A Poet's Blog: Roger N.Taber shares his thoughts & poems...

Thoughts and observations by English poet Roger N. Taber, a retired librarian and poet-novelist.- "Ethnicity, Religion, Gender, Sexuality ... these are but parts of a whole. It is the whole that counts." RNT [NB While I have no wish to create a social network, I will always reply to critical emails about my poetry. Contact: rogertab@aol.com].

Name:
Location: London, United Kingdom

Sadly, a bad fall in 2012 has left me with a mobility problem, and being diagnosed with prostate cancer the same year hasn't helped, but I get out and about with my trusty walking stick as much as I can, take each day as it comes and try to keep looking on the bright(er) side of life. Many of my poems reflect the need to nurture a positive-thinking mindset whatever life throws at us.

Wednesday 7 July 2010

You-Me-Us, Ring of Bells


Every day is an anniversary for those who have lost loved ones in times of war or peace. 

Let us also remember (again, not just today) those who are fighting and/ or campaigning to help make our world a safer, kinder place.

Ironically, many of our political and religious leaders (not to mention the arms dealers)  continue to make world peace a vain hope, the discrepancy between what they say and what they do growing wider each day, creating a bottomless pit for we ordinary men, women and children in the streets of just about any place in the world to drop into even as we go about our everyday lives. Ah, but we need to do just that, whatever else is going on in the world, or terrorism and its threat - in all its various shapes and clever socio-cultural-political-religious disguises - will surely win.

Nothing can beat being with a loved one, and losing them is painful beyond imagination. Yet, love never really dies. Regular readers of the blog will know that I am a passionate believer in a posthumous consciousness wherein love remains first among equals all our lives; in our death, who knows ... ? 

Whatever, love does not only embrace its lovers, but sends out ripples among all those  with whom we have contact in life - whether it be close or in passing - touching even complete strangers to us, with whom we may have engaged in brief conversation and (knowingly or unknowingly) made some reference to love that (to their conscious knowledge or not) may have some bearing on how they live their lives  thereafter ... such is its incredible momentum and continuum.

YOU-ME-US, RING OF BELLS

There is a wood
where we played as children
and bluebells grow

When you came home
after seeing the rape of Zimbabwe
we picked bluebells

When you came home
from the killing fields of Iraq
we picked bluebells

When you came home
from the poppy fields of Afghanistan
we picked bluebells

When you came home
telling of monks beaten in Tibet
we picked bluebells

When you came home
from the line of fire on the Gaza Strip
it was in a coffin

There is a wood
where time always keeps us safe
and bluebells grow

Copyright R N Taber 2010

[Note: An earlier version of this poems appears under the title 'Where No Bells Toll' in On the Battlefields of Love by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2010]

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Sunday 4 July 2010

Beating Up The Planet

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

I suspect historians may well look back at the early 21st century and portray us as a bunch of sadomasochists!

Who could blame them, eh?

At least we have now our first Green Party MP here in the UK so maybe there's hope for us all yet and people will stop thinking that voting Green is a wasted vote. Let's face it. The G8/20 leaders aren't going to do much for us...for all their huffing and puffing.

BEATING UP THE PLANET

Running a gamut of earthquakes,
beating the flames

Sheltering in Iraq from bullets
beating down

Watching children of a lesser god
beating up butterflies

Letting our leaders get away with
beating drums

Standing for democracy’s bouncers
beating up flowers

Paying a price for politic players
beating the odds

Treating poverty’s weeping wounds,
(beating its hunger?)

Singing praises to a Greater Power,
(beating terror?)

Preparing to swim with polar bears,
beating ourselves up

[From: Accomplices to Illusion by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2007]

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Saturday 3 July 2010

Postcards From the Edge OR Notice of Intent

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

This poem provoked a flood of emails after it first appeared on the blog and in my collection during 2007. Most readers expressed pleasure if not relief that I was airing a condition with which many of us are forced to deal, frequently on a regular basis.

Many of my poems touch on the trauma of depression albeit ending on a positive note. Why is that? Well, for a start, too many people continue to underestimate depression, believing it synonymous with being very fed-up. It is an attitude that needs to change. Depression is tough enough without family, friends and work colleagues implying that all we have to do is pull our damn socks up!

There was a time when attitudes towards my sexuality provoked bouts of severe depression, especially as I have been prone to depression since early childhood (not recognized in children and young people then as it is now.) There are multiple causes of depression. We are all vulnerable to it, especially in the kind of world in which we live today although I dare say every century has had its various stresses and strains under which some people have buckled for one reason or another (there is rarely a single cause.)

My dear late mother used to say that when things are looking bad, the trick is to focus on all the good things in life and people. A simple idea, yes, even a trite thing to say. Ah, but does it work? Oh, yes!!! Maybe not right away but, like most things in life, we have to work at it.

Be understanding, patient and supportive towards with depressed people. yeah? Don't rush to write us off (as many people do) as whingeing wasters. Spread the word that there is no stigma in being depressed, and hopefully people might rush to understand (instead of rushing off in the opposite direction) the man, woman or child who so needs that understanding, patience and support.

POSTCARDS FROM THE EDGE or NOTICE OF INTENT

Driven to the naked edge of a snake pit, peering in,
all but poised to leap, defy demons on the brain
constantly jeering because I’m gay, weary of family
and friends urging no surrender to a growing desire
for my own gender, thus acknowledging this, a sexual
identity integral to every other part of me, although
those parts the same, no less true for being honest,
drawn to home truths haunting me since that dawn
I confronted myself for who I am, even as I continued
to perpetuate a sham of being straight (taught a sin,
at the very least a crime - to be gay)

With each new day, subtle shifts of opinion, even in
a fickle media, then legislation intended to give gay
men and women a kinder freedom

I'd stood alone and scared, desperate to end these lies,
half lies, a creeping among shadows like a thief,
seeking a love I dare not own in the face of society's
resolve to expose me for even less than a nobody
crucify me on that old stand-by Cross of Convention
but time, now to let history see I am my own person,
refusing point blank to be made subservient to stereotype.
while not my intention to offend those who mean well,
stood by with tears in their eyes watching the local bigots
breaking our backs with rods for straws, little thought
to making repairs because mud sticks

No more snake pits, self-blame, being made to feel
like a candidate for some Walk of Shame, time to get real,
put closet ways behind me

Copyright R. N. Taber 2007; 2018

[Note: An earlier version of this poem appears in Accomplices to Illusion by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books 2007]

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Friday 2 July 2010

Autobiography of a Light Bulb

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

People often tell me they have a feeling for poetry and would love to write a poem but never seem to find inspiration. Well, look around you. As I have often said, you can write a poem on just about anything,  I have written poems about tables, chairs, even puddles...

A reader has challenged me on this. Only a few days ago, he contacted me to suggest I could not write a poem about a light bulb.

Never let it be said I’d duck such a challenge.

Too many of us, I suspect, remain in the dark about so many things, including ourselves, but it is never too late to switch on, and take a good look; thereby lies the path to discernment and understanding...of ourselves, others too.We may be a diverse human race, but no one person in or facet of it has a monopoly on the human spirit; it is common to us all if less common is how, when or whether we ever choose to acknowledge and address it.


[Image taken from the Internet]

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A LIGHT BULB

I have coloured the cheeks of a child
at a birthday party

I have seen quarrels turn into beatings
and draw blood

I have watched over students yawning
for trying to concentrate

I have watched over meetings ringing
with raised voices

I have followed the progress of lovers
with delight

I am privy to secrets a journalist would
die for

I have been amused by such melodrama
as politicians love to stage

I have been moved by a significant few
brokering for peace

I become incensed by folks playing safe
for a quiet life

I despair of clerics reworking scriptures
to exonerate themselves

I empathise with poets transcending light
to justify darkness

Yet, party as I am to the whole sorry mess,
at least I can switch off

Copyright R. N. Taber 2010


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Monday 14 June 2010

England, My England, Three Cheers for St George

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

A reader has emailed to say he was surprised to discover I had another blog that I write especially with other gay men and women in mind. He was even more surprised to discover that he 'quite enjoyed reading it. and will do so again.' For anyone else who may be interested, follow the link:

http://aspectsofagaymanslifeinverse.blogspot.com/

I am proud of being an Englishman and sick of being told I shouldn’t be by the so-called ‘politically correct’ brigade. During the World Cup some households have been flying the flag of St George ... but some people have complained, suggesting that it will offend people from ethnic minorities ... as if they don't have teams participating as well as England. Given that St George is also known and respected by Muslims only serves to underline the ignorance of some people.

The poem does not appear in any of my collections so far. It has already provoked some protest emails, one from a Muslim man who implied I am racist and complained that English nationalism makes people like him feel excluded. Well, I don’t think that is anyone’s intention and it’s certainly not mine. As for my being racist, regular readers will know better. I have Muslim friends and others whose culture of origin is homophobic but who have no problem with either my sense of national pride (they cherish their own national/cultural identity) or sexuality.

Regarding social exclusion, I'f say gay people have known our share. Yes, things are better now than they used to be ... for some of us. Even so, I, for my part, resent the kind of socio-cultural-religious homophobia I frequently encounter from people who choose to live in the UK because it offers them a better deal than their own country yet persist in complaining about our ‘liberal’ way of life; these may well be in a minority, but it is a significant and (very) vocal minority. Sorry, but if they don’t like how we do things in the UK (or the West generally) no one will stop them returning to their own country.

ENGLAND, MY ENGLAND, THREE CHEERS FOR ST GEORGE

England, my England, where are you now?
Once, I ran in green fields, played conkers
in the school playground with friendly peers
who hadn’t even learned to spell, let alone
discover the meaning of prejudice, bigotry,
racism and homophobia

England, my England, where are you now?
Once I’d shop for sweets in a corner shop
that’s an ugly, costly apartment block now
among other carbuncles that have sneaked
into High Streets and side roads like thieves
in a corporate darkness

England, my England, where are you now?
Once you offered safety in numbers that now
would gobble me up like a swarm of locusts,
forcing an entry to trains, planes and buses,
making it their business to expose my bones
to political scrutiny

England, my England, where are you now
that let ambition get the better of humanity
and now must pay the price for aspiring
to a supremacy sure to be brought down
for its sheer audacity, while (still) declaring
an empathy with globalisation?

England, my England, where are you now
that sucks up to hawks where once it flew
with eagles, leaves crumbs out for doves
where it feasts on cake and caviar, deceiving
itself and all of us who eagerly devour
the latest opinion polls?

England, my England, where are you now?
Falling apart, a unity bought with the blood,
sweat and tears of centuries, even politics
caving in to those who shout the loudest where
this or that smooth tongued religion assumes
the moral high ground

England, my England, my love, pride and joy;
let the locusts feed on me, my spirit dare take
its cue from a bold re-working of our history
into a 21st century that may yet see its crumbs
shared out evenly, a divided humanity declared
its own worst enemy

Where now, once my England, in a world
that’s lost its way?

Copyright R. N. Taber 2009

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Sunday 13 June 2010

The Poet's Song

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

Update (May 2016): Find below, the link to an interview I gave Benjamin Richter, an international student of Multimedia Journalism at the University of Kent in Canterbury; it was an interesting if a little daunting experience and he has agreed that I can share it with you as a number of readers have expressed an interest in how and why I approach poetry the way I do. Meeting Benjamin was a particularly enjoyable experience as I, too, was a student there some 40+ years ago. The Department of Journalism is based at its Medway campus and Benjamin is currently living in my home town of Gillingham where I was born and lived until I was 14 years-old:

https://r224e31251.racontr.com/index.html
[NB You may need to copy this link into your browser for it to work.]

The poem below is especially for ‘Steve N’ who first read it in an anthology, The Poetry Now Book of Kennings, Poetry Now, 2001. (Poetry Now is an imprint of Forward Press.) The alternative title was added later.

Glad you enjoyed it, Steve. I also appreciated Steve saying that ‘as someone with many gay friends’ he particularly appreciates my including poems on a gay theme in general collections, alongside poems on various other themes, rather than ‘marginalising’ them in separate gay collections. Other straight readers have also been kind enough to say they enjoy many of my poems, ‘even the gay stuff’. One man wrote in recently to say how the inclusion of a gay section in a collection borrowed randomly by his wife from their local library came as ‘something of a surprise, to put it mildly’ but they enjoyed reading the poems. It appears that he and his wife subsequently had a ‘lively’ discussion about gay issues…which has to be one of the best compliments I have ever received.

Feedback is always welcome, especially along these lines. I suspect a fair percentage of gay readers would agree with another who emailed me to say that ‘gay material deserves its own collection to reflect gay culture.’ Fair enough but, to my mind, ‘gay culture’ implies a degree of separatism. I’m an integrationist.

Whatever, I see myself as no more or less than someone who happens to be gay and subscribes to no particular culture, religion, philosophy or politics. Mind you, I don’t sit on fences either. Well, not to the extent that I am glued to them; I have always been prepared to jump down on one side or the other as and when it seems appropriate. I will always express a point of view while, at the same time, listening for and trying out new voices.

THE POET’S SONG

I am a Painter of Dreams,
my brush, a pen – words
all the paint available, tackling
the unassailable to bring within reach
of unquiet heart, restless soul,
images of life and love,
vision of a goal beyond perimeters
of time, space - humanity’s crude
conception of grace

I am a Painter of Dreams,
bringing you mine, intruding
on yours, winging heaven’s
elusive towers that flicker in a mist
of aspiration, inviting inspiration,
daring us to home in, defy
the rude mentality of a classroom
morality - humanity’s crude
conception of spirituality

See-Hear-Taste-Touch-Smell,
I am a Painter of Dreams, who
means well but often offends
who dare suggest I speak for all
that seek gold where the rainbow ends
for, like Pandora’s Box, our secrets
once let fly - each to their own;
Painter, dreamer, shades of light
or ships in a cruel night

Senses, falling apart at the seams
for a Painter of Dreams

[From: First Person Plural by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2002] 

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Saturday 24 April 2010

Leasehold OR Reunion with Ghosts

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

This poem appeared on the blog in 2007 following my return to Gillingham (Kent) - where I was born lived until I was 14 years-old - for the first time in over 30 years.

I returned again yesterday. It was strange, visiting favourite childhood haunts, like stepping into a time warp. It was curiously moving and even more curiously exciting as I moved among the ghosts of my distant past. That first time, I’d met up with the mothers of two childhood friends, ladies in their 80’s and 90’s respectively now. I also visited Martin, school captain from my days at Gillingham Technical School in Green Street. I visited Martin again yesterday and have dedicated this poem to him in the collection. The old school building is still there, looks much the same as it did all those years ago and is now a College of Adult Education.

I am not a person who finds it easy to let go of the past and mine is full of (very) mixed blessings. Going back has made it so much easier to let go of the bad memories and continue to enjoy the good ones. There is, after all, an abiding kindness of most ghosts.

LEASEHOLD or REUNION WITH GHOSTS

Once, I returned to the place I was born;
its ghosts gathered to meet me
as I alighted (anxiously) from the train,
unsure how they might treat me

A kinder welcome than I had expected
restored a flagging self-esteem;
I could only wonder if they suspected
it was my intention to release them

As I wandered streets I’d loved so well,
ghosts leading me by the hand,
I relived every shape, sound and smell
of a child’s once magical land

For the old school, new tenants found,
cajoling me to name names
as we entered its sometime playground
to walk, talk, play games

To the house where life first took me
into its care for good or bad,
I fell a willing victim to memory,
innocence briefly recovered

From my ghostly companions, applause
welcoming me as one of their own,
till above the clamour I heard a voice
reminding me why I had come

In spite of my ghosts gravely chiding me
(for fear of reality’s blast?)
I put aside daydreams for a living history
that must (surely?) put them to rest

It took the mothers of childhood friends
to put our history in its place,
turn the pages of a story that never ends
but moves on, ever gathering pace

Reminiscing with my old school captain,
I heard twilight’s sweeter lay
as its ghosts began to grasp a situation
that would (at last) let them slip away

The fast train home told yet another story,
about feelings of love and peace
rediscovered and leasing a new maturity
from a child’s vision of happiness

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

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