L-I-F-E, Dreams and Dragons

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

I wrote today’s poem to help lift me out of a pit of despair, mostly due to years of hormone therapy for the prostate cancer, but with more than a little help from my landlord and certain neighbours. 

Fortunately, I was able to phone a close friend who encouraged me to rise above the worst of my feelings and hitch a ride on a dragon.

Yes, you've guessed it. Having learned long ago that crying over spilt milk gets no one anywhere fast, I made a stab at thinking and writing myself into a less torturous frame of mind. 

As creative therapy, it worked a treat As for what readers will make of the poem, I can but hope they will be less critical of it than I was a few hours ago of the same mind-body-spirit that came close to failing its host poet altogether... 

Among other things a wise old aborigine told me some 50+ years ago, "The only way to deal with despair is with patience. Look it in the eye, dry its tears, insist things can only get better - and they will... eventually."

L-I-F-E, DREAMS AND DRAGONS 

At the very edge of free fall
peering down into a bottomless pit,
all parts of mind-body-spirit
struggling to rise above such fears
as denied even any tears
for its more perceptive selves left dumb
by their own screams 

Teetering, too fearful even
to take a step either forwards or back,
no real sense of direction,
only an intense awareness of being
an abstraction of sorts,
all or nothing, depending how an inner eye
sees what it will 

A kaleidoscope of colours
attempts to perform art in a vacuum,
succeeds only in confusing
the mind, distracting a body left to rely
on some nameless spirit
to make something or nothing of what’s left
have us act accordingly 

Colours, now finding voices,
intent on transforming any senselessness,
bent on lending it images
such as inner-selves project on clouds,
dead eyes coming alive
for recognising a dragon’s head breathing fire
snatched from Apollo

Legs, recoiling instinctively,
stumbling, now arms flung out to save
from falling, dragon descending;
now clambering its scales, now astride,
flying low over landscapes
I used to know and love, inspiring such worlds
as the best dreams spin us 

At the very edge of nightmares,
waking to the sound of birdsong, sunlight
chasing shadows, creating art forms,
reminding mind-body-spirit (as one again)
that if nothing comes of nothing,
it well may be for failing to let inner selves loose
on the likes of dream dragons.

Copyright R. N. Taber, 2021