When the only Way is Up

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

Sometimes we seem to be going nowhere fast, and haven’t a clue what to about it. I felt that way for years. Plans I’d made about becoming a librarian after leaving school depended on my passing at least two A-level exams, but I only passed one. I drifted into my early 20’s with no clear sense of direction and finally decided to migrate to Australia. This didn’t work out, either, but gave me time to take a long, honest look at myself and work out a positive plan of action; this depended on my returning home as it became clear there was no future for me in Oz. As it happened, I couldn’t get a job and soon did just that. I signed up for a course of teacher training in Canterbury, but my first teaching practise made me realise that a hearing problem should not be underestimated. As luck would have it, I was able to transfer to the local university, finally graduating with a good degree in English and American Literature; this, in turn, made me eligible for a postgraduate course in librarianship.

Career-wise, I seemed to be on an even keel at last, but was still grappling with a sexuality I had been raised to believe was ‘sick’ although no longer a criminal offence for consenting adults since 1967. It would be another few years and a bad nervous breakdown later before I would not only be entirely at ease with being gay, but also see my sexuality as a sure positive rather than a defensive one, certainly no negative.

It would be four years after my breakdown before I was eventually able to get a job in my chosen profession, and have never looked back. The only fly in the ointment was a pressing desire to write, and there just weren’t enough hours in the day. In 1993, cutbacks in Local Government spending meant some compulsory redundancies while everyone else at the library where I worked was offered voluntary redundancy. I decided to be positive, accept, and work part-time. Again, I was fortunate enough to get enough work to support myself and try my hand at writing fiction and poetry until I retired in 2004. I didn’t become a best-selling novelist, but have a modest reputation worldwide as a poet and have no regrets. I see gay-interest poetry and fiction as alternative voices of the same genres and have enjoyed exploring and sharing both on my blogs. I only wish I had emerged from my deaf-blind chrysalis years earlier; no butterfly here, but a psyche with which I am no longer anywhere near as unhappy as I was some 50 years ago.

I once commented to an old friend how I felt lost and had no idea even what path next to take in a life that was...a mess. "Well, Roger," he said, "When you reach rock bottom, the only way is up so hadn't you better make start? The sooner, the better by the sound of it. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, right?

Right!

WHEN THE ONLY WAY IS UP

So near, so far, dreams
in the heart desperate to break out
and go live, make themselves known
to an unsuspecting world

So near, so far, thoughts
fit for a positive mind-set playing
fast and loose with a vulnerable psyche
all but unfit for purpose

So near, so far, aspirations
persistently put down by jeers pulsing
a self-esteem deaf-blind to the landscape
of human potential…

Deep breaths and first steps,
picking up the gauntlet thrown down
by die-hard naysayers and doom-mongers
with little or no imagination

Learning the art of persuasion,
pitting it against any nemesis of faith
in the power of positive thinking to prove
a worthy winner over all else

A rush of adrenaline for playing
an active role in life’s amphitheatre
rather than sit with live ghosts in the gallery,
left wishing and hoping in vain

Bit between the teeth, not a time
to be resting on laurels, can do better,
need to take on new roles, new challenges,
critics welcome to any field days

So near, so far, nightmares haunting
a psyche afraid of being measured out
for better or worse according to expectations
thrust upon it by false impressions

Here-and-Now, assigned a lead role
in a past-present-future psyche poised
to explore the rolling see-hear landscape
of human potential

Copyright R. N. Taber 2018