The Old Curiosity Shop (and Slumping)

From Roger’s friend, Graham

Browsing Roger’s blog postings offers interesting snapshots through time. A shop of curiosities decked with gems formed in deep poetic musings, tattered postcards of conflicts and whimsical ephemera. Playthings of the imagination, broken artifacts of childhood and sketches of zeitgeists vanished. Garlands of dried flowers from summers past and evocations of smiling snowmen long melted. His inner eye ever seeking out that glimmer of fascination in grey streets and overcast skies. His beautiful soul always aspiring for a kinder, gentler world united by love and not divided by oceans of tears.

I must admit that I’ve never met anyone like him before or since. Such friendship is a treasure beyond riches. With the pressures and distractions of life it’s easily to lose sight of that. Certainly it comes as an overwhelming realization with the wound of loss. Healed by time, true enough, but some injuries feel deep-rooted with a dull ache resonating through months and years. I’m sad that I’m not able to call Roger today to compare notes on life’s ups and downs, make each other laugh and take off into wild flights of fancy. Just here, earthbound; trying to motivate myself…

It’s raining lightly here in Essex on a Sunday morning. Quiet with just the patter of rain and faint drone of distant traffic. A gaussian grey veil masks the sun. Smudges of blue tease with notions of fairer weather. The wide bow of the Thames estuary that I overlook reflects the sky like a dusty mirror. Sluggish and lazy. Even the raucous black-headed gulls seem muted, pensive.

I’m fortunate that I don’t have to work on Sundays. I’ll feed the birds shortly. (You’re never truly alone among avian friends.) And then a riverside jog to restore flagging spirits and vitality. I’ll prepare a vegan roast dinner, laze for a bit, and dive into the raging torrent of work emails! (This mitigates the horror of my inbox at the start of a working week.) Finally, some indulgent escapism with a movie and some un-milked chocolate.

I’ll leave you with a poem which I hope captures Roger’s enduring rallying cry to ‘rise above!’. Thanks so much for reading. Please feel free to dip in to Roger’s blog and trust to serendipity whenever curiosity overtakes you…

 

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‘Heaven knows we need never be ashamed of our tears, for they are rain upon the blinding dust of earth, overlying our hard hearts.’  Charles Dickens (Great Expectations)

‘The most important thing in life is to stop saying, ‘I wish’ and start saying, ‘I will’. Consider nothing impossible, then treat possibilities as probabilities.’  Charles Dickens (David Copperfield)

 

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SLUMP or (ALMOST) IN FREEFALL…

 

Slump in a chair, thinking about life
and all the people I’ve known,
wondering where have they gone?

Slump in a chair, thinking about life
and all the things I have done,
wondering where I went wrong?

Slump in a chair, thinking about life
and choices made from the heart,
wondering where fear played a part?

Slump in a chair, thinking about life
and lovers who promised to stay
but left within hours of a night or day

Slump in a chair, thinking about life
and all the years wasted on regret
where I should have stood up to fate

Slump in a chair, thinking about life
and every epiphany I’ve known,
wondering where did I go so wrong?

Slump in a chair, thinking about life
and growing older, weaker,
for knowing I could have done better

Slump in a chair, thinking about death,
and all the people I’ve known,
wondering if there’s a hell or heaven?

Slump in a chair, watching television,
soaking up soap opera friends,
lost the plot, left wondering how it ends

Slump in a chair, fret about being alone?
Not this time (slam on the brakes);
will get my life back, whatever it takes

 

Copyright R N. Taber 2008

Shell Seekers

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

Another poem from the archives of my general blog today which I imagine applies to just about everyone regardless of ethnicity, culture, religion or whatever...which just goes to hammer home the point that we are a common humanity; as such sexuality deserves no less respect that all the other differences that comprise a diverse humanity. I sense that the message is getting across to increasing numbers in the heterosexual majority, but I dare say we still have a long way to go before such blots on the human landscape as bigotry, prejudice and hate crime are finally overcome by the better, stronger, kinder side of human nature.

I have changed the appearance of this poem from the original version that appears in my collection which I first posted here on my general blog in 2007. It is no reflection on the original poem (that has also appeared in other poetry publications) but I felt it was crying out for a makeover of sorts. Some readers, I know, prefer the original version which was always well received when I read it at several poetry readings around the UK. Listeners, of course, unlike readers, are oblivious to how a poem is laid out so hopefully people will like the later version as much as if not more than its predecessor. You are welcome to judge (and let me know) which version you prefer.

Any changes to original poems will appear in revised eds. that I plan to bring out in a few years, but in e-format.

You can see/hear me reading the (revised) poem in an early video on my You Tube channel:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gj2HSJCvvBo

If the link does not work, either go to mu You Tube channel and search under title:

http://www.youtube.com/rogerNtaberOR 

for those of you who tell me you often cannot access You Tube for one reason or another, I have also posted the video here. (See below.)

Meanwhile, especially for Tony, Adam, Kylie and Roxanne from ‘Somewhere in the middle of nowhere’:

Original version (1991):

SHELL SEEKERS

No harder thing I do than loving you
at a distance as of sea and sand
at the going out of each tide,
at each coming up of the sun,
all the colours of morning strung
like prayer beads across the sky,
a benediction! You and I
as footprints on the shore;
Together. Parting. Wiped out.
Another tide, another morning,
another day - someone's searching
who'll know that we were here;
Beyond time and space,
false perimeters of place,
our love well-preserved
nor finer served than
by a shell's poetry, as
restless as the sea,
deceptive as each dawn

Like prayer beads, to
each our own

Revised version (2018):

SHELL SEEKERS

No harder thing I do
than loving you at a distance
as of sea and sand
at the going out of each tide,
each coming up of the sun;
all the colours of morning strung
like prayer beads
across the sky, a benediction!
You and I, footprints
on the shore; together, parting,
wiped out

Another tide,
another morning, another day
and others searching
who will know for sure
we were here

Beyond time and space,
and false perimeters of place,
our love no better served
than preserved in a shell's poetry,
as restless as the open sea,
all the more splendid for that
than any sunset or dawn,
for the dreaming or waking up
with a growing affinity
for all the seasons of life, love
and nature

Like prayer beads,
to each our own interpretation
and/or inspiration;
so, too, the ages-old poetry
of seashells

Copyright R. N. Taber 1999; 2018

[Note: The earlier version of this poem appears in  Love And Human Remains by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2000.]