The Borrowers OR Human Nature, a Mind of its Own

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

Today's poem first appeared on my gay-interest blog  in 2013.

While feedback suggests relatively few reader dip into both blogs, I would suggest that human nature is such that there are closer parallels  between them than some of us might care to concede.  Love, though, is above all that and male (and female) bonding is - as it has always been, and always will be - a fact of life. Yes, there are certain lines drawn in sand - just as there have always been and always will be; whether or not close friends choose to cross them is - yes, as it has always been and always will be, down to human nature. 

I was in love with a close friend for a long time. He is gay too, but has never felt the same way. Even so, he has always loved me as a friend and I’ve had to be content with that.

In time, I learned how to let passion go and settled down to enjoy a platonic love we lend and borrow by way of supporting each other all the time.

THE BORROWERS or HUMAN NATURE, A MIND OF ITS OWN

You lay your head on 

my shoulder, its presence there

stirring such feelings in me 

I thought, long gone, no part of me again,

but I was wrong;

my heart bursts into song, if sadly

 for such love cannot be

as I would wish but must settle 

for - what, exactly? 

Not less or (ever) second best,

but first among equals 

where friends touch base with Plato,

no need for words

You are a treasure my heart 

will prize above all else, be glad 

for each time I see your eyes

 smiling into mine or tears even for waves 

of hurt rising like a flood 

in you while I can but do my best 

with mere words to aid, 

inspire, reassure, lend a shoulder 

to trust, an arm to lean upon, 

embrace you as friend to friend, 

longing to hold and kiss you, 

yet unwilling to risk more (far, far more)

than I could bear to lose

True, your love comes not 

as I would dearly have it, yet no less

truly beautiful for that,

nor let it ever be still, this passion in me, 

but forever grow, 

lending you to me and me to you 

in ways this body dare not 

even hope to know ... 

where wishful thinking asks questions 

of history’s blurring sight 

for watching antics of a heart 

deserving more than its slow-fast beatings

here, on my shoulder

Copyright R. N. Taber 2005; 2020

[Note: An earlier version of this poem appears in A Feeling for the Quickness of Time by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2005.]

Predator, Invisible Enemy

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

It being National HIV Testing Week, it seemed a good idea to drop by with this poem from my gay-interest blog archives for March 2013...

Gay or straight, there is no room for complacency regarding HIV-AIDS. We all owe it to ourselves and any potential sex partners to be responsible about sex and use a condom.

It might help if HIV-AIDS were not still something of a taboo subject with many people...

Education has to be the key to raise HIV-AIDS Awareness, in which context I wholeheartedly support organisations like DAMSET whose volunteers created a mural for people who have died of AIDS across Dorset; it involved going into schools and talking about HIV-AIDS. The tiles on the mural were designed by schoolchildren.

I would love to see similar projects worldwide:

http://damset.co.uk

[See also:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKzi9VRjuq0 on my You Tube channel OR search for 'Autobiography of a Beach' on the blog where the video accompanying it is also available.)

PREDATOR, INVISIBLE ENEMY

I have no need to look far for prey,

just follow footprints in the clay

where careless minds feed on a heat

in the blood as if it were for water,

rice or bread, answer to an everyday

need; no problem for a seasoned

tracker such as I, descending upon

bodies nursing what surely has to be

the world’s worst inhumanity

Unable to tell where my axe will fall,

some convince themselves I am

no real threat at all, rather something

akin to a bogeyman, hardly a figment

of the imagination but best consigned

to a cosy corner of a mind less likely

consider why so many get so careless

in the first place. Besides, who wants

to look a bogeyman in the face?

Men, women and children cannot run

from me unless privy to such ways

of the world even I cannot pin down,

kill slowly or, for a while at least,

subject to slavery; every act, thought,

bought with their sweat and tears,

save for those who have the measure

of my intention and can readily access

the means of best protection

In the blood, tracking footprints any size,

I, the predator, who am HIV-AIDS

[From: On The Battlefields Of Love by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2010]

Inside-Out

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

This poem appeared on my gay-interest blog in September, and I have been asked by a teenage reader (not out to family and friends) to post it here as well.

Every now and then, a young person emails me to say they are gay, in their teens, and have no idea what to do or where to turn. Many are convinced parents and peers will turn against them. Believe me you are not alone. When I think back to when I was 14 years old and realised I am gay, the whole closet ethos threatens to overwhelm me all over again.

In many areas, in many countries, there are support groups that did not exist when I was a teenager in the 1960's; search the Internet and try and make contact as this will enable you to meet other young people in the same situation. As for parents and peers, they may well surprise you, they may even  have observed for themselves that you might be gay and have been waiting for you to talk to them about it, not wanting to raise the subject themselves for fear of being mistaken; if not, yes, they may be hostile at first, but this could be an initial shock reaction. Remember how long it took you to come to terms with being gay and allow them,too, time to get used to the idea.

Never underestimate the power of love and friendship.

Sometimes, of course, family and friends refuse to accept gay people, even within their own family circles. This degree of rejection is incredibly hard to bear, but we need to build on the same strength of willpower and character that brought us out of that awful closet in the first place. Believe me, there is a life to be had and enjoyed out there, and there are many good people who gladly take others as they find them whether they be gay, straight, transgender...whatever. We are stereotyped by many, and it is often the stereotype that is vilified, not the person. Whatever, it is we LGBT folks who are so often made to suffer for that ignorance and bigotry.

To LGBT people around the world, I say this. Never, but never let anyone else put you down or make you think any less of yourself for your sexuality. Where staying in the proverbial closet is necessary, for now at least, confide in someone you can trust wherever possible; this may be a close relative, friend or perhaps a teacher less likely to be judgemental than most. Failing that, and failing the availability of any known support groups in your area, be guided by your better instincts and plain common sense until such a time as you can see your way clear to put closet days behind you once and for all, as I did, although, in hindsight, I should have done so years earlier.

No escape from the closet, for whatever reason?  There is an LGBT grapevine in every environment, so keep an ear out for it if only because a closet shared is a crisis halved. I was a psychological mess for years, but listening out for the grapevine and being part of a closet community probably saved my sanity while I wrestled with all the other issues - good,bad and ugly - with which life tests us at any age, but especially when we are young, emotionally inexperienced, and so often made to feel out of our depth.

INSIDE-OUT

His finger brushes mine
across the desk we share in class
and I can feel his gaze
on me out of the corner of an eye
but cannot, dare not
meet it, for fear someone might see us
and guess the turmoil in me

Can it be that he's gay
this classmate I'd joke with about
all sorts, and our laughter
would spread right through me
like fizzy lemonade
on a hot day, its bubbles applauding us
as we sail through the air?

Can it be that I'm gay too,
but how do I know, and what to do
if his finger means business
and he wants to take our friendship
beyond such felt horizons
as assailing  bleary, but half closed eyes
come some know-it-all dawn?

Barely attending the lesson,
the farthest corners of our eyes engage,
attempting to read between lines
blurred by mixed feelings for years,
given our having been raised
to believe one step beyond male bonding
a step too far, the Devil's work

I look away, and so does he,
eyes wide shut, if seeming to look ahead
at our teacher, her lips moving
but any sound coming out drowning
in a sea of intimate images,
and such cries as could easily be of ecstasy
as for help from poor swimmers

Final bell, school's out, mates
on the way home, chatting about nothing
in particular if only to steer clear
of all we need to coax out into the open
from a suffocating closet,
too close for comfort, too real for fantasy
feeding on a vulnerable innocence

Taking a shortcut down an alleyway
we've walked every day for years, turning
to me in tears, giving me a hug
and I hug him back, not a word passing
between us, our first kiss
when it comes, winging us across s history
that once dare not speak its name

A companionable silence descending
as we emerge from that alleyway, bonding
in a new sense of togetherness
transcending our Here-and-Now in ways
defying poetry, prose, gesture,
any spoken word or 'live' art to even attempt
lending expression to its intimacy

Copyright R. N. Taber 2019

Sometimes Love Doesn't (Quite) Make It

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

Gay or straight, man or woman, I dare say there are a good few people out there whose hearts have been stirred if not broken by a romantic interlude on holiday…or just about any time, anywhere.

Oh, but romance can be so fickle. Love, now that’s something else, and where there’s life…

SOMETIMES LOVE DOESN’T (QUITE) MAKE IT

I’ve strolled in green hills

felt summer’s fingers in my hair,

raindrops like kisses,

envying leafy songbirds

free to fly where they choose

as nature intended,

lying on a bed of heather

its scent invading all my senses

just as you (still) do

We’d stroll in green hills

where you’d run fingers in my hair,

(pausing for kisses)

and write love songs

for the birds, fly where we chose

as nature intended,

lying on a bed of heather

its scent invading all our senses,

all but conquering us

I’ve walked grubby streets

felt summer’s fingers tease my hair,

raindrops like tears,

envying couples holding hands

their sweeter life choices

(or nature at play?)

wishing them kinder places

than sure to invade all the senses,

keep the spoils

Once, we were songbirds flying high,

till a north wind exposed us for a lie

Copyright R. N. Taber 2010