Month: March 2015

My Poem ‘Where art endows’

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

As soon as I boarded the train to London;
as soon as I set foot on the bustling platform
at Euston Station;
as soon as I rode the tube to Bakers Street;
as soon as I looked down at the wet pavement
shining under the shadow of a statue
dedicated to ‘The Great Detective’,
I saw art in everything above me,
everything around me,
and everything underneath my feet,
and the art that I saw left me breathless
because it was so epic.

When I was a child,
I used to look at the cover of The Beatles’ album
‘Abbey Road’ and imagine that I was John Lennon –
dressed all in white, and the one to lead
Ringo, Paul, and George over the crossing
to the other side of the road;
and, while in London, I decided
to follow in the footsteps
of the greatest band that ever was
and go to ‘Abbey Road’,
walk over the famous zebra-crossing –
and I swear that while I was there
I felt incredibly emotional
and so privileged to be there,
and I absolutely felt an abundance of love:
because even though I was walking across by myself,
I didn’t for a second feel alone.

The London Underground is like a warren of rabbits,
a hill of ants, or a hive of bees –
there is so much activity,
and there are so many people
traveling from place to place all over the city,
and everybody is in such a rush;
if you are a daily commuter,
keeping calm and knowing where you are going is a must.
Traveling on the tube is exciting –
everything and everybody I saw
were different from each other,
and to me wonderfully inspiring:
my fellow commuters fascinated me –
all the conversations that I heard,
and all the faces that I saw looking back at me,
were like feeling the pulse of the city,
and it was like the people were the blood
and the plasma of London
traveling down tube tunnels
that made me think of a human bodies
blood-vessels and arteries.

When I first arrived at Trafalgar Square,
and I looked up at Nelson’s Column
towering above two giant statues of Lions
that were the size of two large cars,
as soon as I saw the sight
of the beautiful National Portrait Gallery,
I could literally see hundreds of people outside –
and each person looked to me
like the peaks and waves of a multicolored sea.

While in the National Portrait Gallery,
I found myself completely in-awe
at the beautiful artwork within
which can be found through every open door,
and when I stood in front of Vincent Van Gogh’s
“Sunflowers” painting I was completely entranced
by its magnificence – and every second that I spent
gazing at Van Gogh’s masterpiece of art,
I felt connected to it, and to Vincent Van Gogh
so deeply and profoundly, that I am still engulfed
in the power and the feeling that comes
when you touch something that is
the source of so much inspiration and energy.

From the gallery, I then searched,
and caught a train to Soho,
and eventually came across a wall
that had a piece of art painted on it
by the graffiti artist “Banksy” –
and as soon as I looked at the amazing
piece of modern, incredible,
thought-provoking art that symbolized,
at least to me, the creation of beauty
through self-expression,
in the form of the painted outline of a yellow flower,
I was reminded of another incredible artist
that I had seen earlier,
and the day at that moment came full-circle,
and I knew that everything was connected,
and the world was, and is, a gallery of artistic destiny.

On my way home from London,
I mused and I could not stop thinking
about what I had seen and what I had heard,
and what I had felt during the time
that I had been drawn
from one side of the city to the other,
and I wondered what it all meant.
As I sit here now,
I know, as I have always known and believed,
that things in life do not happen by accident:
I know that the world and I
are connected in ways
that no one else but me will ever know.
In this world there are places with many people
living and working in them
that are fountains of inspiration on so many levels,
and every day I see sources of energy that inspire me –
and that is why I return to certain places time after time,
because these sources and places are exquisite art
that will forever continue to endow me and everybody.

London-collage2015-1

My Poem ‘Don’t Panic’

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

Don’t panic, if you ever find yourself
in an unfamiliar place;
don’t panic, if you are a writer
and your pen suddenly runs out of ink;
don’t panic, if you don’t win in a race;
don’t panic, if you find out that life
is not what you think.

Don’t panic if it’s raining –
because the sun will eventually come out;
don’t panic, if you lose something
that means something to you;
don’t panic, if you don’t have unlimited wealth;
don’t panic, if there are clouds above –
because above those clouds
there is a sun shining in a sky the colour of blue.

Don’t panic, if you don’t know everything;
don’t panic, if you can’t do what you want;
don’t panic, if something feels like it may be ruined;
don’t panic, if you want to be somebody – but you can’t.

Don’t panic, if you’re late for something –
because you are meant to be there when you are there;
don’t panic, if you feel that something
is sneaking up on you by surprise;
don’t panic, if someone looks at you and stares;
don’t panic, if your plans might need to be revised.

Don’t panic, if the house you built is blown away;
don’t panic, if you are in the middle of a city
and you don’t know where to go;
don’t panic, if someone comes into your life
but they cannot stay;
don’t panic, if you feel like things
are building up around you too much for you to cope.

Don’t panic, if every light you come up against is red;
don’t panic, if things feel like they are going in reverse;
don’t panic, if you gambled and lost –
or you put something on what seemed like a ‘sure thing’,
and you eventually lost the bet;
don’t panic, if you don’t see everything in life –
because there is no one alive
who will ever know everything,
or will ever have seen everything in the entire universe.

Don’t panic, if you are ever running late;
don’t panic, if everything feels manic;
don’t panic, if you have to wait;
whatever happens, whatever you have to do,
don’t worry about the things that happen
in the world around you that you can’t control –
because the universe has its own plans;
and even though you and everyone has a part to play,
the best thing you can do is to do what you know,
and don’t panic.

My Poem ‘Free the world’

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

Break all the chains;
smash all the tanks;
free all the animals
and let them live in a world
without the threat of pain
and forced-incarceration,
and let them be what they were born to be
with the rest of their species,
and let them do what they feel like doing,
and not what someone with £ or $ signs in their eyes
expects and wants them to do.

Break down all the walls;
tear down all the fences;
end the obsession of the powerful
to feel important through control of the few;
let the world see what lies in the hearts
of the cruel, and capture their crimes
in black and white with words,
or through the aperture of camera lenses.

End the slavery of every living and feeling thing;
let the whales and the dolphins
swim in the ocean from where we all came from;
let the ring-leaders of fear be held accountable
for their sins, and stop the extinction
of life for no good reason.

Prison is prison;
if you commit a crime, you pay the price;
but what could a defenseless animal have done
to suddenly find itself unable to do
what it was born to do, and what everything deserves:
to live a normal and free life?

Some people can be so closed-minded;
some people who want to see the face of true cruelty
need only look in a mirror;
some people are so opportunistically blinded,
and all they care about is money,
that they don’t see the river of blood running behind them
that without them and what they have done
would not be there.

I care about life so much;
I don’t want the children of tomorrow
to grow up seeing, thinking, believing
that being a bully and being the one
who holds power over someone less strong
is in any way a means to feeling important or tough.
I want everyone and everything on Earth
to run free, swim free, break free,
climb high, dive deep,
and not live in distress, nor in fear
of being scared, scarred, or even killed.
I want life to be lived.
I want to help free the world.

My Poem ‘Peach Perfect’

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

The wonderful thing about a person,
the thing that I find the most amazing, and inspiring,
is that, like a book,
you should never judge someone by their covers;
the greatest thing that I have learned about life
is that the people whom you meet,
who may have known for a while,
can surprise you at a moments notice
in ways that you can’t plan for,
and what someone is capable of,
and who they are on the inside,
you may not ever truly realize.

People are like fruit;
meeting and knowing lots of different people
is good for you;
everybody has something about them
that is beautiful;
everybody I have ever met
has been inspirational –
however some people will always
stand out from the crowd in my eyes,
because every time I think of them, or see them,
I willingly become blind,
as I bask in their light.

There are not that many people in this world
who can truly understand us –
the vast majority of people,
who look at us, and objectify us,
will never truly know us;
what we do to pay the bills
says nothing about our passions;
when we find something that we love doing,
we don’t ever want to see it rationed.

In life, we all walk a line;
inside, and to those closest to us,
our heart’s desires burn like a fire;
in life, we have to be a certain kind of someone,
most of the time;
in own space, in our own mind,
when it comes to expressing our true spectrum,
we can keep going without ever feeling tired.

I adore self-expression; I love art;
I look for individuality,
and seeing the depths of someone
is more incredible to me than I can mention;
everybody, no matter who they are,
has a heart – some may be scarred,
but it can still beat hard.

The more introverted you are,
in my opinion, the more creative you are;
the more expressive you are,
the more you can bring your hopes and dreams to life –
and, to me, that makes you akin to a star;
the more of yourself that you show and share,
says that when it comes to people valuing you
for you means more, and goes farther
and deeper than anyone can reach;
life, and people, can sometimes be deceptive;
and if I had to pick a fruit
to describe life perfectly,
it would have to be the perfect peach.

My Poem ‘Our Earth Hour’

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

If all the lights were to go out
all over the world;
if electricity suddenly became
a thing of the past;
if we could no longer communicate
over vast distances so easy
as we can right now,
and instead we had to rely
to get our message across
the beauty of the written and the spoken word;
if we all had to travel to another place;
and the speed of life became so slow and easy –
as opposed to complex and fast;
if we could all stand in silence
and not hear another sound,
but the music inside us;
if we could no longer be drawn to distraction
by the life of other people who we don’t even know:
what would be the thing that fills our focus?
what would we do? where would we go?

If a far-away friend was literally a world away,
and you may only see them once, or twice, in your life –
would their friendship mean more to you,
because of the realization that most things that happen,
and most of the friends that we make,
are collages of moments that are so brief in duration
they are merely grains of sand
in the galactic hour-glass of time?

Our individual definitions of happiness
are influenced, and are reflections,
of what we value the most about life,
and about living on our planet;
our own inter-dependency on certain things
is something that is a part of our DNA –
where once we used to depend and be in awe of the sun
and used to base our choices on what we interpreted,
in this day and age, however,
we look to different sources of light to be our guide.

Earth will endure;
our home planet will turn and change,
and keep doing what it has been doing
for billions of years,
long after humanity comes to the perception,
the appreciation, and the conscious comprehension,
of what truly matters and what the true source is
of our collective power;
Earth is not only a paradise of wonder and beauty
where life of all kinds can live and thrive,
it is also the perfect home, answer,
antidote, inspiration and cure;
our home world is an amazing place
that we should and we must appreciate for what it is
and for what it means –
this hour, this day, every day,
every second of every Earth hour.

My Poem ‘Burning Bright’

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

‘Poet of the Sphere’,
‘The Sound of Mark’,
‘The Eternal Boy’ –
I am my books, and my books are me;
just as Ray Bradbury is ‘Fahrenheit 451’,
‘The Martian Chronicles’, ‘The Illustrated Man’ –
just as those books will forever be
Ray Bradbury.

An author has a connection to their books,
to their stories,
that is even beyond the words that they have written;
a published writer is a part
of each and every one of their books –
deeper than the cover, the ink, the paper, the ideas;
a storyteller knows what it is
to have true unburdened and unbounded imagination;
a wordsmith embodies their words and their works,
and their power cannot be taken away from them,
not even by fire.

To me, there is no greater sin in this life
than to burn a book, to try and destroy a story,
to undo what was done and written;
to me, there is no greater crime
than ignorance of the truth;
to me, everyone of Earth with a story to tell
deserves to speak aloud and stand under a hot sun;
to me, and to a lot of writers,
the knowledge of life that each and every one
of us possesses is what keeps us Human,
and it is what makes us unique –
magic is real,
and language and stories are the proof.

J.M. Barrie is Peter Pan;
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is Sherlock Holmes;
Terry Prachett is every character
that lives on the ‘Disk World’;
William Shakespeare is every character
that he wrote and gave life to in his plays;
Stephen King is Roland Deschain
from his epic ‘Dark Tower’ series of books;
Neil Gaiman is ‘Shadow’ from ‘American Gods’;
Douglas Adams is Arthur Dent;
J.K. Rowling is Harry Potter;
J.R.R. Tolkien is Bilbo Baggins;
and I am every one of my poems,
that to me are like rhyming short-stories.

Every writer of every book,
is each and every one of the characters that they write;
every myth, tale, and story, is an inspiring light;
every author deserves to have their books
remembered and embodied until the end of time –
from the sunrise of every morning,
until the moon fades away again
at the end of another night;
every story can live forever and be retold,
if people take them into their minds
and into their hearts,
and allow them to never stop
burning bright.

In memory of Ray Bradbury;
and all authors, all books;
and all myths, tales,
characters, and stories.

My Poem ‘Mark of a Masterpiece’

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

What makes something a masterpiece,
what makes something second to none,
and perfect, is not a science,
and cannot be predicted;
what makes something stand out,
and perhaps be considered an epic
and a profound work of art,
all comes down to feeling,
emotion, timing, and an electric shock
of energy like a bolt of lightning.

A masterpiece calls to your heart
and gives rise to an overwhelming sensation;
a masterpiece elates you and changes you;
a masterpiece sews the seed of inspiration;
a masterpiece is like the sun in the sky,
or an island on an ocean,
with an endless message from the artist and creator
for you, to perhaps keep its essence
replaying in your mind
like an unforgettable tune.

Everybody has their own idea of perfection –
to some, a place of silence is a paradise;
everybody can remember a day and a time
when they arrived somewhere,
and they knew in their heart
that they had reached their destination;
to some, a person of great beauty in all forms,
and in every side of themselves,
would be somebodies categorical definition
of breathtaking exquisiteness
that they have ever seen with their eyes,
or felt with their senses.

A musical phenomenon to your ears;
a visual extravaganza to your eyes;
a hallucinogenic overload of your thoughts;
an intense and extreme maximizing and amplifying
of touch, taste, smell, greater than the impact
they had on you when you were born;
anything and everything that impacts you,
and leaves an impression on you,
is a masterpiece that is a cure
for any and all of your fears.

I have seen masterpieces of nature;
I have been entranced by masterpieces of art;
I have tasted masterpieces of flavours;
I have felt masterpieces of a person’s heart;
to me, anything that brings about a change
in a person, a place, a feeling, an idea,
about the meaning of life,
is as important as understanding and peace,
and is the true mark of a masterpiece.

My Poem ‘Tableau’

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

The music stops.
Time stands still.
You could hear
the sound of a pin drop.
Everyone and everything
is motionless
and as statuesque
as anyone could ever hope to be.
I look around where I am,
and I see the many different faces of people
who are in the exact same place,
at the exact same time, with me;
I was searching for inspiration,
however it looks like it has found me.

People come to the same place –
but, more often than not,
for different reasons;
I come here to write, to observe,
to listen, to enjoy the atmosphere,
and also to drink some coffee –
however, I can see that even though
there are parallels in people’s lives,
everybody is here under a different guise.

I scan the space where I am in a flash,
and I make instant observations of the people
sitting at all the tables:
some people are talking,
some people are reading,
some people are drinking,
some people are in the middle
of a moment of laughter,
and some people look as if
they are on their way to leaving;
some people look happy;
some people look sad;
some people look over-joyed;
some people look like
they are students from university;
some people look at home where they are sat;
some people are looking in at us all
through the window that separates
the inside from the outside.
Some people look incredibly fashion-conscious;
some people look religious;
some people look like they are on their way to work;
some people look as if they are reading something
that they need to learn.

Most people are wearing the same colours –
black, blue, and grey,
appear to be the predominant palette of choice;
however, there are small touches
being worn by people that set them apart
and show their inner-personality and voice.

Reality snaps back.
Time starts moving forward again.
People continue with their lives.
That frozen moment moves
from being the present to the past;
words are spoken;
people continue their conversations;
and at that instant,
there is the most intense
and extreme explosion of light.

The world is a work of art;
the masterpiece that is life
is a canvas that changes in infinite ways –
by the moment, you can see, feel, and think,
so much within the time of the beat of a heart;
life moves so fast,
and sometimes the only way
that you can truly appreciate
the tapestry of existence
is to have a moment of true stillness –
when you can look at the world
and see it like a tableau.

image

My Poem ‘Don’t stay silent’

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

Every day, someone is abused by someone else;
every hour, someone is subjected
to a storm of words that cut like a knife;
every minute, someone – a child, a man,
or even just a woman walking her dog –
is made to feel as if they are just a piece of meat,
a punching bag, and attacked like a wild animal,
and beaten both verbally and physically,
and looked upon as someone who is helpless,
and THIS MUST STOP! THIS MUST NOT HAPPEN!
Everyone who just wants to live their life
and walk through life unimpeded and unscarred,
deserves to have that god-given freedom and rite.

I am disgusted to hear that son’s
who have not been taught how to respect a woman,
or any human being, are terrorizing women of all ages
and giving them nightmares of fear;
I am at a loss to understand
what gives anybody the rite to make someone
burst into tears;
I cannot believe that in this day and age
abuse is still happening behind closed doors,
as well as in broad-daylight.

Rape, or even the threat of rape, is intolerable;
abusers in all shapes and forms
must be held accountable;
we must all do all that we can
to educate children to respect
their fellow man and woman;
and our animals also need protecting –
we must all do all that we can
to stop all despicable acts of abuse of every kind,
and it should be one of society’s most important pledges.

People’s stories of abuse deserve to be told
and brought into the light,
and they should not be quietened.
Abuse needs to be spoken about and eradicated,
and the victims of abuse,
for the sake of those who are too afraid to speak out,
must not continue to stay silent.

My Poem ‘Sputnik’

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

It’s six o’clock at night,
on a cool spring evening,
and I am looking out my window to the sky
at a beautiful gold and blue light,
watching the sun setting –
and the sight of it takes my breath away;
and within seconds,
I watch the sky go from red to grey,
as all that I see becomes draped
in the dark veil of twilight.

I watch the stars appear;
I see the planets rise;
I see the ultimate display of the constellations,
and I name them one by one, as I imagine them;
and then, when I see the constellation of Orion,
I am awestruck by how wonderfully its stars
shine so clear, and my entire vision
is that of an infinite number of stars in my eyes.

I spent my day taking in nature,
listening to the world around me,
being captivated by birdsong,
and watching the building of bird-nests
in the branches of the trees above,
and in the hedges of the ground below;
I spent my day believing that I knew
all in life that I could ever need to know.

Right this second, I feel like a satellite;
right at this moment, I feel like I am alone in space,
and no one even knows I am here –
because I am just a faint moving white dot in the dark sky;
right now, I feel so far away –
like a distant flickering candle
in the window of a cottage atop a hill;
and barely noticeable –
like a star of the night;
now, I look down,
and around at everyone else on Earth,
and I see what I can of their lives:
I see true happiness,
and I wonder what that feels like.

I look up at the moon;
I gaze up at the stars;
I see the heavens –
the place from where we all came from,
and I dream that I may return there soon;
I imagine that I can reach up and touch the sky,
because in the dark the void of space
does not seem that far.

Every human being has looked above
on a star-lit night, and wondered:
are we alone in the universe?
And, is anybody else out there?
I have asked myself that very question,
and I know the definitive answer –
and I speak that answer aloud every night.

Everybody sometimes goes into their own
“hibernation mode”, in which they appear
to leave their worries in another place somewhere;
I have always found it difficult
to remove myself from the world,
and not think about what is always on my mind;
some days I wish I could be a living, breathing,
astronaut floating in space –
or a part of Earth, circling the planet,
like the very first satellite: Sputnik.

image