Cold Hands, Warm Heart

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

A reader asks how I can write about the power of love when I am growing old and living alone. Love, the same reader suggests, is  "... a fool's game, a fantasy, here today and gone tomorrow".  I disagree, of course, although I understand where the reader is coming from, especially as he, too, lives alone.

As I have said on the blog many times. love comes in all shapes and sizes; once we let it in to mind-body-spirit, it is there forever. We may love a person, and that person my leave us or die, but the love we once had for that person does not die with them. We may love a place, and developers may move in and destroy any  natural beauty that once so captivated us; in our mind's eye though, it will remain the same albeit out love for it touched by sadness. Well, that has been my experience of certain very special people and places anyway... and they are always on hand to distract and inspire me whenever my mind-body-spirit feels inclined to dwell on the darker side of life.

Now, winter will be with us here in the UK for awhile yet, as will the threat of Covid-19. People are feeling scared as well as cold. In some parts of the North, families have been evacuated from their homes due to flooding after persistent heavy rainfall and/or snow; our thoughts are with them during these hardest of times. 

All we can do is get my as best we can, try not to worry (easier said than done, I know!) and keep to the Covid-19 safety regulations by staying at home as much as possible and, when exercising outdoors, taking care to avoid crowds and maintain social distancing. I wear a face mask all the time too. When  shopping, or using public transport, it is obligatory to wear a face mask (unless exempt for medical reasons) not only for our own protection, but for everyone else’s.

 It all sounds simple enough, yet there are still those who seem not to give a damn about themselves or anyone else. I, for one, am sick and tired of hearing various (baseless) conspiracy theories regarding Covid-19; invariably, it is sheer arrogance,  an excuse for being self-centred and selfish rather than a genuine belief. 

Meanwhile, yours truly struggles to make the best of things. Hopefully my later poems are not as bad as I often feel these days.. 😉 

COLD HANDS, WARM HEART 

Hearts in winter,
inevitably mulling far kinder times;
spring sunshine,
awaking nature to its potential,
reminding seedlings
they are contracted by Earth Mother
to grow, if only to bring
splashes of colour to such everyday gardens
as per everyday lives 

Cold, the hands,
reaching out for such reassurances
as only memories
in 3-D and full colour can revisit,
human consciousness
flying as wild and free as songbirds,
mind-body-spirit
searching time and space for what once it had,
called happiness 

Such warmth,
at disengaging with the Spirit of Winter
long enough
for everyday life forms to revert
to customising
such forces of nature and human nature
as embrace potential
rather than see either fail miserably or (worse still)
come to nothing 

Let love inspire
the dimmest fire to create home movies
in 3-D,
invite mind-body s
irit to cease railing
against faux fate,
but celebrate its glow, even as it fades away
for giving way
to human hearts resolving not to be left out in the cold,
but regenerate… 

There are few things love would have us savour longer
than surviving its winters much the stronger

 Copyright R. N. Taber 2021