Life Force, Lifeline

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

It is all very well for President Donald Trump to urge us not to be afraid of the Covid-19 coronavirus, but few of us ordinary folks have access to the best health care available; there are those in those in parts of the world without the kind of NHS system we have here in the UK who can barely access the minimum. It is OK to be scared, and only human. 

At the risk of being a bore for repeating myself yet again, there is a free health service available to us all; no guarantees, but a life force that is first among equals and will, as likely as not, see us through the worst. Nor do I see any failure to survive as the ‘worst’; the end of one thing is invariably the beginning of another, although it may take us some time to see that.  

Death, as I see it, means leaving nothing and no one behind; the life we lead is part of who we are, and part of who we are is passed on from generation to generation. The loss of a loved one of the hardest things we have to bear in this life, yet the life force generated by that love remains as much a life force within us as ever, to be called upon whenever. 

A widower friend once told me that he hopes to see his late wife again in some after-life that, as a Christian, he would call Heaven. I would suggest the operative word here, though, is not Heaven but hope; lose hope, and we lose our hold on as precious a lifeline as mind-body-spirit in its innate wisdom, can throw us.  It can be a tenuous hold at times, for sure, but like many if not most people, I have had my share of bad times, having survived thus far because Hope has always been on call  to help me find a way through the darkness, even if where I’ve ended up has rarely been quite (if at all) where I had intended to be 

That’s life; it doesn’t always go to plan, but, like is closest kin, the Spirit of Love, it will see us through … if we let it. 

Now, regular readers know that I do not subscribe to any formal religion, not least because it has always struck me how each has its own agenda and is inclined to be something of a closed shop. I do consider myself something of a Pantheist though. Whatever, Hope is an open door anyone can walk through and find their way through life within or without the confines of any religious dogma.

Today's (new) poem is a villanelle.

 LIFE-FORCE, LIFELINE

A carer for all human plight,
kin to Apollo and Earth Mother,
always on call, day and night

Its sun, moon, stars, my light,
serving the best of human nature,
a carer for all human plight 

I come to fight the good fight,
loyal ally to humanity like no other;
always on call, day and night 

I will clear Despair’s fading sight,
attend mind-body-spirit’s deaf ear,
a carer for all human plight

I cannot make wrongs come right,
only a kinder, wiser course help steer,
always on call day and night 

I am Hope, in whom all take delight,
notwithstanding our going get tougher;
a carer for all human plight,
always on call, day and night

 Copyright R N Taber 2020