Year: 2015

My Poem ‘Thankful for’

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

As family prepare to gather,
as the sun shines
and the sky is blue –
as someone who is thankful,
as someone who is grateful,
who is both the loved and the lover,
I am thankful in more ways
than I could ever say
to be alive and to be able
to write this for you.

I take lots of time
thinking about the who,
the what, and the when
that have passed by like a river;
I constantly reflect
what I see and what I feel;
I have always considered
golden experiences
as memories to be made
a part of my DNA,
as well as simultaneously
to be remembered;
I have always believed
that no matter where you are in your life,
wherever you are in the world,
that there is always something
that to anybody else would seem small –
but to you that same something is a big deal.

As I have gotten older,
the things that I am thankful for have changed –
but that which matters the most to me
is still the same;
as I have lived, I have slowly come to realize
that life goes by faster than a bullet-train,
and things do sometimes happen
that you should not spend too much time
trying to explain.

Clouds form, rain falls;
colour is painted over the face of the dark;
there is no such thing as an impenetrable wall;
the seafloor, the sands of an island shore,
the photos of now compared to those of before,
that which will be forevermore:
the indescribable, the tangible,
the special, the spiritual –
that which only I will ever truly know –
is what I am the most grateful for;
however, the gift of love
given with all their heart
by the love of my life only to me
is the thing that I am the most fulfilled by
and in my life I am the most thankful for.

My Poem ‘Percussion’

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

The pitter-patter of raindrops
against a window early in the morning;
the foot-falls of steps
outside your door;
the dial-tone of a phone ringing;
the rumble of a crowd of people
reverberating over a floor.

The sound of drums;
the strike of lightning;
the impact of hand against instrument;
the synchronous movements
and almost-balletic arm accentuation
that make the musical performance of an artist
that much more exciting.

The voice of an instrument
that is brought to life by its player
as it was always meant
to be played and heard is magical –
the tone, the depth,
the range, the indistinguishable
call to rise of emotions
that only they can elicit
and evoke is phenomenal;
like the vocal-cords that vibrate
that allow someone to speak,
the unmistakable beat,
like that of a heart,
is its most effective
when it is allowed
to reach its natural peak.

No two ears hear the same;
no two players share the same gestures,
nor the same emotional connection
to a piece of music;
no two pieces of art
can coexist within the same frame;
every member of the same band
shares the same feeling
of being carried-away
and drifting like a flurry of snowflakes
on the wind.

The music of interaction;
the melody of harmony;
the natural cycle of repetition;
the actions of fluidity;
the language of notes;
the knowledge of keys;
the memory that never leaves;
the gift that comes with ease.

While there is still music playing,
while new songs are still being created,
while there is still the sound of waves crashing,
while new lovers of music are born
and want to become instrumentalists and percussionists,
the world will go on,
the Earth will play on and sing as-one,
the sources of all joy sadness
will continue to drum –
and those fluent in sharing
the music of the spheres of the universe
will want to continue to play
with all their heart the music
and the instruments of percussion.

My Poem ‘Paracosmic’

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

Within all of our minds
we all live in a paracosm of reality;
by mixing the real with the imaginary
we can all see sights beyond imagining;
with our eyes we see,
with our ears we hear,
with our insights and our intuition
we create a map of our universe
that is coloured by the memories
we have made that are all
the more beautiful and amazing
because they are too deep
and too perfect to be in any way
artificially designed.

We all hold the key
to the lock of a doorway
that leads far beyond the stars;
we all fly with a burning tail
that contains the fire of rebirth
like the feathers of a phoenix;
we all can watch people take giant leaps,
and then take epic leaps of our own
and imagine we are the first human on Mars;
we all like that moment in a story
when we reach the point
when the story becomes
about something unexpected entirely
with a wonderful dramatic twist.

Stories have a structure,
life is naturally more organic;
stories have characters
that have defining characteristics,
intentions and motivations,
that tie the beginning and the end together;
life is like an untamed animal,
and like any wild creature –
when you come face to face with it
it never pays to run, blink, or panic.

I can return to my dream-scape, my paracosm,
my imagination mansion of infinite rooms
whenever I close my eyes
or whenever I look at the world
and I see rhyme and reason happening
and dancing with one-another in-tandem;
everybody has a world within themselves
where they can be the monarch of their own kingdom;
to me, fantasy is just reality re-imagined
and transformed as if with the dust of Morpheus
into a dream, a wish, or a prayer;
with our mind we can all envision
a way to solve every and any problem of the world –
and sometimes what starts within us
can manifest and be seen and heard
like a dragon awakening from their lair.

People dive deep below
the surface of reality
into the sea of a story
when something tells them
that there is something about it
that they need to know;
books are self-contained galaxies
that have hidden bridges within them
that link them to each other,
as well as to the future and the past;
the times when the more that we blink,
the more that we think,
and the more that we want to make a moment last –
that is when we run, we fly, we dive, we fall,
and take with us our memories of a time
so that they can live forever within our paracosm,
and always have the power of them
to make us feel paracosmic.

My Poem ‘Survivor Instinct’

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

Once the mist has lifted,
once the dust has settled,
once a new day begins
and the dark clouds have drifted,
and the frozen time has melted,
once the sunlight breaks through
and showers to the ground,
once people find a way to say something
to fill the void of silence
once again with sound,
once everybody no longer feels guilty
for showing a smile –
everybody can learn to accept and to move on
without constantly living every hour in denial.

Some people do not blink,
some people do not know,
some people do not think,
some people care so much
that even the thought
of something tragic
happening to someone else
anywhere in the world
feels like they are
carrying a heavy load.

There are people
who would do anything
and would give anything
to someone who was in need
more than them;
there are people
who get up out of bed
hoping to help someone in some way;
there are people
who feel a need to give to charity
in the form of a donation;
there are people
who live their life
with a constant open hand
to anyone and everyone every day.

Heroes are all around us;
angels walk among us;
where there is dark you can find light;
you never know when someone
is going to safe your life.

When something is happening far away from you
it is easy to convince yourself
that it isn’t happening;
when someone is hurting
and you don’t know them
it is easy to switch off
from the image of them
as if the memory of them
was a creation of your imagining;
when you see something happening
and you know that you can do something to help,
when you believe that you can be a light
to guide someone out of a living hell,
when you see a chain
and you would give anything
to be that necessary missing link,
then do what feels the most natural to you
and use all that you feel
when you turn on your survivor instinct.

My Poem ‘Missing Letters’

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

Messages can be exchanged
in an instant;
feelings can be communicated
with a heart-beat;
some letters
that never reached
their intended recipient
and destination
could be those
of the highest importance;
gone are the days
when you would literally
have to wait weeks for a single reply –
however, I still believe
that the most powerful of contacts
that there could ever be
are those that are made
by using your feet.

First-person perspective,
face-to-face,
eye-to-eye and infinitely expressive
is always the best,
especially when it does not wholly
require the assistance of a satellite
orbiting in space –
but in this day and age,
we who are living here on Earth
are so lucky to have
all the means of technology at our fingertips.
I must admit that I too would feel bereft
if I could not speak what I am thinking,
as well as express myself
via my facial-expressions –
like the blowing
the one I love a goodnight kiss.

The written word and the printed white page
is a thing of beauty, to me –
but the power of text and the images
of a back-lit and bright screen,
I must admit, are, to me,
a draw, and to one
I am like that a moth to a flame.
I adore books and stories
written be fantastic and phenomenal writers,
but what you can see and share online
on the internet is an incredibly evocative,
vivid, and epic, world-changing domain.

I recently read a news story online
about the discovery of an amazing find:
a leather trunk from the 17th century
had been unearthed that contained
over two thousand letters –
most of the letters that have been translated
tell stories of a people
and what they were feeling and thinking
at a particularly eventful
and momentous time in their life,
while most of them thus far
still remain a mystery
as to what they say –
and I truly believe that such a discovery
is one of a treasure
that may never again come to light,
because those letters are fragments of time.

Letters can be lost, misplaced, forgotten about
sent out across the sea in a bottle –
however, messages that are sent electronically
follow you wherever you go
and are like coin thrown into a well
that never reaches the watery bottom.
Our electronic messages are like our own
digital ghosts and shadows
that we are responsible for;
our electronic images and profiles
can be seen by everyone and anyone,
24-hours a day, from the last light of dusk
to the first light of a new dawn.

There is a lot to be thankful for
about living in the times that we do;
we have discovered answers to questions
that our ancestors prayed to god
that they wished they knew;
there are things that we all do well –
but we as a species, in my opinion,
can all do better;
we may all find what we have been looking for
all our lives if we too were
to somehow miraculously discover,
or rediscover, buried over time
a treasure trove
of lost or missing letters.

My Poem ‘If you only knew’

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

If you only knew
how much I think about you,
what I feel for you,
how much I would do for you,
and what and whom I see
when I look at you –
then you would know beyond any doubt
that my love for you
was and is beyond any miracle
or dream that could ever come true.

Instant love; infinite hope;
infatuation with an angel from above;
intoxication that no one else
could ever feel or ever know.

If you only knew how happy you make me;
if you only knew how much I can feel you
constantly inside of me;
if you only knew the dreams
that I have of you and me;
if you only knew how much
without you there would be no me.

When I see your face,
I feel like I am weightless in outer-space;
when I hear your voice,
every part of me rises high
in a state of rejoice;
when it is just us,
the blood in my body begins to rush;
when I awake at sunrise,
I see you and only you with my
ever-changing green-to-blue poetic eyes.

If you only knew that to me you are a star;
if you only knew that I would do anything
to keep you from harm;
if you only knew just how beautiful
and amazing you are…
I just wish that I could show you
how much I love you –
however, until I can,
this poem is my way of telling you
and showing you that you are more special
and precious to me than any words could ever describe…
if you only knew.

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My Poem ‘Mourning in Paris’

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

It’s morning in Paris;
people from all over the world
are in mourning;
the city of love
has a shadow hanging over it;
the free world was rocked during the night
by the actions of the agents of darkness;
and when I close my eyes now,
I listen and I can hear
the sound of Paris’ calling.

There is a golden silence;
the smell of burning
still lingers in the air;
kisses are still being shared
on the bridge of sighs;
people are praying for peace
while standing at the feet of the Eiffel Tower;
all eyes are looking for the answer
to the question: why?
eyes still sting with pain
at the thought of all the innocent people
who last night lost their lives.

All violence is needless;
every loss of life is an open-wound;
taking the life of another makes no sense;
the day when all of humanity
wakes up to the truth
that all life is sacred
is long over-due and cannot come too soon.

Fear can be paralyzing;
hope is a way and the road to healing;
the only answer to anger and hate
is to carry on shining
like a search-light in the dark
and be a constant beacon of peace;
standing together in solidarity
and extending a hand to those who are in need
is the only way to accept
and to get past a tragedy –
and that is why it is important
in the morning to remember
those who we have lost…
and this morning,
I am in mourning
and I stand shoulder to shoulder
and hopeful for peace
for the people of the city of Paris.

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My Poem ‘Celestial’

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

We all wonder
when we look up to the sky
what the veil of black or blue
obscures from view –
whether it is in fact above
that we all go to when we die,
and why it is that a burst of light
and energy from the sun
can have the effect that it does
of making us all feel brand new.

If music is the heart-beat
of everything in the universe,
then poetry in the genetic code
that binds all life together;
if light is the way
that the true beauty of the universe
comes to life,
then love is the dream come true
that we all want to live in a state of forever;
if memory is the way that we can all
travel through time,
then the future is a present
that we haven’t yet unwrapped;
if life is about sharing everything
and is about understanding one-another,
then we can all learn again
to live in harmony with every-thing and everybody –
just as all life once did when the things we did,
the things we said, and the things we built
were made to last.

Every sense, every sensation,
every lens, every emotion
of every miracle of creation,
is more detailed and deeper,
and is yet to be fully revealed
and realized by the celestial secrets’ keeper –
however, even though I believe
that humanity is not yet ready
to know all that there is to know,
I believe that there is life out there
who realized and who discovered
the reason for all things to be
as they are and what they are
not long after the universe was born –
before humanity,
or the sun in the sky, for that matter,
were even the twinkle of a star
in any constellation of light in the dark.

Travelers and explorers of space,
singers and players of an opus,
emissaries and examples of an entire race –
each and every one of us
is meant to be different from one-another;
both drivers and passengers of our own destiny,
each and every individual with a consciousness
and a face that has ever expressed
a feeling from within
that there was more to be found
beyond the four walls of their day-to-day world;
everyone who has ever believed
that they have seen, met, and have been touched
by the divine whom they might think of as an angel,
knows more than they might realize –
and no matter where they come from,
and around what star they start out orbiting…
everyone is a child of life,
and just like a light of heaven,
timeless, unique, and celestial.

My Poem ‘Star of My Heart’

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

Your love of life
is the same as mine,
and when I look into
your beautiful eyes
I see all the stars
of my life align –
every moment, every choice,
every person, every time
I looked above and I asked
to be shown a sign –
every thought, every dream,
every time I felt the draw
and the allure of the unseen,
you were always there
waiting for me to come into your life
so that we could both give ourselves
and our overflowing gift of love
to each-other in every way, over and over
like a song on constant replay,
and be there for each other
every second of every day,
always and forever.

We have both sought one-another;
we have both listened out for one-another;
we have both been through so much
so that we could be together;
we have both known
that we were meant for each other
since we both followed
the tweets of each others’ twitter –
and now until the end of time
I promise to love you like no other
and with you discover
what awaits us both
in the life that we will always share,
no matter what blue or star-spangled sky
we both find ourselves sleeping under.

Every second that I see you
my world consists only of you;
every moment that I talk to you
I take a trip into a world
of our own making
that every day becomes filled
with all that could only be
what makes the both of us
so amazing together,
and every memory of us
constantly comes back to the present
and feels like they just happened yesterday;
every moment I gaze and I see everything
in infinite number what I love the most
about the perfection of heaven that is you.

Lightning-bugs light up the dark;
butterflies bring out the beauty of the day;
you bring out the best in me in every way,
and I swear to you, my angel,
that I will always love you
and you will never stop being
the constant star of my heart.

Mark&Melissa-sq

My Poem ‘Coat of Arms’

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

It’s a cold day in early November –
the pavements are clear,
but the sky is white;
it is so cold
that everybody who is out and about
is wrapped up well
and trying to keep warm
in sanctuaries inside;
I am bracing myself
to return to the freezing temperatures
of the outside world,
on the other side of the window
of the coffee shop where I am sitting –
however, what comforts me,
and what I know will warm me
as I brave the cold,
is the same thing and the same feeling
that I get after the love of my life
and I have kissed –
and I know that when it is time
for me to leave where I am now
and venture home,
I know that the love that I share
with my soulmate and my best friend
who lives far away
will surround me and keep me enveloped
like an electric blanket
when I put on my “Melissa” leather jacket.

People seem to be moving quicker;
time seems to be going faster;
people are purchasing more
than they normally world
at every cash-register;
it is frigid outside at the moment,
but I know that this
is only but the start of winter.

People are booking
their summer holidays already;
the world is settling in
to a brand new season;
people are hoping
that when Christmas arrives
they will be ready;
as is necessary,
every thing that is happening
is happening for a reason.

Illuminations and decorations
are being hung in preparation
of being switched on
and enjoyed to their full-effect;
birds are leaving their nests
and flying south to warmer climates;
I am thinking about the future
and about the happy
and the wonderful times
that I will share
with that special someone in my life
that have not happened yet;
the future itself
is being illuminated right in front of me,
and I am ready to race towards it,
while not once thinking
to ever want to take off
my own coat of arms
that is my “Melissa” jacket.

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