L-I-F-E, the many Faces of Love

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

Elton John has accused the Vatican of “hypocrisy” over its decision to prohibit the blessing of same-sex unions, pointing out that the Holy See reportedly indirectly invested in his Rocketman biopic. Good for Elton, I say.

Now, poets are inclined to be very spiritual people and I reject the view that I should be denied a sense of spirituality because I do not subscribe to any of the world religions; religion does not have a monopoly on spirituality.

The main reason I have been drawn to Pantheism for many years is that it has a spirituality to which I can relate, can feel, something religions of the world would deny me because I am gay. Gay men and women need a physical as well as a spiritual relationship with their partners; it is an expression of love, after all, above and beyond anything words can say. 

The idea put forward by certain religious leaders that being a gay person is acceptable so long as he or she remains celibate is absurd, and just goes to how they are so bound by dogma that they have little real understanding of the natural human spirit.

Being gay is a human condition, not a choice. Homosexuality can be dictated by no one, nor does it deserve to be abused by way of interpretation from any source that would have it make a 'sinner' of anyone or, worse, make them appear less human. 

Religions of the world are, of course, entitled to their convictions regarding same sex relationships, but those who don't share those same convictions deserve better than to be verbally and openly abused for it. 

As for a sense of spirituality, whether it relates to an ethereal God-like Being whom Holy Books would have us believe in, and/ or addresses the spirituality with which the natural world embraces us... who's to say engaging with either or both is right or wrong?

L-I-F-E, THE MANY FACES OF LOVE 

He said he liked my tie
(as good a chat-up line as any
then offered to buy me
a beer, taking my broad grin
as the go-ahead
for a conversation’s many a twist
and turn of face
before we finally got around to going
back to his place 

I hadn’t expected to fall
in love with the guy, but love
has an agenda
all its own, and I was hooked
from the start,
the heart, too, inclined to move
in mysterious ways
as left mine feeling, oh,  so happy-sad
and wishing on stars 

It was on the anniversary
of the first hundred days since we met
that we saw a pastor,
asked him to marry us, let us make
the kind of home
to which all couples in love aspire,
but he sighed, insisting
we confess to be living in sin, ‘God is Love’
notwithstanding

To be or not to be? A fair enough question,
but can religion wholly answer for Heaven?

Copyright R. N. Taber, 2021

[Note: Needless to say, this post-poem also appears on my gay-interest blog today.] RT