Beyond Belief

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

An earlier version of today’s poem first appeared in an anthology, Echoes of War, Poetry Now (Forward Press) 2003 and subsequently in my collection the following year.

Now, regular readers will be aware that have revised some poems since they first appeared in my collections and on my blogs. Some readers say they prefer the original version, but most prefer the revised version. All ask why I posted/published the original version if it was likely to be revised later. Well, at the time I wrote it, I saw it as a complete poem not the genesis for another. Years on, I read some of my earlier poems and can see where they fail, to one degree or another, either because they don’t say quite sat what I meant to say or don’t say it at all.

Once I get back inside a poem, I can see where the cracks need filling, not merely papered over. Writing a poem from the outside working inwards is very different to writing from the inside and working outwards.  Yes, the original is written from within the poet, but he or she only created the poem head and heart have shaped; the poem itself, as a developing organism,  needs to have say in that development.

Creating a poem is one thing and, yes, sometimes it is enough, but not always; any further development will comes late so long as the writer leaves room in the poem for that, and I always do. Moreover, I have always had a sense of this with my poems so always kept in mind that I would need to publish new editions of my collections at some point to allow for and include revisions/developments in some poems.  [Revisions that appear on my blogs will appear in new editions after 2015.]

From time to time, someone gets in touch to say he or she enjoyed both an original and revised revision of a poem, but especially enjoyed comparing the two.  One reader wrote to say they found it ‘intriguing’ to look inside my head and see how an original version of a poem led into the later version.  

While I dare say critics will see some of my poems as failures (they may well be right) I see them as relating to the person/poet I was at the time I wrote them. Hopefully, I have changed with passing time (hopefully for the better); similarly, my poetry. Readers are welcome to form their own opinion. Whatever, having written something, it make sense to share it, surely? So I have published my collections since 2001 and feedback, plus the changing nature of my own personal space. will result in new editions after the publication of a final collection - Diary of a Time Traveller in 2015 - when I hit 70.

Now, there is more than one take on aspiration, and somewhere along the line we have to make choices; sometimes it may seem as if the choice is whether or not we are prepared to let someone else make that choice for us. But isn’t that just passing the buck?

Whatever, few things on this earth are anywhere near as simple as we try to make them appear, certainly not that complex network of communications, missed communications,  mixed messages and calls for commitment that comprise the human mind.

BEYOND BELIEF

Some say he sought freedom,

preferring martyrdom to repression;

others point to sentiments

expressed pertaining to the zeal

of a fundamentalist

waging war against the world

armed with Holy Word

Some say he followed a star,

near blinded by its glorious light;

others call him a Messiah

come in peace with a fire in his belly

no one could extinguish,

a measure of anguish fuelling

growing desperation

Some say, he was brainwashed

as a child, taught how the finest ends

justify appalling means,

suicide as a political statement

absolving conscience

from the agony heaped on body bags

at a roadside

Some call him a Dark Angel

that did not know him as well as she

who knew his fears,

saw tears fall, final choices made,

sent alone, small and scared

to brave The Word, bomb the world,

no one spared

Ashes, poor apology for a sorry world

and its every word

Copyright R. N. Taber 2003; 2012

[Note: An earlier version of this poem appears in The Third Eye by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books 2004.]

Ella Sings The Blues

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

Someone very special to me once bought me an album of the late, great Ella Fitzgerald called Ella Sings the Blues. She was, of course, a great jazz singer. But, my, couldn't she sing Blues!  Mind you, Ella could sing anything and it would leave a lasting impression on the listener.

My late mother also loved Ella and I remember playing it some years after she died and thinking maybe she was listening to it, too, in that Great Unknown we call death. I didn't feel in the least bit sad. On the contrary, the experience transcended my sadness to an indescribable feeling approaching enlightenment, and my tears confirmed rather than contradicted it. Moreover, I was in the early stages of recovery from a nervous breakdown at the time and like to think Mum was looking out for me as she always did.

Whimsical, yes, of course, but...don’t we all do whimsy sometimes?

Photo: Ella Fitzgerald (taken from the Internet)

ELLA SINGS THE BLUES

How will it be when I’m dead?

Will I hear music playing in my head,

see doves fly by in a clear blue sky,

hear a newborn baby’s very first cry,

and Ella singing?

How will it be when I die?

Will I wing with doves, oh, so high

that I can look down and see

those I’ve loved crying rivers for me,

or rivers run dry?

How will it be when I’m gone?

World keeps turning and life goes on.

so where does that leave me,

courtesy (hopefully) of a spirituality

come clean?

How will it be when I’m dead?

will I still compose poems in my head,

grieve a sorry world lost its way

for listening to what its ‘betters’ say

who haven’t a clue?

I’ll never know until I’m dying

but when I am, be sure I’ll be flying high

among doves with you, listening

out for every newborn baby’s crying,

and Ella singing

Copyright R. N. Taber 1982; 2010

[From: Tracking the Torchbearer by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2012]

Harvesting Imagination

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

Today’s poem is especially for ‘Hanna’ who asked if I have another poem about dementia as she looks after her brother who is in the early stages of Alzheimer’s; they both liked Misty Memories that I posted recently.

About 750,000 people here in the UK have dementia, and this number is expected to double in the next thirty years. I have seen the unbearably sad consequences for both sufferers and their carers. The British Government says it is committed to improving the care and experience of people with dementia and their carers by transforming dementia services to achieve better awareness, early diagnosis and high quality treatment at every stage and in every setting, with a greater focus on local delivery of quality outcomes and local accountability for achieving them. Let us hope so.

Some young people may say it does not affect them, but I know of at least two school children helping to look after a parent who has Alzheimer’s. Besides, we all have to grow old, and who knows…?

I once knew someone with Alzheimer’s who had been an English teacher and always loved poetry. Now and then in the later stages of the disease, she would come out with a very apt line or even a whole verse from a poem she’d once been able to recite by heart. So great an impression had some poems and events made on her that even the darker mists of memory failed to engulf them completely.

This poem is a villanelle, was inspired by people like my late friend and also the author Sir Terry Pratchett; indeed, all families/carers, some whom I have known personally, that have experienced or are experiencing the truly heartbreaking task of watching their loved ones' mental faculties slowly winding down. 

HARVESTING IMAGINATION

Wheels of the mind winding down;
though time play fast and loose with us,
we’ll reap a harvest of imagination

A smile but lost its way in a frown
seeks sanctuary in Cinderella memories,
wheels of the mind winding down

Though dignity wear a faded gown
as it stumbles through a Hall of Mirrors,
we’ll reap a harvest of imagination

A heart that wears love’s crown
keeps beauty in the folds of its favours,
wheels of the mind winding down

Love’s spirit unbowed, unbeaten,
turning the pages of life’s kinder stories,
we’ll reap a harvest of imagination

Among spoils of battles lost and won,
pathways to peace for all benign ghosts;
wheels of the mind winding down,
we’ll reap a harvest of imagination


Copyright R. N. Taber 2010

[Note: This poem first appeared in Ygdrasil, an online poetry journal, June 2010, and subsequently in On the Battlefields of Love by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books 2010]

Autobiography of a Beach

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

[Update - December 25th 2019: Sadly, the Memorial Wall I am told the wall has now been neglected and encroached upon by commercial ventures to the extent that the path which used to exist taking visitors past the wall and giving a fine view over the bay has been blocked. Apparently, even before the memorial was unveiled five years ago, certain townsfolk made it clear they did not want it so now they, at least, will be well pleased. Complaints to the local council have been ignored, in my humble opinion a disgrace. Yes, the memorial was for those who have died of AIDS in Bournemouth, but - metaphorically - it was also for those who have died of AIDS worldwide; since people are still dying of AIDS worldwide, it would appear that human nature is such that it doesn't really care...? Whatever happened to the Spirit of Christmas...?]

December 1st is World AIDS Day. I wrote today’s poem at the request of the Chairman of DAMSET, an HIV-AIDS Educational Trust in Dorset after giving a poetry reading in Bournemouth public library, and subsequently dedicated it to DAMSET in my collection, Accomplices to Illusion. DAMSET was established with a view to creating a memorial mural for all those in Bournemouth who have died of AIDS, and was later extended to cover the whole of Dorset. The mural is now well established near the pier and I feel very privileged that my poem is included.

For more information about this inspiring project go to: http://damset.co.uk/

I read the poem on the 4th plinth in Trafalgar Square on July 14^th 2009 as my contribution to sculptor Sir Antony Gormley’s One and Other ‘live sculpture’ and you can still catch it at the British Library archive. [However, be warned; the video of my plinth experience and (very informal) poetry reading lasts an hour.]: www.oneandother.co.uk/participants/Roger_T [NB: Sept 19, 2019 - The British Library confirmed today that he video is no longer available as it was incompatible with a new IT system, However, it still exists and BL hope to reinstate it and make it available to the public again at some future date.] RNT

I also read it in Bournemouth, by the DAMSET mural, for my YouTube channel and have posted the (much) shorter video below. While feedback suggests some readers cannot access You Tube for various reasons, those who can may prefer to click on the direct link:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKzi9VRjuq0

OR go to the channel and search under title: http://www.youtube.com/rogerNtaber

AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A BEACH

Sun and moon, sailing fickle skies

to safe harbours;

Sea, like a cabbage-stained tablecloth

edged with white lace;

Heads peering up, peering down

as they have always done,

listening to waves, voices of the heart

that stay with us, move on with us,

play a part in our lives, no matter all

temporal hosts come and gone,

sun and moon out of reach, cabbage

stains on the world’s tablecloths…

tales told by shells on Bournemouth

beach of those whose faces may

blur with time but we remember them,

who died of AIDS and not to blame

(the fruits of love bitter-sweet, yet better

by far to live by it than hate)

nor sexuality, physicality, morality,

any match for our own mortality

but as small boats on a passionate sea

driven by a feeling for integrity;

Come a time when death may put love

out of reach, then take a walk

on the sand, talk with the waves, listen

to shells on Bournemouth beach

(or any other that stirs a grieving soul

to recover the heart’s grail);

join a passing ship awhile, carrying

family, friends, lovers, even

old neighbours…by day and night,

be they gay or straight…cruise

Loving Memory’s fair shores, share

old jokes, laugh about crises

over cabbage stains on best tablecloths

To inner eye (and ear) time never deleted

nor love, though AIDS, ever defeated

[Bournemouth, Dorset, March 2006)

  

[From: Accomplices To Illusion, by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2007; revised ed. in e-format in preparation.]

 

Master Baiter

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

This wryly emotive poem was written as a protest against political correctness creeping into and even censoring humour and satire. As I have said before on the blogs, if we cannot laugh at ourselves, we might as well be dead.

I speak from personal experience. As a partially deaf person, I had a speech defect for many years and peers were always making fun of me for it. I’d simply exaggerate the defect and make them laugh; the teasing invariably stopped. For the same reason, I’d often mishear what people said and give a totally inappropriate answer to a question. Again, I learned to laugh it off although my teachers at school despaired of me.

It was years before hearing aids were available here in the UK for my kind of (perceptive) deafness and life is much easier and richer for that.  Even so, I like to think my sense of humour - if quirky at times - prevails and helps me carry on the Monty Python tradition of looking on the bright side of life.  It saw me through a traumatic youth and early manhood at a time when being gay was a criminal offence .(It still is in some parts of the world!)

Never underestimate the power of humour. As regular readers will know only too well, it helped me through a severe nervous breakdown some 30+ years ago when I almost lost it to the extent that I attempted suicide and very nearly succeeded. Thankfully, instinct eventually kicked in. I survived to tell the tale and bore the pants off everyone.

Incidentally the dictionary definition of peristalsis reads, ‘The wavelike muscular contractions of the alimentary canal or other tubular structures by which contents are forced onward toward the opening …’

This poem is a kenning.

MASTER BAITER

I take centre-stage,
audience in the palm of my hand,
or wait in the wings for a cue
along the lines of something borrowed
that was blue but turned green
in the wash so let’s air the laundry,
on the Internet (of course)
so socially screwed-up networks
can web-stream the divorce

I make politicians smart
till he or she is wriggling like a maggot
on my line at election time,
drive religious folks to drink (or worse)
for exposing a putting of cart
before horse and making sure it’s loaded
so a congregation’s conscience
all the lighter (and its pockets) saved
by heaven-sent Muppets

I make misanthropists believe
that what their keeping up their sleeve
is the sunshine of a smile,
ready to spread like butter on my bread
(though some say that’s not healthy)
to help keep hearty a world on the blink
that, damn it, needs the likes of me
to get it thinking about mud it’s throwing
and where it’s sticking

Take your cue from me, catch a whopper;
I am called Humour... (Gotcha!)

Copyright R. N. Taber 2010

The Time Keeper

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

I spent most of yesterday in my beloved Brighton. It only takes an hour on the train from London, Victoria and I can get to Victoria in about 30 mins from where I live. As I am not really up to much travelling at the moment, it is an easy journey to a delightful place and a guaranteed lovely day (whatever the weather).

Yesterday was like summer and I really enjoyed my usual stroll on the beach until meeting up with old friends to catch up over a few beers later.

THE TIME KEEPER

Keeper of my time since the day

I first saw you, a beauty to the eye

more splendid than royalty, riding

on a white unicorn in pastures green

mountains or gently rolling hills,

Child of Avalon, Queen of Hearts,

carried on wings and a prayer

like wildly flowing hair in chariots

of fire

Keeper of my time since the day

I first heard you sing songs making

heaven ring out with such hopes

of spring, joys only summer days

can bring, dreams that autumn

cannot fulfill or winter kill, whatever

any God may have in mind for us,

left free to choose, for good or ill,

always

Keeper of my time since a day

I first followed you in a storm,

shared the violence of a passion

equal to death's own, nor less

a rage to live than ever stirs in me,

envious of rider-unicorn a place

in eternity, riding, rearing or simply

left to graze, my fickle mistress,

Lady of the Hours

Keeper of our tides in history,

the sea, the sea ...

  

Copyright R. N. Taber 2004

Alma Mater OR Matriarch Extraordinaire

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

June 9th is Her Majesty The Queen's official birthday.

(see also : https://rogertab.blogspot.com/2016/04/majesty-evergreen.html

[Update Feb 6th 2019: it is 67 years to the day when her Majesty became Queen upon the death of her father, George V1 on Feb 6th 1952; she was crowned the following year.]

[Update January 14th 2018]: 2018 (June 2nd ) will see the 65th anniversary of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth 11's coronation when thousands lined the streets to watch her travel to Westminster Abbey in the gold coach (Yes, real gold!) She had, of course, ascended to the throne in 1957 following the death of her father King George V1 in February the previous year.

(Photo taken from the Internet)

[Update November 20th 2017]:Today marks the 70th wedding anniversary of Her Majesty, the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh. I feel sure that hearts across the world will join mine in reaching out to them with love, respect and many congratulations.]

[Update, June 17th 2017]: Today marks Her Majesty's official birthday albeit a low key affair this year in the wake of the terrible tower block fire in North Kensington only days ago. It was very encouraging to see our Queen and Prince William visit the scene of the fire that consumed an entire block with horrific speed and has left many people dead and scores homeless. They spoke with and offered heartfelt words of comfort to survivors, emergency services, and those still seeking news of loved ones feared dead. I spoke to someone who was there and she told me that everyone appreciated Her Majesty making the effort to show she cared, demonstrating a willingness to share something of their trauma. Actions, after all, speak louder than rhetoric...of which there is plenty flying around in various socio-cultural-political arenas these days.] RT

King George VI died in February 1952; and as is the custom, his firstborn child succeeded to the throne. Princess Elizabeth was just 26 years old and married to Prince Philip. They had been blessed with two children by then, Prince Charles and Princess Anne.  So her long reign began. The date of her coronation was June 2, 1953 (it took that long to prepare.)


Update (June 11th 2016): Today marks Her Majesty the Queen’s official 90th birthday; for other (British) royalty related posts/poems, see:

http://rogertab.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/majesty-evergreen.html

http://rogertab.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/a-poem-for-baby-hrh-prince-george-of.html

http://rogertab.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/death-of-princess.html 

Portrait of the Queen and Prince Philip taken by celebrity photographer Annie Leibovitz to mark the Queen’s 90th birthday. Copied from the Internet)

Diamond Jubilee, 2012 (original post):

Yesterday, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II addressed both Houses of Parliament here in London to mark her Diamond Jubilee just as she did during her Silver and Golden Jubilee years. She has already begun touring the UK; no mean feat at the age of 85 years nor for Prince Philip who is 90.

Now, as anyone who knows me is aware, I am no die-hard royalist, but one by default as I hate the idea of the UK becoming a a republic. However, I have always been a great admirer of Her Majesty The Queen. In this, her Diamond Jubilee year, it seems appropriate to repeat this poem that first appeared on the blog in 2010 and subsequently in my collection that same year.

Photo: from the Internet

ALMA MATER or MATRIARCH EXTRAORDINAIRE

Epitome of majesty,

walk-about among us she goes,

smiling thoughtfully

She sees what she will see

though just what, no one knows;

epitome of majesty

Watching over a family,

keeping politicians on their toes,

smiling thoughtfully

Mindful of a public duty,

regardless of any stones it throws;

epitome of majesty

Heard said, admiringly,

of private selves to some she shows,

smiling thoughtfully

Alma Mater to set us free

if but briefly from the world’s woes;

epitome of majesty,

smiling thoughtfully

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

T