John Bull's Midnight Garden

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

Today’s first poem last appeared on the blog in 2008. Now, I have written several anti-drugs poems and reader ‘Marcel P’ has asked me to repeat this one ‘as a warning to a close friend.’ I only hope he makes sure his friend reads it.  I have added the second poem for good measure.

Drug abuse destroys lives so why are there relatively few rehab centres available, even in big cities like London? Why isn’t there more high profile anti-drugs promotion?

Drug addicts need help, not condemnation. Apart from young people who are targeted by unscrupulous drug pushers, there are others (all ages) who turn to drugs because they cannot cope with the pressures of everyday life. It isn’t long before they find themselves trapped in a vicious spiral of desperation and despair.  

Even so-called ‘soft’ drugs such as cannabis are not without their dangers. Smoking weed can help a person relax, but if he or she is smoking because they cannot cope with certain pressures, the chances are it won’t be long before they will try something stronger, always convinced they are not vulnerable to addiction...

Everyone’s body chemistry is different; take ‘designer’ drugs like ecstasy; for example one person’s high, another’s death. Yes, the latter is rare, but is it worth taking the chance? Besides, many of these drugs have not been around long enough for full research to be done into their long-term effects on mind and body. 

What’s that you say> It’s my life and I’ll live it how I want?  Fair enough, except drug abuse doesn’t only ruin an addict’s life but the lives of his or her family and friends too.

So be careful out there, yeah? If you can’t cope, for whatever reason, ask for help, don’t take the drugs route.

There is no shame in asking for help, only common sense.

JOHN BULL’S MIDNIGHT GARDEN

Blades of grass dipped in moonlight,

Old Man winking mischievously

at shadows chasing their own tails

across number ten’s garden;

Lights in a window peeking between

chinks in closed curtains, envious

of a night left in peace to play without

fear of interruption

Beyond the wall, a screech of tyres

leaves someone’s child dead,

wearing pretty ribbons of moonlight

dipped in a druggie’s blood;

Old Man pointing the finger of blame

at shadows chasing their own tails

from the garden of number ten,

preferring to be left in peace without

fear of interruption

Behind the Rehab Centre, closed down

because of local residents objecting,

a desperate company sniffing, injecting,

clutching at straws in a sea of moonlight

flooding the garden of number ten;

Old Man takes to hiding behind clouds

rather than watch shadows made to chase

their own tails where no peace without

fear of interruption

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

CHARYBDIS MON AMOUR

Whirlpool

Anguish, mirrored

in eddies of shrapnel light;

Pain, caught fast

in a grip of mute supplication;

Loneliness, laid bare

in a mad rape

Round, round, this raving soul

chases its own dear folly

Life, long since perjured

for roller coaster thrills;

Love, all scratched

and bleeding after spills,

spread-eagled

on a cross

Lord, have mercy

on us

No screaming brakes

at Salvation’s door

left ajar;

Nor one kind echo

in the blind

drop

[From: Love and Human Remains by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2001]

Love Is...

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

Today's poem last appeared on the blog in the autumn of 2010. It is repeated here today for no other reason that I am in the mood for love...

Not romantically linked to anyone? Feeling low because it’s Valentine’s Day tomorrow?

Never mind, love comes in all shapes and forms. Most of us have family and/or friends and /or pets. If you have none of these, all the more reason for those of us who live alone, and often feel alone, to stop feeling sorry for ourselves, look at ways to get a life and GO for it. I live alone so this is my cue to say "Thank you for your company." to my many blog readers around the world. I have a few good friends, yes, but even the best of friends are not available 24/7, yet I can go into my blogs and be among friends any time.

LOVE IS...

Love is, oh, so beautiful,

no matter who, where, how or why,

nor always reciprocal but lets us laugh,

lets us cry, like champagne bringing

a tear to an eye long since made dry

by seasons much like a child’s first toys,

treasures once, now barely worth a sigh.

Oh, we get by, our reasons for living

worthy enough and true, yet going through

the motions of existence without existing;

getting up, going to bed, getting up again

without kissing sunshine, embracing rain,

warming ourselves at the hot coals

of humanity when struck by the cold

of everyday insanity. We are who we are,

no matter how or why, nor always free

(or able) to sing, laugh, cry, with those

around us - to whom we mean everything.

So let us hear skylarks sing, if not always

the same song, see love work a miracle,

no matter whether reciprocal in every

shape or form. Love alone keeps us safe,

keeps us warm. Let the world do its worst;

love will shelter us, nor will its spirit fail

to lead the way though it shine differently,

at the end of this or that tunnel,

a light, oh, so beautiful

[From: A Feeling for the Quickness of Time by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2005]

Soulmates OR Whatever Happened to Freedom of Choice?

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

[Update Jan 15 2019]: Today the Royal College of Physicians (RCP) announced they'll be surveying their members on their stance to assisted dying. A majority of two thirds for either support or opposition will be needed for the RCP to take either of these positions. If there is not a two-thirds majority for either option, the college will become neutral in order to respect the range of views among doctors.]

[Update Nov 29 2017]: Most readers will be aware that three judges subsequently ruled against Noel, who argued that the law on assisted dying should be changed to allow him a “peaceful and dignified” death. He had wanted a declaration that the Suicide Act 1961 is incompatible with article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights which relates to respect for private and family life. ]

[Update July 17 2017]: Noel Conway, 67, a terminally ill former lecturer, will come before the high court today to challenge the UK’s ban on assisted dying. Noel, from Shrewsbury, was diagnosed with motor neurone disease in November 2014. His condition is incurable and he is not expected to live beyond the next 12 months.]

[Update Jan 06 2017): Yet another case hits the national news of a man, Noel Conway, who has Motor Neurone Disease who is seeking the legal right to end his life with professional help. I appreciate that opinion is very divided on what is, after all, a very emotive matter. I can only agree, though, that it is QUALITY of life that matters, not necessarily life itself in certain circumstances. Everyone's capacity for bearing pain and a diminishing quality of life is different. But surely, we all, as individual human beings have the right to decide when enough is enough? Yes, of course, any law permitting assisted dying would need to impose reasonable limitations. Even so, my own feeling is that it is my life and no one has the right to force me into a state of existence that appals me. We have no choice about coming into the world. Do we not deserve to be shown some compassion and the right to choose on the question of leaving it, as controversial as it may well always be...?]

[Update (Oct 20 2016) I write a lot about positive thinking (and practise what I preach) and several readers have asked how I reconcile this poem to that mindset. For me, a release from pain when there is little of no chance of one's quality of life improving (before it worsens) is positive thinking. It is not only tough on the person who is in pain, but also on their friends and family. For me, also, I could not bear the prospect of any dementia getting progressively worse and would want to take action while I could still make the decision. It is a purely personal choice and one which I would expect those who know me to respect. Those of you who agree with me probably feel as I do that quality of life is more important to us than simply carrying on for life's sake in circumstances we would find appalling. As far as I am concerned, the law is an ass in this respect and no judge has the right to tell me I must live the kind of life I would not wish on my worst enemy.] 

'The quality of mercy is not strained,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath; it is twice blest;
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes…'

William Shakespeare (The Merchant of Venice)

Meanwhile...

Readers often get in touch about the complex, sensitive and highly emotive subject of assisted suicide since I first posted this poem on the blogs and included it in my last poetry collection. I have to say, 99% of these have expressed much the same sentiments as my own. Having said that, everyone will, of course, have their own views, and almost certainly feel as strongly as I do wherever they stand on this contentious issue.

Now, according to reports, it appears that plans for a mobile euthanasia team to assist people to die at home have been given the go-ahead in Holland. A mobile team of doctors would be the first in the world to carry out assisted suicides in borderline cases where family doctors refuse to administer patients with lethal drugs on ethical grounds. Even so, these doctors will have to comply with the same ‘due care criteria’ as ‘regular’ doctors.

Many people have pressed for changes in the law regarding euthanasia here in the UK. Only last week the Archbishop of Canterbury warned that changes to the law to allow assisted suicide in the UK would spell “disaster” and a shift in societal attitudes towards the sanctity of life, it was reported by the Press Association.

How dare these people presume to deny us the basic Human Right to decide to end our lives when we no longer feel able to go on living? Whose life is it, anyway?

We have no say in being born, we deserve a say in dying. It is pathetic that we have a Court of Human Rights that denies us one of the most fundamental Human Rights of all; the right to have a say in whether we live or die, and in appropriate circumstances be listened to and have our personal feelings on the matter respected.

No one would deny there have to be safeguards in place; anyone contemplating suicide is very vulnerable to abuse by unscrupulous people. I also agree that anyone contemplating such a step should discuss it with a professional counsellor as well as their immediate family.

 I tried to commit suicide some 30+ years ago during a severe nervous breakdown. I narrowly survived, and each day since has been a welcome bonus. I could probably have been talked out of it had there been anyone at the time in whom I could confide. Depression alone is no grounds for euthanasia although it may well seem so to a depressed person at the time.

 I've always  strongly supported assisted suicide for people in chronic pain, for whom there is little if any relief and those diagnosed with a terminal illness that have no wish to see it through to the bitter end. It is their choice; while they have every right to express an opinion, no law, religion  or pro-life activist should be allowed to dictate to us about ending our lives where we can make a cast iron personal case for doing so; i.e. in the light of how we see it, not them, and on our terms not theirs. I, for one would have no hesitation should, for example, my prostate cancer spread and I was told nothing could be done about it. Close friends are aware of this, and share my views on the matter. Yet, were such circumstances to arise, they would face potential imprisonment for helping me end my own life at my own carefully considered wish.  I would not wish that on them any more than they would wish a lonely death on me.

Dementia is a tricky one. As regular readers will know, I, personally, share the views publicly expressed by the author Sir Terry Pratchett who is in the early stages of Alzheimer’s. I, too, would not want to sink into the kind of twilight existence that comes later. But everyone has their own view on the subject. Whatever, that view should be respected, not dismissed on either a point of law or a religious belief that the person concerned may not even share. Loved ones will, understandably, want to keep us with them for as long as possible, but love is also about knowing when to let go...

SOULMATES or WHATEVER HAPPENED TO FREEDOM OF CHOICE?

I feel my body growing weaker,
active mind starting to lose its way,
will as stubborn as ever
as I get through each new day
as best I can, tearful
now and then rather than fearful
of coming to the end
of all ends, wishing it could be
on my own terms

My body, once my best friend,
now my jailer, denying me access
to even the simplest things
I need to do, places I’d like to go,
people I want to see
who understand (only too well)
how much harder it is for me
to endure all this, knowing things
can only get worse

How can I be as strong for others
as I want to be when each day sees
the strength draining out of me,
save a sense of spirituality that keeps
me afloat in a cruel sea
where few dare throw even a straw
for fear the law will not recognise
that how a person lives merits a say
in how he or she dies?

I, Dignity, soulmate to Human Rights,
dares keep the dying, too, in my sights

Copyright R. N. Taber 2010; 2017

[Note: This poem has been slightly but significantly revised since its first appeared in On the Battlefields of Love by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2010]

To The Lighthouse

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

It isn't only sailors that need to watch out for a guardian light.

We all need to keep an eye on light at the end of whatever tunnel we may sometimes find ourselves in; it may dim sometimes, but will never go out...unless we let it.

The poem is a villanelle, its title inspired by a novel of the same name by Virginia Woolf. Even so, where her brilliant, deceptively simple tale might well be seen as a literary variation on the old adage, it is better to travel hopefully than to arrive, my poem could only ever aspire to be, at best, a distant echo. It is true, though, that all that goes into getting there counts even more than reaching (or not reaching) any goal.

Regrets? Yes, of course, we all have them, but we also deserve credit for trying...well, don't we?

TO THE LIGHTHOUSE

It’s a light that I will always see

wherever I go…

in spite of shadows crowding me

Day or night, it will constant be,

come rain or snow...

it’s a light that I will always see

I take heart that others can see,

be in the know…

in spite of shadows crowding me

On land or sea, a born sexuality

like a lighthouse glow...

it’s a light that I will always see

It lends me a sense of spirituality

as through this life I go…

in spite of shadows crowding me

Come a time we are but history,

let others follow...

it’s a light that I will always see,

in spite of shadows crowding me

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

An Affinity with Nature

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

Among all our cues we take from nature, survival has to be one of the most if not the most important.

Surely, the very least we can (all) do is to watch out for nature too?

AN AFFINITY WITH NATURE

Watch as spring lays a path into summer,

and chicks in leafy branches learn to fly

in a world out of step with Earth Mother,

carbon footprint across land, sea and sky

Watch buds open and burst into flower

closing at dusk, woken again at dawn

by the kisses and tears of Earth Mother

for each child lost, found, dying, reborn

Watch as the world slowly opens its heart

summer rest on its laurels fair and frayed,

anxious for Earth Mother to play her part,

helping restore foundations poorly laid…

Watch autumn weep and winter keep vigil

at a window on the landscape of survival

Copyright R. N. Taber 2010; 2018

[Note: This poem first appears under the title ' Landscape of Survival' in On the Battlefields of Love by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2010]

Keeper of the Flame

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

A reader who has to use an Internet café to go on-line has asked me to repeat the link to my YouTube channel.  My friend and cameraman Graham and I are hoping to record more poems ‘on location’ for YouTube, weather and time permitting.

http://www.youtube.com/rogerNtaber

Meanwhile ...

Raking the heart’s embers is easy enough. It takes but one precious memory to stir the flames of a love that was never meant - for whatever reasons - to (quite) fulfil its promises until, with all the passion of regret, we can but watch them fall away like autumn leaves ....

Alternatively, whatever our gender or sexuality, we can find happiness and comfort in the knowledge that we have loved and been loved in return ...

No one is more or less vulnerable than another to any love that only two will ever truly share whether it be parent to child, friend to friend or lover to lover ... and only a fool lets the flame it ignites in us fade and die; rather, let it be a  light in any darkness given that there will always be dark times, c'est la vie.


KEEPER OF THE FLAME


Piling on wood,
and the flames leap higher,
bringing us together
as we were that summer
we’d meet up again
and again to go swimming
in the sunshine,
walking in the rain,
playing with fire
from each dawn to sunset,
now flaring, now fading,
like love’s wistful voices,
its weepy echoes

Piling on wood,
and the flames are dancing,
lovers romancing
as we were that summer
we’d cherish
precious moments together,
each one stolen
from those who thought
they knew us,
yet never once suspecting
we were lovers,
not just best of friends
hamming it up

Running out of wood;
too soon, the flames starting
to fall away
like an audience once a play
has reached an ending,
well deserving of applause
even if no one cares
to admit the staged goings-on
were too close
for comfort, disturbing
vulnerable ghosts
ever tearful for being shut
in some secret closet

Eternal flame, ever reworking us
over centuries

Copyright R. N. Taber 2012


[Note: This poem has been slightly revised (final couplet) from the original as it was first published  in Tracking the Torchbearer by R N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2012.]

Youth-Middle Age-Old Age (Three poems)

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

Yesterday, I posted a poem inspired by a song sung by Doris Day. A reader has been in touch to ask, ‘It is bad enough that someone who claims to be a serious poet writes gay rubbish, which I find offensive, but to write about Doris Day is really the last straw!’

Well, for a start I have never claimed to be a serious poet only someone who takes poetry seriously; well, most of the time. I am certainly no poetry snob, and readers will know that I write on all manner of themes. Nor am I a music snob. I love Doris Day just as I love Ella Fitzgerald and Johnny Cash.  I love some classical music, but I also love some pop and adore rock ‘n’ roll. I love some opera but cannot claim to be an opera buff. With me, it’s pick’n’mix. So what’s wrong with that? If it is good of its kind, I will usually enjoy it. Why shouldn’t I enjoy Elvis Presley every bit as much as Placido Domingo or adore Shirley Bassey just as I do Diana Ross and Leona Lewis. And let's not forget the late, great Dusty Springfield or, for that matter, Mario Lanza or Frank Sinatra. I could go on all day...

If people choose to limit their appreciation to one kind of music, one genre of literature or one period of art, that’s up to them. But there are lots of people like me who love to dabble in this ‘n’ that, and where’s the harm?

So I offer no apology for offending that particular reader. What planet is he (or she) from, I wonder?

Meanwhile...

So many readers have asked me to repeat this trilogy of villanelles that has not appeared on the blog since early 2010 so here it is again. I hope new readers and those who are unable to browse the blog archives for whatever reason, quite possibly because they simply don’t have the time, will enjoy it and regular readers will also enjoy being reacquainted with it.

We all have to grow old, but to how many of us, I wonder, does the ageing process convey the wisdom that we must make the most of the best not the worst of it all...?

IN APPRECIATION OF YOUTH

Youth cries the world’s tears,

slows time’s flight,

relays Earth Mother’s fears

It will always lead the cheers

for wrongs put right,

Youth cries the world’s tears

Youth bonds with its peers,

develops second sight,

relays Earth Mother’s fears

To peace and love it steers

(Armageddon in sight)

Youth cries the world’s tears

As a mist of naivety clears,

it won't throw the fight,

relays Earth Mother’s fears

It straddles the world’s terrors,

a love poem to write;

Youth cries the world’s tears

relays Earth Mother’s fears

Copyright R. N. Taber 2008

IN CELEBRATION OF MIDDLE AGE

In celebration of middle age

(after much rehearsing)

time brings us centre-stage

Like a bird freed from its cage,

we’ll fly on a poem’s wing

in celebration of middle age

Daring us turn the first page

in our history’s re-shaping,

time brings us centre-stage

Shake off cliché and adage,

give truth a rare dusting

in celebration of middle age

Inspired by youth’s raw rage,

its humanity enduring,

time brings us centre-stage

Acted out on a custom page,

a love poem in the making;

in celebration of middle age

time brings us centre-stage

Copyright R. N. Taber 2008

BY WAY OF MARKING OLD AGE

By way of marking old age

(after much reflecting)

time edges us off-stage

Like a bird returned to its cage,

we’ll flex a feisty wing

by way of marking old age

Letting slip that life's last page

makes good reading,

time edges us off-stage

Let’s not pass cliché and adage

off as living…

by way of marking old age

Inspired by a well-honed rage,

its humanity enduring…

time edges us off-stage

No matter memory skips a page,

its poetry re-working;

by way of marking old age

time edges us off-stage

Copyright R. N. Taber 2008

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