Flights of Tension to Fanciful Places

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

This may not be one of my better poems, but it has a certain therapeutic value, for me at any rate. Many years ago, someone told me that the best cure for tension and stress is imagination. I had never thought of imagination as a form of creative therapy, but of course it is, and one of the best.

Oh, but haven’t we all been there at some time or another, past caring and simply wanting to shut the world out, slump in a comfortable armchair and forget about everything and everyone for a while …?

The trouble with slumping is that it has a nasty habit of temporarily removing life’s more attractive distractions from the inner eye and insisting it takes us down the darker side of Memory Lane, thereby making us feel even worse … which is where imagination comes in, and will  play its part
part to perfection ... if we but let it. We have but to close our eyes, think nice thoughts and let mind-body-spirit whisk us off to wherever it is we would rather be, and with whom ...

At the time I wrote this poem, I was in the early stages of recovering from and reflecting on a very bad cold when a good ‘slump’ is just about all I’d felt like doing. My cold all but forgotten, I was soon putting pen to paper ...

For many years, writing a poem has been my way of not letting a ‘slump’ get the better of me. The same can be said, if to a lesser degree, when writing fiction; while my novels have not been bestsellers, they have given me much pleasure, and feedback from my fiction blog/has been very encouraging. (Feel free to browse any time - for both my general and gay-interest fiction - at:  

https://rogertaberfiction.blogspot.com/2016/05/news-updates-fiction.html

FLIGHTS OF TENSION TO FANCIFUL PLACES

Slump in a chair, thinking about life

and all the people I’ve known,

wondering where have they gone?

Slump in a chair, thinking about life

and all the things I have done,

wondering where I went wrong?

Slump in a chair, thinking about life

and choices made from the heart,

wondering where fear played a part?

Slump in a chair, thinking about life

and lovers who promised to stay

but left within hours of a night or day

Slump in a chair, thinking about life

and all the years wasted on regret

where I should have stood up to fate

Slump in a chair, thinking about life

and every epiphany I’ve known,

wondering where did I go so wrong?

Slump in a chair, thinking about life

and growing older, weaker,

for knowing I could have done better

Slump in a chair, thinking about death,

and all the people I’ve known,

wondering if there’s a hell or heaven?

  

Slump in a chair, watching television,

soaking up soap opera friends ,

lost the plot, left wondering how it ends

Slump in a chair, fret about being alone?

Not this time (slam on the brakes);

will get my life back, whatever it takes

Copyright R N. Taber 2008

Dressing Table Wars

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

I suspect that aspects of the human self are as often at war with each other as suing for peace it is a confusing, even distressing scenario of which mind, body and spirit not unsurprisingly or infrequently grow weary, sometimes all at once, and we sink into depression.

Sadly, there is still a stigma attached to any form of mental illness, not least because few people understand it unless they have been depressed through it themselves or close to someone who has. It was much the same when I experienced a severe nervous breakdown some 30+ years ago. Few people understood what I was going through, and it was only after a long, lonely battle over several years that I began to feel well again. I even managed to find and hold down a job although it would be a few more years yet before the sense of fighting a losing battle would leave me once and for all. Well, not quite once and for all, but I can honestly say that my quality of life and resistance to despair improved beyond measure as the years passed. I still take a m low dose (25mg) of antidepressant nightly and – as regular readers well know – writing has been more a creative therapy for me than an art form even as a child. (I will be 70 this year.)

Being depressed is nothing like being fed-up; it is a soul-destroying nightmare from which the depressed person can take a very long time to awaken, if ever.  An invisible illness, it is easily misunderstood. Sadly, one of the last people to recognize depression is the depressed person him/herself. Uncharacteristic mood swings, aggression, rudeness, bouts of crying for no obvious reason, over-reacting and getting things out of proportion…all these can be signs of depression, likely to culminate over a period of time in a firm of mental breakdown unless professional help and support is made available.

While the best help and support can be provided by family and friends, not everyone has family on hand while some friends feel so let down by a depressed person’s attitude towards them that they drift away; they SEE the same person, but have no idea of the emotional turmoil that person is going through and which, if left unchecked, may well permanently damage his or her whole personality.

To be fair, none of us are mind readers. Even so, the more sensitive and discerning family member or close friend will suspect something is wrong. Suggesting to someone they may be depressed will almost certainly meet with a hot denial in the first instance. Please don’t give up, but stick with it, no matter how tough it gets; and it will get tough, almost as much for the person who is trying to help as for the person who is mentally ill.

There are degrees of mental illness, of course. Whatever, there is no shame in it, especially in the kind of stressful, even dangerous world we live in with stress often coming at us from all sides to such an extent and at such a rate that even the strongest body, mind and spirit feels under siege.

Depression is not a battle that can be easily won, and certainly not alone. If you are depressed, don’t wait, as I did, for depression to get the better of you. Strike first. Ask for help or at least try and express something of how you feel to someone you sense will understand and help you to help yourself. Easily said than done, as I know only too well… 

DRESSING TABLE WARS 

Wall, shining like a mirror,

shadows dripping drops of light

like sweat on a battlefield

Words, pitting foe against foe;

a roaring in the head like sounds

of battle in a silent movie

Wall, a white board left blank

to any suggestions from the floor

on the subject of peace talks

Words, advancing like armies
on an invisible enemy, worn down
by stomach pains and tears

Wall, questioning the nature

of the beast, philosophy left to run

a lonely gamut of home truths

Words, starting to make sense

of sensibilities modernity so loves

to camouflage in Rat Race gear

Wall, a collage of human selves

reflecting vulnerability to life forces

and potential for common sense

Words, moving lips in a mirror,

rehearsing a plea for help in repairing

any cracks in mind-body-spirit 

Copyright R. N. Taber 2015

An Affinity with the Spiritual Nature of Ancient Woodlands

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

Where Earth Mother has held a mirror to human nature for centuries, it is small wonder that even great artists struggle to capture glimpses of its reflection, relying on the inner eye to explore its similes and metaphors just as a space probe might home in on moon craters…

AN AFFINITY WITH THE SPIRITUAL NATURE OF ANCIENT WOODLANDS

Leafy dome, a spread of crystal prisms;

like a familiar cheek deflecting its tears

Stained glassiness, images of a sunset;

pink flesh betraying shades of ageing

Moon, shining through, beacon of hope;

human spirit anxious for inspiration

Stars, drawing on mythology and religion

to engage the human mind’s potential

Clouds, siding with the world’s sceptics

shaping like endings to like beginnings

Dome, engaging with our metamorphoses,

inciting we creative dreamers to waken

Glassiness, flushed with dawn’s promises;

pink flesh, responding to nature’s kisses

Birdsong, like distant bells ringing changes;

humanity, left trailing old gods and new

Between earth and sky, our time and space;

to each of us, a prism (some call it Heaven)

Copyright R. N. Taber 2015

Flotilla of Remembrance

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Today, May 21st 2015, a flotilla of boats will set sail from Ramsgate to mark the 75^th anniversary of the Dunkirk evacuation during World War 2.

This poem is a villanelle.

FLOTILLA OF REMEMBRANCE

To Dunkirk, the little ships did sail

for tens of thousands, backs to the sea;

an awesome task they dare not fail

Its bloody beaches saw hope prevail,

a town on fire, centre-stage for history;

to Dunkirk, the little ships did sail

Ordinary people, answering the call

to play their part for king and country;

an awesome task they dare not fail

Injured and dying due for a miracle

few could believe they would ever see;

to Dunkirk, the little ships did sail

Tens of thousands plucked from hell

under plain sail transcending the ordinary;

an awesome task they dare not fail

Soldiers of Peace, heroes one and all,

applying humanity’s balm, braving its fury;

to Dunkirk, the little ships did sail,

an awesome task they dare not fail

Copyright R. N. Taber 2010; 2015 

[Note: May 27^th - June 4^th 1940 saw the remarkable rescue of tens of thousands of allied troops trapped under enemy fire on the beaches of Dunkirk. ]

Pleading for the Planet

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

[Update : July 30th 2019: We are still reeling from a week of very hot temperatures here in the UK, worse in other parts of Europe. Naturally, people have rushed to the seaside. However, there is no excuse for the appalling state of some  beaches - litter strewed as far as the eye can see - where those responsible simply could not be bothered to take it home and dispose of it there or at least wait until they could find a litter bin. Whatever happened to social conscience? We are polluting our seas, killing off and causing pain to sea creatures who, sadly, have no say in the matter. Until we all start acting more responsibly, it is not only climate change that will damage civilization as we know it, possibly if not probably beyond repair.]

Many if not most of us take nature for granted and use it to our own advantage at every opportunity as if we have every right to do so.

Meanwhile, I suspect Earth Mother whispers much the same in many an inner ear. Ah, but, hey, anyone listening…? Whose conscience pricking them for taking social responsibility so lightly, if at all?

Who is the guardian of whom, I wonder? We of nature or nature of us? Better, surely, that we work with rather than against each other...?

PLEADING FOR THE PLANET

Listen to the rain

telling tales on people

killing each other

Listen to the trees

telling tales on people
disrespecting them

Listen to the birds

telling tales on people

shooting them down

Listen to the fishes

telling tales on people

poisoning the seas

Listen to the worms

telling tales on people

doctoring the soil

Listen to the wind

telling tales of people

on borrowed time

Listen to the people

pleading for the planet

before it’s too late

Copyright R. N. Taber 2015

L-O-V-E, Logo for Life

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

Whatever our ethnicity, creed, gender or sexuality, of all the choices we choose to confirm in life, the most important has to be love…

L-O-V-E, LOGO FOR LIFE

Choose love

for the comfort of old slippers

once rejected for smacking

of growing old, nor (quite) ready

to concede the case

for a comfortable shoe   

replacing the ever toe-pinching

designer variety

Choose love,

rejecting the nagging loneliness

of one-upmanship,

a sense of always having to prove

something to someone

(if not everyone) - everything

a must have, must do, must not

go without

Choose love

among its many shapes and forms;

never discriminate,

but take each at face value,

no trying to shape it

after a fashion to satisfy

some selfish desire that chances

losing it altogether

Choose love;

heat the body by its eternal flame,

be guided by a light

as reassuring to its acolytes

ever imprinting

time and (personal) space

with its logo as any swallow’s cue

to flee winter

Copyright R. N. Taber 2012; 2015

[Note: An earlier version of this poem was previously published on the blog in 2012 under the title as 'Choose Love' .]

Notes on the Dark Side of Imagination

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

Regular readers will know that I suffer from regular bouts of depression although I usually manage to avoid plunging into The Abyss if only just...

When depression strikes, I am inclined to wallow in misery and self-pity until a natural optimism and love for life (in spite of its erratic ups and downs) brings me to my senses, and once again I feel free to embrace the world as I invariably see it from the shimmering summit of Mount Parnassus.

Inspiration comes from all aspects of nature, including human nature, fickle though these can be until (eventually) I start to make sense of  who I am; my social, sexual, cultural and spiritual identity...all the parts that comprise a person's whole. It is, after all, the whole that counts, with which all of us need to come to terms, each in our own way, and take pride.

Oh, and, yes, I find the task of hitting on an appropriate title to a poem as challenging an art form as the poem itself; yet another positive step in the survival business.

NOTES ON THE DARK SIDE OF IMAGINATION

Now among friends, now left alone,
wandering a gloomy, scary by-way,
thorns like vampires in fields of stone
under a jaundiced sky turning grey

No one in sight, man, woman or child;
gargoyles on Heaven’s outer walls
perpetuating horror, while as beguiled
by such arts for leaving me appalled

Tearing at cloth ears, misery and pain
for the end of a world still enduring
Man’s rape for the sake of Power’s gain,
now at Earth Mother’s final reckoning

How many poets, I dare wonder aloud,
have permitted demons to spawn here,
this fine company of gargoyles, allowed
but a grimace, neither a voice nor tear?

Oh for just one kiss of sun on the face,
or garden smells after downpours,
to empathize with a lark’s winged grace,
speak out against the world’s eyesores

Suddenly, the ghastly mirage is gone,
I am back on track, among friends
whose loyalty and love I shall lean upon
where it’s said the track (finally?) ends


Copyright R. N. Taber 2007


[Note: This poem has been slightly revised from an earlier version that appears in first editions of Accomplice to Illusion by R. N. Taber, Assembly Books, 2007; revised ed. in e-format in preparation.]