It's not so Different if you're Gay

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

This poem is from my gay-interest blog archives for March 2012. I confess I had reservations about carrying over some poems from one blog to another, but many readers seem to like it so I will continue, for now at least, especially as health problems (in my 70's now) mean I am not always feeling up to composing new poems. Archives are listed on and can be accessed from the right hand side of any page on this, my gay-interest (G-A-Y in the Subject Field) or fiction (Fiction in the Subject Field) blogs.

Straight and gay friends alike have told me how they thought they had found the love of their lives, only to discover that all he or she wanted was sex.

Now, I'm not knocking sex, but so many of us are in love with the idea of falling in love, and good sex can be very persuasive.  Love, though, now that's something else, and if sex was good before, love adds a whole new dimension and meaning; there is a whole lot more to love than good sex.

Love, loss, grief, pain, relief, happiness, joy...all are feelings common to everyone. I can only say (and should not need to) that...

IT’S NOT SO DIFFERENT IF YOU’RE GAY

Sunshine threw a veil across the sea,

keeping you from me

as we shared the heat of frantic kisses

in anxious embraces;

lithe limbs, every contour of your face,

I dared trace…

among the smouldering ashes of noon,

promises made at dawn

Against your body’s rhythmic heaving,

the poetry of leave-taking

exploded love’s bitter-sweetness in me

(myth v reality?);

Clouds, like exhausted lovers sprawled

on a water bed

turned to the mechanics of bland gesture

signifying bad weather

We put into harbour barely interacting

with each other,

you so distant, anxious to drop anchor

and dash ashore;

a storm broke, but unexpectedly mild,

like the tears of child,

for no better reason than a desire to cry

as did I…

There would be other lovers, other times,

and other poems;

more storms, too, I could be sure of that

and keep a look-out;

yet, if that day on the water played tricks

on me with sex

I took for love, I’d learned the hard way,

it’s no different if you’re gay

  

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