Ode to Apollo, Profile of a Life Force

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

I have just uploaded the second of three Stourhead videos/poems to You Tube, shot by my close friend Graham Collet and for which I wrote Ode To Apollo (see poem below). 

http://www.youtube.com/rogerNtaber

Regular readers of my poetry will know that I have a strong affinity with Apollo, the sun god of Greek mythology, not least because he was reputed to be bisexual. The old gods are the stuff of mythology and legend now, but have we not replaced them with little tin gods of our own which, incidentally, have far less gravitas?

The Temple of Apollo at Stourhead stands high on a hill overlooking the gardens; it was built in 1765 by Henry Hoare as his finishing touch to the famous landscape garden. Renovation work was begun by the National Trust in 2009 before which the Trust spent months gathering historic paintings, family records, accounts, letters and visitors' diaries to find out how the monument would have originally appeared. 

The temple at Stourhead was designed by Henry Flitcroft and influenced by an engraving of a circular temple at Baalbec, an ancient Syrian city now part of the Lebanon, and the Temple of the Sun at Kew Gardens, which was destroyed in a gale during 1916. A favourite spot for romance, it was used as the location for a rain-drenched dramatic exchange between Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet in the 2005 remake of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice starring Keira Knightley and Matthew Macfadyen. Timber from the Stourhead estate was used to form the structure of the new dome which has been covered in sheets of lead to keep it watertight. The walls inside the temple have been re-plastered and gilded plasterwork based on a description in a letter written in 1801 by Reverend Warner, the Rector of Stourton.

Rev Warner's letter states: "The roof of the Temple spreads into a dome and has a double ceiling; in the lower is the aperture, and in the coving of the other, a splendid gilt representation of the Solar Rays, which, receiving the real light of this orb by an artful construction, throws into the Temple below a most splendid reflection when the sun is in its strength."

Well worth a visit on a sunny day.

ODE TO APOLLO, PROFILE OF A LIFE FORCE

Hear old gods mocking us

behind passing clouds

as a defeated foe well might

for observing its enemies

counting the ever rising costs
of victory

Only Apollo (still) brokers

an enduring peace

without taking sides or even

an ulterior motive

besides a voyeur’s delight

in human behaviour

Where the world rides out

its storms over land,

sea and air, find fair Apollo

behind the scenes

busy negotiating its survival,

albeit conditional

Where time wings past us

at a tangent,

see Apollo rein in his chariot

just long enough

to shine hope in our faces,

the rest up to us

For every bitter-sweet smile,

a bitter-sweet tear

at Apollo’s call to nature

and human nature

for nurture, reconciliation,

and regeneration

Meanwhile, all life presses on

with the act of Being;

the Here-and-Now engaging

with us for better,

for worse, ugly or beautiful,

old gods or new

Copyright R. N. Taber 2014

 

A Hymn To Nature

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Like most poets, I am inspired by nature, not least perhaps for the ways in which it mirrors human behaviour…now benign and beautiful, now almost the opposite although always beautiful, even in a rage.

By its very history, humanity, it has to be said, has demonstrated a feeling for nature’s capacity for regeneration and survival. Nature, on the other hand, does not make war on its own kind. Nor does it discriminate among its own in the way many humans do. I dare say gay men and women are closer to nature in the latter respect than most…so who’s to say we are ‘unnatural’ in the way we conduct ourselves?

As for sexuality, all the world religions appear reach some agreement in various beliefs that make God responsible for the creation of all human beings. (What happens next is down to us). Christians, for example, are always telling us that God made us in His own image.

Me, I don’t like the image of God various religions like to convey, invariably made in their own image. On the other hand, I can easily reconcile a strong sense of spirituality to what I see in the natural world.

[Update 8/14: I have just recorded this poem along with another for my You Tube channel to accompany a video of Stourhead (National Trust Gardens); it is the third and last of three Stourhead videos. You can access my channel at: http://www.youtube.com/rogerNtaber ]

A HYMN TO NATURE

On the left hand of spring,

pause among dog roses,

where choral voices bring

its bitter-sweet centuries

In summer, listen yet again

to the same wistful plea

of an ancient congregation

keeping faith with history

Inspiring, autumnal places,

stoic trees weeping

for the tears on human faces

where winter creeping

Resuming, come December,

its place in nature’s womb,

eternal echo, a sure reminder

of where we came from

Copyright R. N. Taber 2009