A unique Species of Rose

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[Update: 11/7/2020: I am often criticised for rarely using full stops at the end of stanzas; fair enough, but I see a poem (like life and time) as a continuum; it is meant to give the reader food for thought; for much the same reason, I often hyphenate words to bring them together, such as yesterday-today-tomorrow in the poem below. Hopefully, the reader will continue to consider the implications and relation to the poem’s theme/s long after they have forgotten the poem itself.] RT

In the closing scenes of a classic movie Gone with the Wind - based on a novel of the same name by Margaret Mitchell - its heroine, Scarlett O’Hara, magnificently portrayed by Vivien Leigh, briefly considers confronting some uncomfortable home truths before backing out with the immortal words, “I’ll think about that tomorrow. After all, tomorrow is another day.”

How many of us, I wonder, have told ourselves much the same thing, and for how many of us has that changed much, if anything …?

Me? As guilty as sin … as are most if not all of us.

Meanwhile, while time passes and, for the most part, poor, misunderstood humanity persists in pausing at the brink of self-awareness … if only to excuse this or that course of action (or inaction) should it ever be called to account.  

Time, marking the days that come and go in our lives, may well be much the same for everyone; it is how we choose to nurture those days (or not, as the case may be) that makes them unique for each and every one of us, whoever and wherever. Raison d'être, too, is unique, to every individual even in shared circumstances like relationships; I dare say the world would be a better, kinder, place if only we were (all) to remember that, more often, especially those among us - in all walks of life - inclined to rush to judgement.

“It’s the time that you spent on your rose that makes your rose so important…" 

- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

A UNIQUE SPECIES OF ROSE

Yesterday, I’d traverse deserts,

goaded by false images to kneel and drink

from oases of illusion

Yesterday, I’d climb leafy trees

browse the words of ancient philosophers

in passing clouds

Yesterday, I’d swim in the oceans,

bear witness to creatures choking to death

on human waste

Today, I’ll try to pass on something

of lessons learned by the mind-body-spirit

in poetry and prose

Today, I’ll try stirring cloth ears

all but glued to mobile phones into hearing

global warnings

Today, I’d do an Internet search

for answers to questions ever plaguing me,

but, alas, no wi-fi

Tomorrow, I’ll join other nomads

(still) misled by fake news, kneeling to drink

from oases of delusion

Tomorrow, I’ll ask the few trees left

how Earth Mother might have had us comply

had we but listened …?

Tomorrow, I’ll start thinking of ways

to prevent stereotypes slamming down the lid

of the box they put me in

Yesterday-today-tomorrow, live streams

of consciousness calling on Earth to reconcile

nature and human nature

Yesterday-today-tomorrow, last spotted

sailing under false colours where imagination

having settle for cast-offs

Yesterday-today-tomorrow, making hay

in the sunshine, world clocks winding us up

and down, up and down ...

Copyright R. N. Taber 2019

Tapping into Social Conscience OR Shaking Up Society

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Few people set out to deliberately hurt others. It’s just a sad fact of human nature that some  are so blinkered to any if not all home truths that it’s just the way they are; we can take it or leave it. More needs to be done, especially in schools, by way of educating the blinkered among us to the harsher realities of life, an how we can combat them.

With several people who have played a significant part in my life, it took 20+ years before I finally decided to call it a day. Since being diagnosed with prostate cancer in February 2011, I have written off more fair weather friendships. 

There was a time I’d have been philosophical to the extent of being stoical and simply accepted the situation, telling myself I was being selfish and others had their own lives to lead and resuming the friendship once this or that crisis to which I had been subjected and they preferred to turn a blind eye had passed. Not anymore though. Since turning 60 (born in 1945) I decided that enough is enough, and time is too precious to waste on such people. .

So why do I feel so guilty about it...?

It is easy enough to jump to wrong conclusions or fall prey to false impressions passed on and further distorted by gossips, hackers and the like. I guess we need to give people - especially family and friends - the benefit of any doubt; it works both ways, though ... doesn't it?

[Update 2/2016: I still feel much the same way if not more so. Having spent nearly eighteen months learning to walk again after smashing up my foot in a bad fall during the summer of 2014, I now know for sure who my real friends are. I was housebound for five months during which relatively few so-called friends could be bothered to even pick up a phone for a chat, which would have meant a lot. Oh, I haven't given up on all my fair weather friends, but our association is much the worse for wear and I will see to it that I spend far less time with them than in future.]

This poem is a kenning.

TAPPING INTO SOCIAL CONSCIENCE or SHAKING UP SOCIETY

I’ve run the gauntlet

of love, life, fun, and tears,

trying to make the best

of things rather than complain

about the worst years,

struggling to rise above

the pain human beings

inflict upon each other time

and time again

I turn to nature

for comfort and brief respite

from a daily torture

humanity asks me to endure

with all the dignity

and stoicism of someone

always expected to put

other people’s needs before

his or her own

I lie awake at night

wondering who or what

is wrong or right

amongst all that’s been said

and done in the course

of whatever merry chase

mischievous Apollo

and outcast Cassiopeia care

to lead us on

I am that heartbeat of humanity
embracing its own vulnerability

Copyright R. N. Taber 2011

Christmas, Glossing Over Missed Opportunities

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At this time of year, people often tell me they are so looking forward to Christmas because they see it as a reason for celebration and renewal, usually more in a temporal than religious sense, as if Christmas will make everything bad in their lives so much better, keeping up the momentum until New Year, and then…?

Too often, the bubble of make-believe is burst soon enough as January arrives with all the indifference to human potential of a Grim Reaper.

We may not be altogether masters of our own fate, but life is what we make it. Mind and body may well be subject to external influences, sometimes of the worst kind, but the human spirit is better than that, and deserves to be given its head. The inner self knows us better than we think we know ourselves, and more of us need to listen rather than turn a deaf ear in favour of false (if attractive) promises the world often makes but has no intention of keeping.

Christmas, like all religious festivals is too often seen as signposting a sanctuary or at least some respite or escape from the harsher elements of life threatening to overwhelm us. Rarely, in my experience, will religion remove the threat for long; we need to build on the spirit and spirituality of peace and love (religion may have its share of both, but no monopoly), not be afraid to ask for help, and make a better life for ourselves on terms we will not flinch from meeting, no matter whether they are unacceptable to those who think they know us better than we know ourselves.

CHRISTMAS, GLOSSING OVER MISSED OPPORTUNITIES

Rain soaking the shirt, jeans;

body responding freely

to Earth Mother’s call to live,

let live, and get real

Face upturned, glad to be out

getting wet, mind distracted;

domestic crises, work targets

and assessments wreaking

havoc (with the best intentions)

stifling that very inspiration

meant to persuade, encourage,

leaves us feeling like flies

feeding on garbage left out

for the bin men, fodder for stray

cats, dogs, homeless folks, waiting

for Christmas

Oh, we may have a job, home,

mortgage etcetera - but a life

to call our own…?

Some may beg to differ, thinking

through yet another staff rota

at supper or marking homework

once guests (finally) gone home

to snug beds, 1001 nights and more

besides of cramming heads,

misting-up eyes, asking questions,

stirring up more lies and half lies

meant to persuade, encourage, only

to leave us feeling like flies

on garbage left for the bin men

to dispose

Christmas comes, Christmas goes;

it’s the inner self knows best

how to make the most of a potential

too precious to waste

Copyright R. N. Taber 2005; 2018

[Note: An earlier version of this poem appears under the title 'Waiting for Christmas' in A Feeling for the Quickness of Time, Assembly Books, 2005; revised ed. in e-format in preparation.]

Passage Home OR Nature at the Helm

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We may travel far and wide in life or not all. It’s the going (or staying) wherever and doing whatever makes us and others happy that is journey enough for most people.

Yes, most if not all of us make mistakes and sometimes lose our way. But it’s my belief that those among us who make the journey for the right reasons can’t go too far wrong even though it may sometimes seem otherwise.

As for making the passage home, that’s wherever (and with whomsoever?) we feel the need to be; journey’s end.

PASSAGE HOME or NATURE AT THE HELM

I have heard waves whisper

of battles lost and won

on stormy seas, in far places,

among others demanding a turn

at the helm

I have watched clouds paint

pictures of losers, victors,

those staying on to dry a tear,

others preferring to turn a deaf ear

than take the helm

I have beached lonely shore

and coral reef, swam

with fishes, come to grief

in oceans surreal for abandoning

the helm

Time, our seasoned captain

has nailed my colours  

to its mast while stars, moon,

and rising sun insist on taking turns

at the helm

Passage home…

Copyright R. N. Taber 2002; 2014

[Note: An earlier version of this poem appears in First Person Plural by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2002.]

Notes on the Sociology of Imagination

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As we grow up, we like to think we embrace the world and its greater wisdom. Yet, we grow old and look at a divided humanity across the world, wondering…whatever happened to wisdom?

Thank goodness for imagination: inspiration, escapism, and the sense of a better, kinder world never entirely out of reach.

NOTES ON THE SOCIOLOGY OF IMAGINATION

Child,

chasing a white rabbit,

relishing the thrill

of discovering places

nobody knows

so nobody goes, and secrets

mean safety

Youth, 

scornful of white rabbits,

relishing the thrill

of reworking everyday

text-speak

if only to nurture new ideas,

keep them safe

Mature,

mindful of a feisty rabbit

relishing the thrill

of discovering places

nobody knows

so nobody goes, and secrets

mean power

Old,

conjuring up reflections,

of Once-upon-a-time,

struggling to make sense

of Here-and-Now,

wondering whatever happened

to its dreams...

Rabbit droppings, proof of life

in a Hall of Mirrors

Copyright R. N. Taber 2014

Hollywood Boulevard

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Many of us dream of fame and fortune, especially when we are feeling low and life is not working out too well for us. Fortunately, most of us have both feet planted firmly in terra firma and begin to mull over the down side of fame and fortune; lack of privacy, petty jealousies and one-upmanship, not forgetting critics who haven’t a creative bone in their bodies yet feel qualified to judge the creative performances of others...

Better by far to settle for the best of things on our side of the proverbial fence. Even so, a little daydreaming does no harm...

Me? I just enjoy writing poetry, as much as a form of creative therapy as an art form. I have been prone to depression since childhood, and it is no coincidence that my first published poem appeared in my school magazine when I was only 11 years-old. Writing, painting, music, gardening...any form of creative therapy that a person enjoys and can keep his or her demons at bay has to be worth the effort...doesn't it?  As for fame and fortune... a welcome by-product, of course, but far less of a priority than any pleasure and personal satisfaction, especially when the shared by others, and making a difference. I don't expect anyone to like everything I write, but I so love it when readers get in touch to say that reading a poem of mine - in either of my poetry blogs, general or gay-interest - has helped motivate them to improving their quality of life.

HOLLYWOOD BOULEVARD

Walked with Fame one afternoon, watery sun
and a misty rain;
man, woman, couldn’t tell - Humphrey Bogart
or Lauren Bacall?
Better than any movie, the suspense
was really getting to me,
and where would I be by the end of the day?
(Good question...)

Strained to hear what my companion
had to say about it, though abysmally scripted;
caught words like fate, jealousy, love, hate,
sounding as trite as Mother’s plastic mac worn
to fend off a heavy summer storm;
only, no storm broke nor did any ghost
call me out, settling for thinly disguised threats
and nagging innuendo

Should I take the bait? Oh, I thought I might,
but - no!
Rather, I quickened my step, widening the gap
between us,
hardly able to see hand in front of face
for tears,
a now glaring sun hastening to dispel mist, rain,
and human anxieties

Copyright R. N. Taber2005; 2009



[Note: An earlier version of this poem appears in 1st eds. of A Feeling For The Quickness Of Time by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books 2005; 2nd ed. in preparation].