My Poem “Happy Saint Patrick’s Day”

Mark Hastings Poetry , , , , , , , , , ,

Cheers, everybody!
Today is the day!
Today is Saint Patrick’s Day –
and some of the best ways
that you may wish to choose
to remember and to pay tribute to
the fifth century patron Saint of Ireland
might be to wear something green,
to find yourself a shamrock,
to venture into a town or a city
and enjoy a Saint Patrick’s Day parade,
or to visit an Irish bar
and consume a dark and heavy
pint of Guinness, perhaps?

A shamrock has always been closely associated
with Saint Patrick, and also with luck –
and it is sometimes claimed that
Saint Patrick used the three-leafed shamrock
as a way to teach people about the holy trinity
at the centre of Christianity –
the father, the son, and the holy ghost –
and of course the shamrock has long
been thought of and considered a symbol of
the regenerative power of nature
and it’s indomitable resilience.

There are many legends and traditions
that surround Saint Patrick, his life,
and his importance in Irish history
and culture, that have spread
and are well known all around the world –
and every year people gather together,
they wear green, they maybe drink some Irish ale,
they feast, they sing, they dance,
they embrace the gifts that
the island of Ireland has given us,
and people remember the apostle of Ireland,
Saint Patrick, on the day of his death,
and they pay tribute in their own way
to the great missionary and man of the people,
who may have been born in Roman Britain
but who will always be considered
Ireland’s most famous Irishman.

So, find yourself a shamrock,
wear something green, eat, drink,
be merry, and remember Saint Patrick
today, March the 17th, and have a
Happy Saint Patrick’s Day, everybody!

☘🍀 🇮🇪

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My Poem “It’s all relative”

Mark Hastings Poetry , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Life on Earth, time on Earth,
is individually relative to everybody
and every thing alive on this planet…
the way that anybody or any thing
perceives and interacts with the world
is always dependent upon
who they are, what they are,
and where they come from…
Life on another planet,
the way that time is perceived
on another world orbiting around another star,
in another solar system,
in another part of the galaxy,
is always going to be different
in comparison to how we see things here…
Life in another galaxy,
when seen from the unique
vantage point of a radically different
celestial body, if someone were looking up
to their version of the night sky
with their own sense od sight
or through their version
of an intergalactic telescope,
would be the same as a microscopic
organism looking at a macroscopic form of life…
Life in another universe
might not be defined, nor bound,
by the same laws of nature as we have here on Earth –
so anything or anyone living
on their own version of a planet,
a moon, in their own version of a galaxy,
would be unlike anything
that we could ever quantify,
because more than likely
another universe would have their own
definitions of life, reality,
and what constitutes science…
Life for an omnipotent and omnipresent
divine being, such as God,
and the way that they would
undoubtedly observer and perceive
mortal beings with a limited life-span –
such as humanity – would be akin
to someone walking past
and looking through the glass
of an ant-farm, a maze, or an aquarium –
because life and existence
and the way that it is perceived,
interpreted, and analysed
is always relative.

Two years ago: ‘The Wolf In Me’

Mark Hastings books, me , , , , , ,

My book ‘The Wolf In Me’ came out two years ago this week, and I am still so proud of it and myself for writing it – because it was the first long form of fiction that I got published. Before ‘The Wolf In Me’, I had written hundreds and hundreds of poems and many short-stories – which ‘The Wolf In Me’ was supposed to be; however, when I was writing it, I just kept writing and writing and writing… because the story of Olivia Hunter and the Wolf compelled me to do so – to keep writing until I reached the end of this first chapter of her story. And who knows, there could be a second or a third chapter? We shall see! But, for now, ‘The Wolf In Me’ to me is a story of one woman/one werewolf’s journey and their struggle to survive through all the extraordinary, inexplicable, and supernatural entanglements that are thrown at them, not to mention the daily struggles of real life: losing your identity, finding an identity, bereavement, losing control, finding the strength within to carry on. ‘The Wolf In Me’ is the story of a woman who won’t give up no matter what, and it is a story that is close to my heart. Occasionally-dark, but full of strength and heart – that is how I would describe this first story of Olivia Hunter, which you can buy from Amazon today for the bargain price of $2.77 for the paperback and $1.25 for the Kindle version! Follow this link to get yourself a copy of ‘The Wolf In Me’ from Amazon.com! Enjoy! And say hello to Olivia for me when you meet her! 😊

My Poem “Anniversary”

Mark Hastings Poetry , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

There is just something
about two people who,
no matter who they are
and where they’re from,
are always meant to be together…
distance means nothing
when it comes to destiny…
some times two people
are just inexplicably drawn
to the same place, at the same time,
and are meant to be drawn to one another –
and when two people who are meant
to be together first see each other
it is as if they already know
that they share something:
a fate, a life, a future,
a reason to be there for one another,
that influences every choice
that they make…
when two people who are meant to be together
first get to know one another
where they are from
and what they had done in their past
is irrelevant to what really matters:
that lightning-strike of attraction,
that infatuation, and that love
that makes them feel like they have
never felt before…
everybody in life makes mistakes –
sometimes people meet and things do not
work out in a relationship,
but all for good reason;
the relationships that last are not always
the ones in which everybody involved
gets along with one another and never fights,
because often times it is having
a difference of opinion about some things
that keeps the spark of a relationship alive…
it is always important to remind your partner,
your lover, your fiance, your husband, your wife,
how much they mean to you and why you love them
above everything and everyone else,
by complementing them, by supporting them,
by giving them as much of your attention as you can,
and by looking at them as if they were
the brightest and the most beautiful light
that has ever shined in the galaxy…
when two people who love each other
first find each other they have no idea
what is going to happen next,
but what they already know
is that they have an instant chemistry
that could never be replicated,
and after years of being together
two people can often come to develop
and share their own language
and their own method of communication
with one another –
and when a certain date and day
rolls around on the calendar,
and a day that two people in a relationship
recognize as meaning something
to the two of them and none others,
they often want to mark
and proclaim to everybody
that on such a day they are celebrating
the fact that they share something
that is just theirs and no one else’s:
their anniversary.

My Poem “The Presence of Purpose”

Mark Hastings Poetry , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The sight of the sun
is sometimes deceptive –
first thing in the morning
when you see the sun shining
through your bedroom window
you might expect to walk out
your door into a world of warmth –
however, especially during
the period when winter
transitions into spring,
most of the time,
even though there is a blue sky
above you to marvel at,
the air is cold and you can see
your own breath rising
in front of your face,
and you have to brace yourself
for what you might encounter…
There is nothing greater
than a winter morning
that features the brightest sunlight,
the most breathtaking and beautiful of sunrises,
and when time changes
and the clocks go back
because that is when you see
the most spectacular sunsets –
tokens of memory
to an evening of dreams
that you will never forget…
Every new day of every new season
is never the same as the one
that came before…
Every sight, every sound, every voice
of every moment is unique –
even though it may appear to be
something that is being repeated…
Every moment contains echoes of the past
and foreshadowing of the future –
however, it is mostly only in times
of reflection when we see
crossroads of existence intersect…
Mornings like this – mornings that instantly
and constantly inspire dreamers
and artists – are the best…
Being grateful for all the times
of unbridled peace and joy
that you feel and experience is important,
because life is about living, breathing,
being present in a moment,
and about feeling the positive pull
of having a presence of purpose.

My Poem “Divine Intervention”

Mark Hastings Poetry , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Sometimes things happen
that are true mysteries…
if the devil is in the details,
and if God works in mysterious ways,
then each of us are constantly
walking a path of choices and destiny…
sometimes things just pop up in front of you,
like a lucky penny, and you have to
make a course-correction,
and you have to do what you have to do
and you have got to see what you have got to see…
sometimes you return to places
that you never thought that you
would ever go back to
for reasons that you can’t control
and you cannot explain.

Sometimes in life you just need to have faith
and believe that something, or someone,
is watching over you –
protecting you, directing you, conducting you,
and pointing you in the direction
to where you need to be,
as if adhering to some kind of
inter-dimensional time-table…
things change, places change, people change –
there is always a time in your life
to find peace and reconciliation
with something that regularly
used to keep you up at night.

Thank God that things, places,
and people change – that is what I say;
because if life, the world, the universe,
did not revolve around the singularity of change
then where would any of us be?
There are so many moments of inspiration
that are really instances
of divine intervention in disguise.

My Poem “Robot Artists”

Mark Hastings Poetry , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Handmade with the human touch:
something that takes hours,
maybe even days, to create
always means more
and communicates so much –
because we can always tell the difference
between something that a human heart
was responsible for,
compared to something that was
mass-produced by a machine;
but machines do make amazing,
wonderful, and complex things
that can be fascinating…
however, some things – like art –
I believe could be copied
and replicated by a robot,
but when it comes to random,
chaotic, artistic synchronicity
I am not sure that a machine
could be capable of being as phenomenally,
spontaneously, inspired as much
as a human can sometimes be.

Technology is capable of doing things
that humans will never be able to do,
and it is very likely that the first
fragment and symbol of humanity
that an alien race from space will find
and see will be one of the robotic probes
that we have launched into
the great unknowns of the galaxy.

Robots can explore… robots can observe…
robots can extend our reach
and deepen our knowledge of the universe…
robots can already reproduce themselves,
and maybe one day robots will even know what love is –
but I am not sure if, or when, any kind of technology
will be able to describe, put into words,
and use love, pain, feelings, and emotions
like human artists do to build
the worlds that they fill with a life of experiences,
that nothing artificial could ever replicate.

But, maybe it’s possible? Maybe one day there will
come a time when a machine will embody
pure inspiration and pure empathy
greater than even a human artist
or poet could ever express?

When I write, it is almost like having
a direct line to something divine –
like having a religious experience,
like asking a question and getting an answer…
maybe machines, robots, and artificial intelligence
will one day evolve and reach a point
when and where they can out dance the greatest dancers?
Our perform the greatest actors who have ever lived?
And out inspire every great thinker
that humanity has ever had, and create
and make something that will eclipse human understanding
about life, about religion, about the universe,
about art, that the human mind
has always been incapable of knowing?

One day there will be robot cars
driving us to where we want to go to;
and one day there will be
art in art galleries
created by Artificial Intelligence,
by some of the most remarkable
machines ever made –
and when we arrive at such a time
we will find ourselves living
in an era of robot integration,
when robots can be
anything they choose: even artists.