Great Expectations Poem by Roger Taber

I am a dream kept alive
for centuries, through thick and thin,
peace and war,
harvest or famine, drought or flood,
a hope for better times
that will look kindly upon us all,
see us fulfil the birthright
for which we were intended
come calm or squall

I am a dream kept alive
for centuries, though an inhumanity
persist in its persecution
of those daring to resist, question
layers of convention
piled high upon cherished tradition
seeing its better values
perish in faces putting matches
to oil in troubled waters

I am a dream kept alive
for centuries, despised by the many,
respected by the few,
(understood by fewer still) until
a gradual progression
of wider education came to fruition,
finding compassion, admiration
for my tenacity, a growing empathy
with my humanity

Come the world’s lovers, night or day,
I rise to its words and one word is ‘gay’