Stumbling Blocks

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

While I continue to replace originals in my print collections with any later revised poems in preparation for publishing online at a later date, I have also decided that, once having completed the task, I will first publish a collection of the most  popular poems on the blogs; this way,  readers will be able to dip into them should Google delete my blogs once I have gone walkies with the Grim Reaper.

I have to confess that I am finding even  my early 70's heavy going on a daily basis. I am 74 now, live alone, and seem to deal with just about everything so much worse than I used to. Inclined to get everyday crises out of proportion, to say I am less than happy with my quality of life these days is an understatement. 

I used to be happy enough living on my own, but now I often feel isolated, probably because I have so much less of a social life these days. Even so, I have much to be thankful for, especially a best friend without whom my life would be unbearable. 
  
Life could be better, for sure, but it could also be much worse so...as good a reason as any to continue taking my cue from Monty Python, and always look on the bright side of life; well, nearly always... (My cue for visiting nearby Hampstead Heath, where the  peace and beauty of nature can always be relied upon to clear even the most dissatisfied mind-body-spirit.)
.
I guess growing old(er) was never meant to be an easy journey. Writing poetry helps; in my head, I can hear Ella Fitzgerald singing 'A Satisfied Mind', and do my best to achieve just that...

STUMBLING BLOCKS

Stumbling so, my years
across a shifting sea of sand;

the poetry of unshed tears

In a haze that never clears

though blind faith withstand,

stumbling so, my years

A sad heart’s secret fears

expected to make a last stand; 
the poetry of unshed tears

Deafened by global cheers

at some false god’s command,

stumbling so, my years

World, too, nursing its fears,

(failing to stay a logger’s hand);
the poetry of unshed tears

Peace, it all but disappears,
under layers of dissatisfied mind;

stumbling so, my years,

the poetry of unshed tears

 Copyright R. N. Taber 2007

[Note: An earlier version of this poem appears in 'On the Battlefields of Love' by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2010.]

Time, Critic-cum-Tallyman

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

I wrote an earlier and significantly different version of this poem for a collection published in 2010. So why revise it nearly ten years later? You may well ask, and I will do my best to make the case not only for for its revision but for having revised many poems that appear in my collections between 2001-2012.

Our perspectives on and attitudes towards life and people  change as time passes, perhaps not radically, but significantly all the same. You only have to look at political correctness; what was tolerated - even if not acceptable - years ago  is now considered abuse; racism and sexism are but two examples, never acceptable but once tolerated. Even now, there are often huge discrepancies as to what is politically incorrect and what is not, often depending on the context in which something is said/interpreted/misinterpreted and/ or the person who says it. It is one reason why I object to people being taken to task for politically incorrect behaviour years ago when it did not have anywhere near as high a profile as it rightly does now;  it doesn't mean that a person was right to say or do whatever at the time, but society, too, has to take its share of responsibility for not taking that person to task then rather than using it as a weapon against them years later.

Language and the use of language changes alongside our perceptions on all manner of issues. Climate change is another example; now getting the high profile it deserves, but still dismissed by some as a fairy story or 'fake news'. Ordinary people like me cannot help but become confused sometimes, and this confusion sometimes comes through in what they say - or write - at any given moment in time; by the time it is made public, circumstances may have caused hem us to have a change of mind and heart. The point being, they genuinely believed whatever they said or wrote at the time; even more to the point, perhaps, is that they were satisfied at the time with heir choice of words.

There is always, of course, the hope that we become better speakers/writers the more we practise either craft or both.

In poetry especially, titles are so important too.I have to confess I struggle with titles. Interestingly, I have changed the title of a poem that hasn't gone down too well with readers and - without changing a word of the poem itself - hey, presto, it attracts significantly more readers and favourable feedback.

There will always be some who don't like what we say or do, for whatever reason, and that is human nature; no problem there so long as the critic is prepared to engage with the writer/speaker rather than seize upon one word or sentence and proceed to attack that, rather than take in the whole. As I have said many times, many parts make a whole, but it is the whole that counts; the parts may well be critically interpreted separately, but should always replaced.in the context of that same whole.

Such is human nature and the complexity of mind-body-spirit, that we are too often inclined to mistake one or more parts of a person for their whole; a whole that is not always a certainty; as such, can it not be forgiven for being  no less susceptible to change than  any uncertainty, feeling its way though the maze that is life - and the range of emotions it invariably invokes - at any age or given moment in time, no matter what our ethnicity, culture, politics, social background or religion...?

TIME, CRITIC-CUM-TALLYMAN

No impartial critic of old age,

(performance s-l-o-w-i--n-g)

Time's remit, clearing the stage

Letting slip how life’s last page

guarantees no happy ending,

no impartial critic of old age

Like a songbird kept in a cage

see humanity flex a wing;

Time's remit, clearing the stage

Earth, driven to express outrage

for an inhumanity enduring,

no impartial critic of old age

Proving neither apathy nor rage

a true template for living,

Time's remit, clearing the stage

Humanity (still) acting The Sage,
its poetry-prose but reworking;

no impartial critic of old age, 

Time’s remit, clearing the stage

Copyright R. N. Taber 2019

[Note: An earlier version of this poem appears under the title ‘By Way of Marking Old Age’in On the Battlefields of Love by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2010.]