Poetry

My Poem “Skyline”

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

Every city is constantly
remaking itself and is a mixture
of the old and the new,
and Birmingham is no different.
There is always so much to see
and so much to experience,
and no matter what day of the week it is
I always look upon its many different
buildings and its diverse population
and I think positively
and optimistically about
what it has always been, what it is,
what it will one day be,
and how it and the people
who make it what it is
will be seen when looked upon
from the ground or from high above
and among the many buildings
that make up is iconic skyline.

My Poem “Locutus”

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

Every collective and assembly
of individuals who seek to speak
with one voice when dealing with others
often elects one member of their society
to be the spokesperson for them
in matters of peace, diplomacy,
and the continued prosperity
of their shared consciousness,
while at the same time attempting
to announce, to advertise,
and to further their own interests
and to bolster the idea of the betterment
of those who are connected and interlinked
with every other person who makes up
the hive of knowledge, energy,
and the gift of adaptability
that their culture is built upon.

Figureheads, presidents, prime ministers,
kings, queens, ambassadors have been
sent on missions of state for centuries
in order to explore the prospect
and the possibility of assimilating
a new investment of riches in the form of
people, experience, and examples
of distinctive innovations
that surpass that which is already known,
and it is the act of seeking out
and trying to understand
what is presently a mystery
that has driven the course of the history
of all the empires and also the democracies
that have risen, those that have flourished,
and those that have survived
where others have fallen
because the victorious
chose to change some things
while continuing to stay true to their
underlying pursuit of a vision
and of a state of perfection for their nation.

Sometimes an individual’s voice
and their face can get lost in a crowd
of people who all have their own
personal perspective on what
the reason is for why things
should be the way that they are –
and when that happens
some people naturally seek out
a representative
to speak on their behalf,
and just as long as the person
who is naturally chosen
because they somehow embody
what needs to be conveyed
stays true to the message
and the ethics of who they are
supposed to be representing,
then unless their advancements
lead to conflict there should be no reason
why no one who is anyone
would not listen to a “Locutus” –
in other words, someone who is literally:
“the one who speaks”.

Resistance is not futile

My Poem “02022020”

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

Today is the second of February, 2020 –
meaning that if you were to write it down
then today’s date would be read as “02022020”,
which of course is a palidrome:
meaning that no matter in which order
that you read it it can be read in exactly the same way,
forwards or backwards,
which I consider as being symbolic
of the beautiful symmetry of life, of people,
of the universe that everybody finds themselves
a vital member of when they look up,
when they look down,
when they look in every direction possible,
in order to find their place in this
amazing hive of activity that is constantly
creating new gifts of love, energy, and inspiration
that we can only hope will fuel
that which is responsible for helping
each and everyone of us –
especially those of us here on Earth –
find our way and our purpose in life.

In Punxsutawney, PA, this morning
the Groundhog spoke
and Punxsutawney Phil himself
informed all in attendance that
he did not see his shadow –
which of course means that
there will be an early Spring,
which means that everything
and everyone can look forward
to the early start of a brand new season
of light and beauty
and all the blessings
that it will bring.


Happy Groundhog Day! 😊

My Poem “NEU”

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

When you make a choice
to wade out into an ocean of uncertainty
and away from the coast
of what is tried, tested, and known,
you have to stay calm,
you have to stay positive,
you have to stay strong,
and you have to keep going
if you want to realize the dream
of remaking, redefining,
and perhaps rediscovering
who you are in your heart of hearts
and what you want to see as
the ever changing face
and identity of your home.

Learning to swim can be scary at first –
being out in a vast and expansive environment
that is as uncontrollable,
as unrecognisable, as breathtaking,
and as alien as water can sometimes seem
can be daunting, and the further out that you go
and the deeper that delve
the more that you can sometimes
feel the need and the urge to turn back,
to return to the surface,
and to breathe in the air of the ordinary –
but if everybody in history had decided
to turn back when the waves of a sea got rough,
or when the land beneath their feet
started to seem impassable,
then no one would be around
to tell the tales of how humanity came to be.

A new day always harbours a new dawn..
a new morning always gives everybody
new things to think about,
to discover, and to explore…
an opportunity to do something
revolutionary is one that many people
around the world have taken advantage of
and the results of which undeniably
show more often than not
a beneficial change for those seeking
to expand their horizons –
which is why I always believe that
every new day, every new morning,
and every new opportunity
has to be grasped and considered
a gift to make a change that
may improve things, people,
attitudes, and fuel the dreams
of those people who are capable
of seeing beyond the horizon
and who can imagine what can become
a reality if you do not stop believing in
the power of transformation
and staying hopeful to what is possible
when people decide to make a move
to go their own way and carve out
their own individual groove.

Mark Hastings: “My Writing Journey”

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

My Poem “Story of a writer’s life”

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

Whenever you ask a writer
what the hardest thing to do
when writing anything is
they will most likely tell you
that the same thing that is
the hardest thing to do is also
one of the most essential,
one of the most fundamental,
one of the most amazing
and one of the most fulfilling
things that a writer can do:
to finish things, to end things,
to conclude things, to write a definitive
and effective last verse that defines,
underlines, and gives a new insight into
what the meaning of a work
of literature might be,
why its underlying message
might be enlightening,
and also the reason why an author
chose to explore a particular story
or subject matter in the first place.

It is always good to restart a story
the minute after you have just read
a particular book. Why?
Because no matter how much you think
you know about the story
that you have just read
there is always more to be found
within the lines of text,
especially with a god-like insight into
what is going to happen before
the characters do,
because by restarting the story again
you are turning back the clock
and resetting an entire world
of characters whom you know more about
than they know about themselves –
which gives everything
a fresh new perspective.

Stories and storytellers
are to what, and they are to whom,
everybody turns to when they want to be
entertained, enchanted, educated,
and illuminated about something
or someone that has a tale to be told
about the what, the when, the why,
and how so much of life
revolves around and is built upon
stories told by storytellers
who might have spent countless hours
retelling, building, understanding,
and trying to capture
a sometimes indefinable magic
that they once found themselves
inspired by and compelled to grasp
the ball of entangled threads
that combine to create every single
word, of every single line,
of every story, of every writer,
of every creator since
the beginning to time.

My Poem “Peace of Mind”

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

When we go so far outwardly
I find that it is sometimes necessary
to turn inwardly, to regress –
if only momentarily –
essentially to regain some perspective,
to connect all the dots that lead
from where we were and who we were
to where we find ourselves
at a given moment in time,
in order to appreciate everything
that we have and to realize why
what we left in the past
we needed to leave behind
for the prosperity of our future
as well as our present peace of mind.

My Poem “Walkie Talkie”

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

Talking while you are walking,
walking while you are talking,
is a skill that not everybody
is able to perform both simultaneously
as well as effectively –
but there are of course some people
who do speak before they think
and before they are able to consider
how what they want to say
will be interpreted, internalized,
and how what they want to say
will impact whomever they
want to tell what is on their mind –
and not everybody at every time
of the day is fully capable
of performing the same multiple tasks,
at the same time, in exactly the same way.

Thinking and walking
go hand in hand…
daydreaming while watching
something exciting is
something we can all understand…
trying to do things that
are at complete opposite ends
of the spectrum of what is possible
can be more demanding than
at first thought…
acting on instinct can be exhilarating,
but at some point everyone and everything
has to take the time to think about
if what they are telling themselves
they want to do is truly something
that is achievable.

There is an old saying
involving the combination
of both talking and eating
that says that if you attempt
to do both at the same time
then you will ultimately end up
“doing neither very well”;
however, people naturally
tend to do certain things
that might not seem like
they would jive with one another
when they are first acted up –
say listening to something
while talking at the same time –
but it is entirely possible,
with as much time and practice
as you can commit to doing something,
for anybody to become a professional
at doing two things at once:
like listening and writing,
singing and dancing,
saying and doing,
reading while watching,
and of course walking
while they are talking.

“Blur”

Mark Hastings me, Poetry, Quote , , , , , ,

Sometimes life goes by so fast that everything becomes a blur – that is why it is always important to hold on to the memory of something or someone whose image is always as clear as day in your mind, and no matter the distance from you what they mean to you will never fade away. 😊

My Poem “The Eyes of a Poet”

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

As the rain lashed down
on a cloudy day
I looked out the window
of the Diplomat café,
as a bright blue tram car
glided passed upon the rails
of the tram railway –
and as I did I immediately
found myself experiencing
a wave of inspiration grow within me,
which I knew almost instantly
that I wanted to savour,
to save, and to capture
so that it may endure
in some profound way.

Writers and artists are always looking
for a place where they can create
unimpeded by the distractions
of the outside world –
especially when they are first
starting out upon their artistic journey;
personally, I try not to box myself
into the corner of a particular room
and declare that there is only
one place and one way,
where, when, and how,
I can express what I want to say.

Writers and artists are constantly
finding themselves creating art
at every time of the day
and wherever they find themselves
caught in the shower of
shooting stars of inspiration,
because what artists become inspired by
is ultimately in the hands of fate,
and over the years I have
randomly found myself –
while staring at a sunset,
while sitting in a movie theatre,
while staring at a masterpiece of art
by Vincent van Gogh or Leonardo da Vinci –
absolutely and unfathomably
in a state of complete mesmerism
in which I felt like I could access
deeper layers of connection, life,
and an understanding about the art
that I saw and the artist
responsible for creating
what ultimately turned out to be
that something that would inspire me.

Artists and writers
are always chasing that once
in a lifetime spark
of artistic creativity
that will excite and unify
every one of their senses
and their instincts
and that will perfectly combine
to make something special
that people will never forget –
and being an artist is sometimes
like walking a line,
like crossing borders,
and like discovering
and delivering a message…
being an artist and a writer
is sometimes like being some kind
of an envoy, a peacemaker, a diplomat,
and someone who can occasionally see –
when they can look at all
the multiple possibilities
of something simultaneously –
that things become increasingly
more clearer when you
take a step back from something,
while still looking at it
and while still internalizing it,
however while secretly interpreting it
by using the eyes of a poet.