A Poet's Blog: Roger N.Taber shares his thoughts & poems...

Thoughts and observations by English poet Roger N. Taber, a retired librarian and poet-novelist.- "Ethnicity, Religion, Gender, Sexuality ... these are but parts of a whole. It is the whole that counts." RNT [NB While I have no wish to create a social network, I will always reply to critical emails about my poetry. Contact: rogertab@aol.com].

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Location: London, United Kingdom

Sadly, a bad fall in 2012 has left me with a mobility problem, and being diagnosed with prostate cancer the same year hasn't helped, but I get out and about with my trusty walking stick as much as I can, take each day as it comes and try to keep looking on the bright(er) side of life. Many of my poems reflect the need to nurture a positive-thinking mindset whatever life throws at us.

Monday, 13 July 2020

Human Spirit, Life Forces

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

Today’s poem is, yes, another kenning; it first appeared on the blog in November 2009, again in 2011 and today (for a second time) by 'Hannah and Jonathan’ for no special reason other than "it always lifts our spirits." Well, thank you, folks, happy to oblige.

Several people have commented to me recently that they feel "like death warmed up" and /or "totally drained" by the pandemic and its everyday implications for and limitations on everyday life; and so say all of us, I suspect. We can but stay positive and trust the human spirit to help us run the gamut and survive the stronger, not than weaker for it. Never easy, of course, even at the best of times.

A friend I knew as a student once confided that he 'envied' poets and others engaging in the arts because ' they can experience at first hand the everlasting quality of a vibrant Poetry of Life that passes so many of us by. At best..." he conceded, "...we can enjoy it while it lasts, provided we even recognise it for what it is at the time, of course. But, let's face it who want to be reminded once it moves on? I mean to say, no one wants to be reminded of any what-might-have-been, do they?"

While these were rhetorical questions, of course, I practised my right to agree to differ anyway, pointing out that no human experience either passes us by or even moves on completely, but remains a part of us, and whether we like/acknowledge it or not, it helps shape who we are and how we learn from whatever might-have-been may have affected us as it clearly had my friend. He shrugged, commented that "you arty types are all the same, always looking on the brighter side of life, and expecting the rest of us to take a leaf out of your poetry books." We both laughed. and he changed the subject.

Strange, isn't it, how some conversations stay with you like the lyric of a song you can't forget, as much for the singer as the song, if not more so...? Arts and artists, they help shape our lives along with their own; as for who gets the better deal, active participant or audience, that's anyone's guess, although I suspect it is in some timely inspiration that lies the key to any answers. Nor should it ever be assumed that anyone outside the arts field has ever been excluded from enjoying the Poetry of Life; it is a global consciousness, open to and welcoming anyone whose natural spirit engages with the poetry (and prose) of life in all its human diversity of expression and experience.

As regular readers of either or both poetry blogs will know only too well, I subscribe to no religion as such; an empathy with nature since childhood, though, leads me confess an intimate relationship with Pantheism in the sense that I see any 'God' as nature, rather than its creator, having never felt comfortable with the idea of a personified God.

Sadly, while I respect world religion/s, few who enter into them respect my point of view; neither atheist nor agnostic am I, though, so can we not simply agree to differ and get on with our lives without invoking words on historical tablets of stone that would keep us apart ...?

So ...what happens to the human spirit once its host body dies?  Regular readers will know by now that my sense of a posthumous consciousness is another of the life forces my poem suggests drives  a human spirit that ia not only eternal, but also, in its own unique way, continues to not only make a 'live' contribution to history .... be it in a personal and/or wider sense.

HUMAN SPIRIT, LIFE FORCES

I am that life force feeling its way
into dreams, making sure moon and stars
shine love’s light through layers
of darkness if only to reveal what’s real
in a world so easily misled by word
or gesture, generally making a poor show
of communicating such feelings
as all our kinder senses often banging
at the doors of closed minds

I am that life force lending a shoulder
to cry on, an ear to confide in, sees caution
thrown to the wind and returns it
as a kindness, suggesting we reconsider
persistently pitting human nature
against its other selves, risk losing face
in the eyes of old (and new) gods
looking down on our crude obsession
with mortality, and wondering why

I am that life force to whom they turn
whom flames of any passion would devour
for better, for worse, but only ashes
where we'd have left a blaze of memory
to comfort, leave us feeling secure,
whatever some Grim Reaper may yet
demand of us; no life force, he,
intending to override the Poetry of Life,
foiled by the resilience of its humanity

Come day or night, find me, Earth Mother,
archiving centuries of nurture

Copyright R. N. Taber 2010, rev.2020

[Note: This post/ poem also appears on my gay-interest poetry blog today given that the poem (no less than all poetry) is all-inclusive, and feedback suggests many readers only drop in to one or the other blog; an earlier version of the poem appears under the title The Archivist in On the Battlefields of Love by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2010.] RNT

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