Every performer is a character…
everyone who performs on a stage,
on a screen, to a camera, to a microphone,
from a speaker has to adopt a persona…
every actor, every singer, every politician,
every comedian, every personality,
every person known for doing something
or for being somebody has to embody
a certain magic and emanate a certain gravity
in order to make their audience
fall under their spell…
everybody who has a gift
and who has this hunger within
to craft something of their own creation
and their own imagination
that they want to share with other people –
something that people like,
something that people understand,
something that people respond to
and empathize with – is an artist
with a heart and a soul deeper
than the deepest well…
everybody who plays at being someone
for a long time naturally has moments
when the character that they play
seeps into and starts to influence
the actions and the boards walked
by a performer during the moments
when they are being who they really are,
behind the mask of the character that they portray,
when they are doing the day to day
activities of real life…
every performer sometimes has moments
when they find it hard to see the dividing line
between one side of their personality and the others –
which can ultimately lead to moments when performers
look in the mirror and they ask themselves: who am I?
every performer wears a costume,
every performer has their own voice,
every performer longs to dive into a world
and be someone else – even if it is for a short time –
and every performer has their own back-story,
as well as the story that they tell themselves
within their mind which they are at the centre of…
every performer is a magician –
even if they do not directly advertise
that they perform magic…
every performer is an artist of an art…
every performer is constantly a student
and a teacher of those who follow them
and to those who they are walking
in the footprints of who are sometimes
so influential to a performer
that their performances are considered mythic…
every performer – no matter who they are –
in order to continue to do what they do
and to continue to love how they choose to live
often times have to play and practice at
being someone else and at having to act out
the performance at being the person
at the centre of the art their act.
art
Happy World Poetry Day!
Happy World Poetry Day, everybody! I have been writing poetry for over 11 years now, I have been publishing poetry books with my amazing publisher Zeloo Media for 7 years now, and in all that time I have written hundreds and hundreds of poems about absolutely everything – from Love to Life, from Birth to Death, about people still alive and well, and about those who we have sadly lost – and for me it has been a rollercoaster ride of inspiration and discovery during which I have learned a lot about life, the world, people, and myself. Writing is one of the most amazing expressions that an artist can commit to, and over time – like a musician – what you write changes and evolves, as does the writer in the process. I have changed, what I write about has changed – but what has never changed, and never will, is my passion for poetry. I was introduced to poetry by reading William Shakespeare’s sonnets – and after I read them all I was inspired to try my hand at writing my own poetry, and the rest (as they say) is history! I am a writer, and I will always be a poet… and over the years I have been fortunate to meet other poets and writers who are amazing in their own right. I write almost every day, everywhere I can… and I know for sure that when you are blessed with any kind of a gift I believe that you have to use your gift and practice your art every day to keep the instrument of your creativity sharp – even if you only write within your mind, in your dreams, on your phone, or in a notebook. I love writing! I love being a writer! I love writing poetry! And for me every day is World Poetry Day! But today is officially World Poetry Day – so, to everybody reading this, I would just like to say Happy World Poetry Day! πββπππππ
-Mark
“There is a vitality, a life force, a quickening that is translated through you into action, and there is only one of you in all time, this expression is unique, and if you block it, it will never exist through any other medium; and be lost. The world will not have it. It is not your business to determine how good it is, not how it compares with other expression. It is your business to keep it yours clearly and directly, to keep the channel open. You do not even have to believe in yourself or your work. You have to keep open and aware directly to the urges that motivate you. Keep the channel open. No artist is pleased. There is no satisfaction whatever at any time. There is on a queer, divine dissatisfaction, a blessed unrest that keeps us marching and makes us more alive than the others.”
-Martha Graham
My Poem “Never Stop Reaching”
Most dreamers, most writers,
most artists, like me,
often reach beyond what they know
in order to imagine, to see,
and to understand things
that they do not know,
have never experienced,
and have never seen –
sometimes you just have to,
sometimes you just have to
take a leap of imagination
into another world
equipped with as much knowledge
and first-hand accounts from people
who have been through
what you want to say
and let what you have heard
play out throughout your mind
and be interpreted with your own
internal voice and your artistic echo chamber,
and then share with your own
artistic license in the way
that a poet does…
no two people will have
the exact same thing to say about the same something –
unless they are experiencing a moment
of true and unfiltered synchronicity –
because, most of the time,
our memories and our experiences
have their own unique and predetermined
say on how we will personally
react to a given situation…
everybody finds their own truth
in their own time…
everybody finds their own gifts
in their own way…
everybody finds their own identity
in the mirror the more that they
find people who inspire them
and give them an answer to
what and why they are who they are
and how they should be living their life…
everybody finds their own discipline to practice,
their own doctrine to follow,
their own natural medicine to heal their own
unseen scars, the more that they
make strides down paths
that they do not know the end of…
everybody who is adventurous
is like a child – no matter how old they are –
because they know that sometimes
you have to reach the edge of something,
sometimes you have to leap
into the unknown without thinking,
and no matter what you are doing
you should never stop reaching.
My Poem “Robot Artists”
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.
My Poem “It’s not rocket science”
Some things – like poetry, art,
biology, chemistry – can be easy
if you possess the right key,
that fits the right lock,
at the right time,
to open the right gateway
to the way of understanding
that you need to comprehend what you find…
some things – like being a parent –
can seem easy when seen from far away;
however, the closer that you get to anything
the more that you discover that there are
more constantly moving parts
that need to be juggled
than can be observed with an observers eye…
some things seem so simple,
but at their heart they are more
complicated, chaotic, unpredictable,
and uncontrollable than can be put into words…
the sun rising in the sky every morning,
the moon orbiting the Earth,
the Earth orbiting the sun –
things that repeat day after day,
things that we believe we understand
and have an answer for,
but which are far from
as simplistic as they appear…
even a simple magic trick
takes many instances of practice
by a magician to make them seem effortless…
even the ability to stand up straight
and not fall over is something
that most people take for granted…
even the fact that we have clean air to breathe,
sunlight to brighten our day,
trees and flowers growing all around us…
even the fact that there are
insanely complicated cycles, systems,
and forms of life – like humanity –
is proof positive that sometimes
the things that appear so perfect
take time, perseverance, and patience…
the blue sky above, the epic peaks of mountains
that tower, which are constant draws
to adventurers and explorers to conquer,
the oceans of life that are the home
of some of the most diverse and amazing
forms of curiosity known to man,
space, the stars of the night-sky –
some things, especially the simplest of things,
are the most complicated of things;
however, it isn’t until you dig deeper
into what makes something what it is
that you realize that every thing
sings its own multi-layered song –
even silence – and everything is complex,
even it isnβt rocket science.
Listen to My Poem ‘It’s not rocket science’ by Mark The Poet on #SoundCloud
My Poem “Ideas don’t die”
You can bury ideas,
you can file them away for a rainy day,
you can hide ideas –
but one day those same ideas
will return to haunt you,
to keep you up at night,
and continue to make you think…
Ideas come from places, from things,
and from people – sometimes randomly…
Ideas are like sharks –
and sometimes they are just too big,
too fast, and too strong, to get away from,
because they are so imposing
and so overpowering…
Life itself is an idea,
and many people have different
and varying ideas and opinions
on how people should choose to live their lives…
Art is mostly a nexus of many ideas
coming together to form a unified idea
that surpasses and eclipses
all the others that made it…
The creation of ideas is like
engaging in an act of reproduction –
and just like every spawn or offspring,
a song, a piece of music, a story, a poem,
has an idea running through it
that binds every note, every word,
every picture of imagery,
like a strand of DNA…
Ideas make “something” out of “nothing” –
but “nothing” in my experience
is ever truly “nothing”,
because everything does mean something…
Perception is everything…
Ideas are born from experience,
and by seeing, listening, and feeling
something that creates a connection…
Ideas are the greatest and the most powerful
source of fuel for any creative person –
however, even if do not deliberately make art,
I believe that certain ideas have a way
of changing someone in such a way
that they are never the same
after they have come into contact with them –
because, for some reason, some ideas just won’t die.
Listen to My Poem “Ideas don’t die” by Mark The Poet on #SoundCloud
My Poem “Magpie”
I’ll admit it,
when it comes to writing poetry,
writing stories, making art,
creating light from the dark,
I – like many of my kind –
am a bit of a Magpie…
certain things – people, places,
smells, sounds, tastes, experiences –
that I see, hear, feel, and sense
enter my mind through my eyes,
through my ears, through my nose,
through my mouth, through my fingertips,
and make me slightly different
than I was before…
so many things that I see,
that I hear, that I feel,
shine for me and give me
the same reaction that I am sure
a Magpie experiences when they see
a glistening piece of metal from far away.
Magpies are highly intelligent
and they can live a relatively long life –
and it is because of their observed
and recorded intellectual capabilities,
their extraordinary memory,
and their innate nature, that has led
people over the ages to come to believe
that Magpies can sense and perceive
things before they happen,
as if their existence is connected
to a realm that can only be described
as being supernatural.
So many people think in the same way…
so many artistically minded people
regularly experience moments of inspiration
when they see, hear, or feel something
that opens their eyes wide
and compels them to make a reality
an idea that they cannot shake, nor deny…
so many people see things that other people
may also see, but could never convey…
so many people, like me, who express
what they see, what they hear, what they feel,
what they think, and what they believe,
ultimately choose to use what they have collected
within their mind until a time in the future
when they can let their creative side
fly like the black and white wings of a Magpie.
My Poem “Bowie and Me”
Every day of the week
I head down to Dudley Street
to meet, to greet, and to speak
with the one and the only
David Bowie,
and every time I see him
he talks to me and
he communicates so much to me
without even having to say a word
how lucky we all are to be alive
and walking the streets and the paths
of this world –
and every time I see him
I get this instant flash
of inspiration,
like a bolt of lightning,
that I try to imbue
into the art that I create
which always follows
my divine-like encounter with “Bowie”
who waits tirelessly for me
against a wall of blue
on Dudley Street like a gate-keeper
and a guide to a world of
wonder, imagination, and self-discovery.
“Bowie” by Annatomix – Dudley Street, Birmingham, United Kingdom
My Poem “Deus ex Poetica”
Wishes and prayers come from hope…
inspiration rises when a feeling is set free…
memories and emotions are like ghosts…
poetry comes from God, and God comes from poetry.
Nobody has ever asked God why they created the universe –
but nobody should ever ask an artist
why they create the art that they make,
because, most of the time, an artist
is only following their instincts
and trying to capture a feeling, an experience,
or an emotion that they want to share.
An artist can spend years living in darkness –
and then, light, life, an idea,
an entire universe can instantly come into being
and start a chain-reaction that expands without end
before their eyes, and build a reality
of its own, layer by layer.
There is always someone listening…
there is always someone watching…
there is always someone thinking,
dreaming, and imagining something new…
there is always someone waiting…
there is always someone anticipating…
there is always someone creating
magic from out of the blue.
Everything is what it is for a reason…
everybody is who they are because who they are
is who they are meant to be…
everyone who is anyone has at least once in their life
opened their heart, closed their eyes,
dug down deep within themselves, touched their own soul,
and returned to the world with something about themselves
that they never knew they possessed.
When an artist first becomes an artist,
what they feel, what they see,
and what they know drives their emotions
and their imagination, can sometimes be scary –
however, the more that an artist creates,
the more that they want to create…
artists are constantly driving to inspire
a feeling in someone else because of the echo
of a feeling of that which inspired them –
comedians receive such a feverish reaction
to their art when they inspire
an audience of people into laughter.
God has always been
the greatest artist anyone has ever known…
since the beginning – when they created
the heavens and the Earth –
every day God’s greatest creation – Life –
continues to evolve and be reinterpreted
over and over again, and it will continue to be –
because Life will always be the greatest masterpiece
ever envisioned or created, just as it has been
since the beginning of time
when God created poetry.
markthepoet.me 