close to desperation as the Covid-19 coronavirus persists even though there are signs that it is starting to abate. I miss being with friends and am finding my own company increasingly unbearable. Only by engaging with an inner self that has always been a more positive thinking force than its human host, am I able to recover sufficient  self-confidence to not only face the day ahead, but even write a poem.

I have always been plagued by self-doubt. As a child and young person at school many years ago, any self-confidence I was able to muster would soon be undermined by one thing or another. My perceptive of ‘pitch’ deafness was not diagnosed till my early twenties, and this did not help; time and time again, I was made to look a fool by not hearing or mishearing what people said, whether they be family members, friends or school teachers. I had no way of knowing how the pitch of someone’s voice or surrounding acoustics could affect how I perceived what someone said and, in turn, what response was required. When I realised that I am gay, I was almost as inclined to put myself down for it as most people were in the 1950’s, and many still are although they might well deny it for fear of being seen to contravene any equality and /or political correctness legislation.

While I can only speak from personal experience, I have had many a conversation with people of all genders, ages and socio-cultural-religious backgrounds who, for whatever reason, have had battles with self-confidence all their lives; hopefully, we ain more than we lose, bit it is invariably the latter that continue to haunt us.

So how do we overcome a lack of self-confidence, faith in ourselves, and any subsequent self-consciousness that makes us wish the earth beneath us would swallow us up in certain situations? My Religious Education teacher,  a Mr Partridge, who ‘regretted’ but did not hold my inability to identify with religion against me, told me on the day I left forever that “Those unable to reach out to God, for whatever reason, have no choice but to reach out to themselves, that is to say the inner self. The chances are, they will touch and draw upon such physical and spiritual life forces beyond all understanding.” I was sceptical the time, but now in my 70’s, I have to say it is among the best advice I have ever received.

When nature and/ or human nature takes you to the edge of some existential abyss, take heart, dear readers, look to your inner self, and you may well be pleasantly surprised at what you may find there.

This poem is a kenning. …

FACING UP TO LIFE

Let good times roll,

and find me responding

in kind as, indeed,

much the same whenever

life they take a turn

for the worse, although be sure

I will default to positives

before the harshest negatives will get

the better of me

See bad times persist,

and find me smiling through

if only to conceal

an everyday struggle within

to rise above however

mind-body-spirit defaulting

to autopilot by way

of blocking any such feelings likely to get

the better of me  

Yet, there are such times

in the human condition effecting

system failure,

demanding I call on whatever

native skills as left me

to restore working order,

rise above any sense of failure likely to get

the better of me

Above all things, I, Inspiration am set the task

of encouraging mine host to but do as I ask

Copyright R. N. Taber 2010

Curtain Rising on a Sense of What's What

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

This entry is from my general poetry blog archives for June 2014; like many such recent  entries, it could just as well been published on either blog, given that people are people are people, whatever their sexual orientation or socio-cultural-religious background. Many if not most of us would agree, of course, while just as many others continue to judge LGBT people differently. Do any of us have a given right to judge another person, least of all for their sexuality?

Sometimes we wake up and wonder why we bother. Time then to force ourselves to prepare for another day, throw open curtains and windows, breathe in deeply, imbibe the sweeter sounds and smells of life and let them inspire us...in spite of everything that seems to be working against us.

Now, nature may well be as fickle as humankind, but we have but to open our minds to acknowledge its capacity for life, love, and peace to feel invited and inspired to share in it all … and let sheer willpower do the rest, albeit with a native inclination for positive thinking in the driving seat.

No? Try it, and see. It has worked wonders for me over all of 70+ years, even getting me through a bad nervous breakdown in my 30's.

Did I say it was easy ... ?

CURTAIN RISING ON A SENSE OF WHAT'S WHAT

Human hearts top-heavy,

so needing to give expression
to an ache in the soul,
but no one to listen, everyone
playing pass-the-parcel
with us to avoid being put
on the spot or delivering us up
to an answering machine

Come, let's at least try

to appreciate how Earth Mother
does her best for us

Sunshine in a misty rain

making pretty flowers grow;
heavens shedding tears
for us even while raising smiles
on human faces
etched with pain if only
for having gone that extra mile
and been let down

Longing for loved ones

far away (or dead) to give us a hug,

make everything all right

Listen! The trees are singing

in country, city, and town;

Look! Children laughing, playing,
lovers wishing on stars,
Life forces ever reaching out to us,
inviting us to share in it all,
though human nature play us
fair or foul

Copyright R. N. Taber 2007; 2014

[Note: An earlier version of this poem appears under the title 'Curtain Rising in Accomplices to Illusion by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2007.]

Earth Mother, a Carer called Hope

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

This poem/post is from my general poetry blog archives for January 2012. Life can be tough, cruel even, but hope springs eternal, and is always on hand to help us rise above it all...if we let it. Yes, sometimes our hopes are dashed, but Hope always has a plan B; look for it within a human spirit's greater predilection for peace and love, common to us all whatever our race, religion, gender, or sexuality; we have but to seek-find-listen-hear...our choice, our life, our future so let it be a triumph for positive over negative thinking, yeah?

Regular readers will know that many years ago, when I was in my early thirties, I had a severe nervous breakdown and became suicidal. I overdosed on paracetamol and was unconscious for thirty-six hours. I awoke in such pain that I somehow found the resolve to make my way to my nearby GP’s surgery but only recall telling a receptionist I had taken an overdose before I passed out again to wake up in hospital the next morning. 

It was stupid thing to do. Yet, desperation rarely if ever recognises stupidity. 

In hospital, I felt guilty and ashamed for taking up a bed and the nurses’ time. The nurses were brilliant and could not have been kinder, which made me feel all the more ashamed of what, after all, is a very selfish act. 

Yes, selfish. Yet, desperation rarely if ever recognises selfishness either.  

For the first and only time in my life, I saw a psychiatrist who was actually very helpful. [I have seen several who have been a complete waste of time.] It would be several years before I recovered sufficiently to think about finding another job, and years more before I began to feel all but fully recovered.  I have looked upon every day since as a bonus. 

I survived all this with the support of some good friends and a faith in Earth Mother of which I had  had temporarily lost sight in a maze of feelings to which I could scarcely relate, and where I had lost all sense of identity. Various factors contributed to this sorry state of affairs, not least growing up in a gay-unfriendly environment although this was but one of many; a significant hearing loss no one appreciated, including myself as a child and an appalling relationship with my father played their part. Even so, I was an adult and needed to take responsibility for myself instead of playing the blame game and sinking into self-pity. I like to think I learned that lesson as time passed and I got a life. 

Anyone driven to despair, whether or not they contemplate suicide, will know that it is hard if not impossible at the time to rationalise either cause or consequences. It is an illness for which the only cure must come from within. Yet, so often, those in despair fail to find the strength they need to go that last mile. But if strength fails them, so too does human nature. Even these days, mental illness is regarded with suspicion and scepticism. 

I was lucky to have some good friends and Earth Mother looking out for me.  My despair had been a long slow burning fuse that was bound to ignite a powder keg of sheer chaos in me sooner or later. There were casualties other than myself, and I can only hope they, too, survived to continue making the best of life, people and circumstances; a philosophy that saved me and taught me a valuable lesson. 

So if you know anyone caught up in a downward spiral of depression and despair, please don’t give up on them, but lend a helping hand to being them back to mainstream life. There are no shortcuts, and the journey is likely to be a long one; in my case, years, and I’ve still a way to go yet. I have travelled a long way along that road, and am grateful for all the help I’ve had in making every step. But among all the good memories, there will always be bad ones that will try to pull us down and sometimes succeed however hard we resist. 

When I started to recover from my breakdown, many people thought I was ‘cured’; as if I’d had a bad dose of flu and was now okay. 30+ years on, I hear from and about other people in much the same position. So much for progress in real terms; that is to say in human terms...

Earth Mother image taken from the Internet

EARTH MOTHER, A CARER CALLED HOPE

I sat by the sea contemplating suicide
when a woman in green came and sat by my side.
stayed quite still, didn’t say a word;
my head, it rang with a gull’s shrill cry
as if echoing the heart’s screaming to be left to die,
no hanging on to this useless body

The woman in green didn’t look at me
but continued to exude that youth, life and beauty
I’d once loved, become my enemy;
following her gaze to a misty horizon,
I entered into a way of seeing altogether unknown
where the sea wore a green velvet gown

Grey hair streaked with a sunset’s glow
above eyes as teasing a blue as those I used to know
and pink lips urging me not to follow;
where once the sea, now a patch of grass
beneath an old tree on whose leaves of painted glass
nature would work its magic for us

Vanished, just as suddenly as it came,
knowing memories will keep murmuring your name
(sea of grass, leaves of glass, the same);
suddenly, I am bursting with a desire
to live (even love?) again, like an autumn leaf on fire,
its story all but told, waiting on another

I laughed aloud, forgetting the Woman in Green
and turned to explain, but she had already gone

Copyright R. N. Taber 2011

You-Me-Us, a Garden for All Seasons

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

A new poem today, relevant to everyone, regardless of ethnicity, sexuality, religion...or whatever; for this reason it will appear on both blogs. (I am encouraged, by the way, that some readers who use a shared computer have, in turn, recently felt encouraged to dip occasionally into both blogs after years years of being wary of others rushing to any misleading judgement of them for their reading one or the other.)

Now, the singular beauty of memory is that we can not only revisit kinder times when life is treating us badly, but also revisit the same positive feelings feelings that inspired us then and call for a repeat performance; such is the lasting power of inspiration, neither subject to time nor place, but a 'live' memory upon which we are free to draw upon for inner strength at such times as we need it most. Oh, and we can all be sure of those if hopefully only now and then, no matter who or where we are in the world...

YOU-ME-US, A GARDEN FOR ALL SEASONS 

It could have been just another walk

in the garden, only it meant more than that

to both of us as we would never walk

this way again, among flowers all colours

and trees whose branches might well

have been greeting or waving us goodbye,

sunlight glancing off smiley leaves like tears of joy

for being alive and well

Clouds across the sun attempt in vain

to send our sprits into free fall just yet awhile,

the sunshine of your smile inviting me

to fly with you across a world struggling

(but succeeding, if barely)) to combat

its fears of homegrown bigotry and hate

fed the mind-body-spirit taught to trust our “betters”

to know what’s best for us

A light rain, as if the heavens weeping

at this, our parting from a garden more beautiful

than any Eden could be, Earth Mother

embracing us, any tears but for the passing

of a Here-and-Now into an Unknown,

where contemporaneity as fickle as the wind,

now friend, now enemy, no sooner dragging us down

than lending a helping hand

Hugging, kissing, our parting less in sorrow

for treasuring and archiving the moment

Copyright R. N. Taber 2019

[Note: this poem also appears on my general blog today.]

High Seas Rescue

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

Now, I've met many people who have managed to turn their lives around in a constructive, positive way, survived high seas and made it to a safe shore. In my edition of the Book of Life, they and their like are its real heroes, whatever their gender, sexuality, ethnicity or socio-cultural background.

True, getting the better of the darker self is never easy...and all more heroic for that. 

HIGH SEAS RESCUE

Once I didn’t give a damn

about where I was or who I am,

even less what I was doing

or where I was going, the kind of life

I was generally leading…

no time for forward planning

or positive thinking,

content just to get high on drugs,

and binge drinking, no matter

the cruise liner I am on is sinking;

suddenly a cry, ‘Abandon ship!’

dived into the dark high seas of hell

and woke up in hospital

Among the survivors, only I

lived to tell the sorry tale of a life

that had no meaning,

everyone in it long past caring

about what I was doing

or where I was going, the kind of life

I was generally leading…

no time for forward planning

or positive thinking,

content just to get high on drugs 

and binge drinking, no matter

I’m close to hitting self-destruct

and time running out

Those wasted years made me

the kind of person I try to be now,

telling everyone I meet how

life only has purpose and meaning

when you’re kind and caring,

make time for forward planning

and positive thinking…

say ‘no’ to getting high on drugs

and binge drinking,

offer a helping hand to others as you

would have them do,

if only to be saved from drowning

in those killer seas too

[From: On The Battlefields Of Love by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2010]

Mind-Body-Spirit, on Rescue Alert

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

This week saw  World Mental Health Day, but every day is a struggle for some. This poem appeared on my general blog in July 2011. To see the original post, go the the archives - on the right hand side of any blog page - for https://rogertab.blogspot.com/

IYears ago, I became very deoressed about being gay, feeling rejected by family, friends and workmates for my sexuality alone...just a few of the knock life is inclined to throw at us, human nature being what it is.

Now, as a great fan of actor Jonathan Rhys Meyers (I loved The Tudors series on TV) I was very saddened to read that he had apparently attempted suicide. I attempted the same during a severe nervous breakdown some 30+ years ago. I swallowed a LOT of paracetamol tablets, washed down with a bottle of sherry. [Needless to say, I haven’t touched sherry since.] It was a terrible time, and I well recall the despair when I woke up after being unconscious for about 35 hours. Even so, I couldn’t stand the pain so managed to stagger half-dressed to my local surgery that was close to where I was living at the time.

Recovery took years, and I was unable to work for nearly four. Regular readers will be familiar with my poems like the one below that take depression and rising above it as a theme. I still suffer bouts of depression as I have since childhood, but I know the warning signs now and usually manage to rise above things through my writing, thereby avoiding going into free fall.

My passion for nature plays no small part in a self-taught capacity for positive thinking that, again, has its roots in a troubled childhood. I didn’t grow up in a broken home or anything as awful, but an appalling relationship with my father and a significant hearing loss that no one picked up on made life (and me) difficult, to say the least. It didn’t help when, as a teenager, I had to learn to cope alone with an awakening sexuality; same sex relationships remained a criminal offence here in the UK until 1967 by which time I was in my early 20’s.

Failure to commit suicide gave me a whole new outlook on life. So, yes, I am glad I failed although life has been an uphill struggle ever since, both emotionally and psychologically. Yet, isn’t life a challenge for most of us? I suspect the key is to take up the challenge instead of letting notions of failure mess with the mind; with the heart, too, perhaps. It isn’t easy, and there are times when the depressed person wants to run away from it all. Even so, as I have already said, learn to recognise the signs and it becomes marginally easier to prevent freefall.

For an actor, writer or any creative person, being something of a perfectionist is a mixed blessing. The perfectionist is never satisfied with his or her performance and this alone can lead us to the cliff edge of despair. One of the hardest lessons a creative person has to learn is to enjoy the creative process for its own sake, and while trying our best, not cave in to a mistaken sense of failure should our achievements fall short of expectation. Someone once said to me that she could not do anything creative until she recovered her self-esteem. In my experience, that is putting the cart before the horse. Until we try something, we will never know whether or not we can succeed at it; if we don’t succeed, we should give ourselves a pat on the back for trying and try something else until we discover our forte, something that gives us satisfaction and a boost to self-esteem that can only grow if duly nurtured.

Never feel a failure. Invariably, we do so in relation to someone else. There are times in life when other people don’t matter in the sense that we will only continue to feel close to freefall all the while we insist on comparing ourselves with those whom we most admire for whatever reason. At such times, we need to put ourselves first and refuse to let others put us down for who and what we are.

We can only make the best of what talents we have, and if these are insufficient to give us a sense of fulfilment then we should look elsewhere for the tools we need to help us feel a more complete person. Love and friendship offer fulfilment if we are prepared to work at them and not take either for granted. A talent for love and friendship is as creative an inspiration as we are ever likely to find in life; they come in all shapes and sizes and, again, we should not compare what we seek with others who have different needs and expectations.

I have said before on the blogs, we are all different and should not be in any hurry to measure ourselves by other people’s achievements.

I doubt whether Jonathan Rhys Myers reads my blog, but to him and all people driven to that degree of psychological and emotional free fall for whatever reason, I say, take heart, think well of yourself, and time may not heal all our hurts, but it will do a damn good job on most of them if only we are prepared work at it. There are no quick fixes and time can seem (very) frustratingly slow, but trying out new steps each day will produce positive results in the end if not always at a time we need them most.

A depressed person deserves a medal just for going through the motions of getting on with daily life. Believe me, I have been there, and my heart goes out to all those who suffer the worst depression can throw at us. Even once it has taken what seems like an eternity to lift, it will hover, and then go to wait in the wings until the next time it will try to take centre-stage; it is up to us to try and make sure it doesn’t. Oh, it will probably always insist on being a bit player in our lives, but that becomes just about bearable. People who suffer from depression are very fortunate indeed if it doesn’t make at least the occasional appearance. [The trick is to see it coming, and keep it from doing too much damage.]

To their loved ones, friends and work colleagues, I urge patience and understanding. Depression is NOT the same as feeling low or fed-up; it is light years beyond. At the same time, there is no need to let a depressed person’s mood swings take you to the edge as well. Speak up. Don’t let anyone walk all over you, whether they are depressed or not. But do so with kindness rather than in anger. Keep faith with love and friendship; it is at such times when depression or other hardships strike and test all of us that both truly come into their own.

Oh, but life can be so complicated, and rarely gives us a clear run all the way. Yet, for all its ups and downs, it is the only life we have so let’s make the best, not the worst of it, yeah? [Did I say it was easy?]

MIND-BODY-SPIRIT, ON RESCUE ALERT

A shadow came to squat by my side,
its features obscured,
took my hand, claimed to be a guide,
said I should not be afraid;
a voice as silky as a child’s brow
persuaded me to my feet,
vaguely familiar voices calling, ‘No!’
distant echoes in my heart

If reassuring, the voice kept insisting
this was no time to be fanciful,
its silk at my ears faintly brushing
like lips behind a veil;
I let myself be led into my own garden
where I’d plant flowers,
prune its fruit trees and mow the lawn
during golden hours

Yet, even as the trellis gate swung open
to let us enter there,
I was gripped by an awful premonition
and sickening fear;
the silky voice took on a mocking tone
as the veil fell away
to a pecking at my flesh to the very bone
like a bird of prey

In a panic, I called the garden to my aid
only to see…
its trees were dying, its flowers dead,
the lawn but a spread of algae;
desperate to escape being eaten alive,
I tore myself free,
begging of that cold, dark, watery grave
a last sanctuary

I dropped as sure as a stone into the slime
and lay on its bed,
watching the algae, like veils of time,
expose half-truths over my head;
hands reached down to pull me to a surface
I instantly recognised,
where fruit trees, flowers and green grass
have endured

Between the lines of Earth Mother’s smile
I read how survival is but half the battle...

Copyright R. N. Taber 2009

Where the Road is Bare, Plant Trees

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

Many years ago, I had a Russian boyfriend. (I would love to visit Russia. Yes, in spite of President Putin’s anti-gay stance. One day, maybe…) His name was Anatoly and he was studying here. He answered to Nat although I’m not sure even he knew how this had come about. He was not only a genuinely nice guy but also good looking and a brilliant cook. In short, he was every gay man’s dream of a partner and way out of my league, or so I thought. Yet, somehow Nat and I became more than friends during his stay here.

Nat is the only boyfriend I’ve ever had who loved poetry. (Yes, even mine.) I missed him a lot when he returned to Russia and hoped we would stay in touch, but Fate had other plans for us. About three years later, I received a brief note that has been forwarded from several different addresses to say he was getting married to ‘a girl called Anna.’ It was just as well he hadn’t put an address or I would probably have caught the next plane to Moscow.

While my poetry is a diary of sorts. no one but me will ever know which poems are based on my own life or on observations of other people’s lives or just wishful thinking on all our parts. It is not surprising then that, as I browse my poems, faces, places and circumstances spring to mind that may be directly related to the poem or simply passing at a tangent to it. So now I find myself thinking about Nat and wondering what happened to him, hoping he is happy, but concerned that a hot-blooded young gay man should have chosen to marry. Has Anna made him happy? Do they have children? I will probably never know.

None of us are perfect nor do we live perfect lives. Yet, it is in those very imperfections that the roller coaster ups and downs of everyday existence lie. Whether or not we are feeling quite up to the ride is another matter…

As I grow old(er) I find myself looking back on the past and regretting much of it for one reason or another.  After all, where has my life brought me but to this growing old alone…and me with such a capacity for love?

Oh, but a pointless exercise, this negative stuff, I agree. Better by far to engage in some positive thinking, be glad for the parts regret cannot reach and try to be that person regret could never touch. Easier said than done, but methinks well worth the effort or old age is likely to be even less of a picnic than old bones would have it…

WHERE THE ROAD IS BARE, PLANT TREES 

Smoky haze on a lonely road,

rogue leaves falling one by one

like faces in a Hall of Mirrors

reflecting such multiple fractures

of times past, hints of joy

and laughter mangled by tears,

as those I have loved and lost

gazing anxiously through my fears;

a merciless naming of parts

(success, achievement…) heads

turned by the darker side

of fulfillment, tiny flames licking

at what we care to call 'soul’

Smouldering seasons lost

to wisps of smoke, scalding caresses,

half-truths let drift with a smile;

familiar faces rallying at such times 

of need as this, reassurances

once betrayed and tossed aside,

now returning to haunt

the self-centred manipulations

and errors of judgement

that brought us here, fuelling a pyre

of purpose-built paranoia;

time to put life’s illusions to rout

and its angrier fires out

Look, and find a hunchback called Pain

planting trees on New Memory Lane

Copyright R. N. Taber 1999; 2014

[Note: An earlier version of this poem first appeared in the anthology Duende, Poetry Today [Forward Press] 1999 and subsequently in Love and Human Remains, Assembly Books, 2001.] 

(Back) Down to Earth

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

Regular readers will know that I suffer from regular bouts of depression. Antidepressants help, but they are no magic cure. Yet, somehow I manage to call on hidden strengths to keep from falling into the proverbial pit and make my way back to a semblance of ‘normal life’…whatever that is. The kinder spirits of nature and human nature play their part, taking me on journeys across time and space,  revisiting loved ones dead and living, places and people that have given me sanctuary from the worst life so loves to throw at us from time to lime, reminding me why I attempted suicide at  the age of thirty-three as well as how and why I found my way to start living again.

I have suffered from depression as a child although depression in children was not recognized in those days. I was often told I was a moody or ‘difficult’ child at school and at home. As I grew older and realized I am gay, I found myself fighting a lonely battle with my feelings but was probably seen by many as just another ‘difficult’ teenager. I was a nervous breakdown waiting to happen…as it did in my early 30s. Then, as now, writing was my lifeline, especially poetry.

Not so long ago, I met a young man who poured out his heart over several cups of tea in a local café where I sometimes have lunch. He was plainly depressed. I recognized the symptoms. He was also in denial of his sexuality, just as I had been many years ago. Could the two be linked? I put it to him that he might give it some thought. He leapt to his feet, almost knocking his chair over. ‘I’m not gay,’ he shouted. ‘I hate gays,’ he yelled again and left …but not before snatching up my card that was lying on the table.

He did get in touch and we exchange emails regularly. After using me as a verbal punch bag for some time, he later acknowledged to me (and more importantly, to himself) that he is gay, but has yet to come out to family, friends and colleagues. It is his decision, but I am sure he will find his way to being openly gay in time. Until then,  he says, it feels like like living in a halfway house as he discovers what it is to be gay and creates a comfort zone from which he can come out to family and friends.

Whatever our social, cultural or religious identity, sexual identity also needs (and deserves) to express itself, openly and freely. 

In many countries - Russia, Nigeria, Uganda, to name but a few, LGBT relationships are a criminal offence, but in so-called 'liberal' countries, too, gay boys and girls, men and women are growing up in a gay-unfriendly environment under immeasurable stress. Those of us who can be openly gay without fear or (visible) prejudice would do well to give them some thought, offer encouragement, and never become complacent. 

(BACK) DOWN TO EARTH 

Swaying, drunk with life

at the very edge of its darkness,

struggling to keep a balance

of sorts or go into freefall,

no soft landing if landing at all,

but a lonely journey

among fake highs and tearful lows,

landscape of human nature

Darkness, hell among ghosts

losing the will to live and keep

fighting the good fight

for all mind-body-spirit can achieve

in spite of those ever ready

to dismiss any positive soundings

by prose and poetry to obliterate us

from living memory

Let painters, musicians,

all art-forms inspire we less blessed

to find a place of rest

within ourselves for engaging

with the artist in a finer art

than art alone can aspire, take heart

heart from its ascension into a heaven

of its and our own making

Oh, but joie de vivre

can be ours for the reworking yet

if we but dare to let

its spirit run free - look to see,

read to learn, hear to listen,

lose what we fear most

to senses left open to ‘live’ positives

in nature and human nature 

At the edge of darkness,

sounds, sights, cries, calling

me back to you, my love,

while grieving us (much like this),

the kinder for mind-body-spirit

stage-managing rehearsals

for ... what, exactly? Where to look 

but in personal space?

Few if any answers there,

but I am as I am, and any who would

put me down cannot erase

Apollo’s first kisses on my lips

as to certain bliss

(if uncertain peace) it's back down

to Earth, all the softer landing to find

you waiting for me here

Copyright R. N. Taber 2005; 2014

[Note: An earlier version of this poem under the title 'The Return' first appeared in A Feeling for the Quickness of Time by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books 2005.]

Close Encounters of the Third Age

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

A gay friend, growing old(er) like me, recently commented with some bitterness that he probably would not be on his own in the winter of his years if he wasn’t gay. ‘Gay relationships are so fragile,’ he said.

Bollocks!

True, many people find themselves on their own as they get old(er). Some relationships are too fragile to stand the test of time, but that has more to do with people not working at them than their sexuality. (Far too many people take their partners for granted.)  Sadly, some partners die while others fade away into a mist of wishful thinking.

Whatever, the Spirit of Love (in all its various shapes and forms) will be a good companion for life if we but let it. Moreover, gay or straight, male or female, we are never too old for romance, and never let anyone tell you differently.

The way some people pour scorn on relationships between old(er) people where clearly more than just platonic makes me so angry. Take no notice. They are just jealous.

Okay, sex isn’t everything, but nice work if you can get it…

CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD AGE

Clouds broke,

made us run for shelter

in a shop doorway;

you spoke first,

but I didn’t catch a word

for wind and rain

I could but trust

my smile would convey

all I wanted to say

as you closed in,

put your mouth to an ear

straining to hear

Breath on my face

sweeter than a love poem,

and I was smitten,

half-forgotten

dreams of youth returning

my embrace

A dull, grey, day,

bringing people together,

no matter we’re gay

or past our prime

for the Rainmaker doesn’t

give a damn

Copyright R. N. Taber 2011