inspired

My Poem ‘The Morning Person’

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

I wake up even before the sun has risen;
I am thinking about the day ahead,
while others are still dreaming;
I am there to witness a divine sight
every time I open my eyes
and I watch the sunrise,
and I feel with every beat of my heart
as it races that I am here for a reason;
I see hope in the daylight,
and in the blue sky that follows
I see a beautiful purpose
being reflected back like a mirror…
as one half of the world says “goodnight”
and the other says “good morning”.

I reveal my true colours
when I imagine and I am inspired…
I see the universe’s path for me
when something occurs to me
that I had not thought of or considered before…
I wish I could help people see
that each and every one of us
is the beholder of,
as well as in constant orbit of,
a life-giving and life-changing fire…
I wish every-thing and everyone
had the instinct to share
all the gifts that Earth blesses us with every day –
and there would be no greed, no hunger,
no richer, no poorer.

I thrive and I feel energized
by the light and the bright
of a beautiful morning;
I have stayed up through the night,
and I have been shrouded by the dark of the night
and I have walked under the silver shimmer of moonlight;
I love a night-owl dearly –
however, to me, it is not after the sun has set
that the dream-world that awaits me starts calling;
I am the one who listens to every solemn sound
that only slightly breaks the silence
of a new day’s dawn, and who looks for,
and who sees more –
however, that is just me…
I cannot help myself from being a “morning person”
who smiles at the instant that I see
the first breath-taking burst of daylight
and the golden flash
that is our sun’s magical star-light.

My poem ‘A world of poetry’

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

People sitting in the sun;
people on the phone;
people having some time alone;
people, a family sitting down
and having a picnic for their lunch…
Birmingham, Victoria Square –
June 9th, 2016, 12.04pm…
I am sitting here
basking in sunlight
with my notebook and pen
capturing a moment of time
with words that are inspired
from this moment of inspiration…
I am looking out and seeing
every kind of person –
tourists, friends, business people,
artists, sun-worshippers, and many more –
and at every instant
I am almost blinded by fascination.

A sudden breeze decreases the temperature,
the sun becomes less intense
because of a momentary overhead cloud-cover…
a sudden realisation of time
motivates everyone to move again with a purpose…
and then another sudden burst of energy
gives everybody a gift of focus.

A falling white feather,
as if an angel had left behind a token of heaven…
I sit, I watch, I see, I feel
a wave of something indescribable engulf me…
I see, I watch, a world of poetry…
I feel connected to everything…
I feel the world moving…
I feel like I have just taken
a bite from the fruit of the first tree…
I have always known
that poetry is the world,
and the world is poetry.

My Poem ‘V’

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Our lives are stories
within an epic and ever-evolving,
ever-changing, ever-continuing poem
that started at the moment
that the universe began;
my own life has changed over time –
as I have grown, experienced,
thought, and felt, the world
and everybody whom I have met
has contributed into making me
who I am now at every turn;
we are more free to be who we want to be
when we are young and when we know nothing
about the need of adults to make plans;
I always knew that I had an energy
and a passion within myself –
however, it is only since I began
writing poetry and stories
that I have felt as if I were able
to allow the inspired fire
within my heart to burn.

I can still remember
the first poem I ever wrote;
I can still recall
where I was when I started
to put together the poems
and the pages and the images
of my first book;
I can still feel what it was like
when I knew that I had a gift
and that I could use words
to express my feelings
like a musician makes music
by playing notes;
I can still sit, stare,
and hold my pen and my notebook
in my hand and relive
the experience of inspirations magic touch.

Every time that I unveil
a new poetic-offspring of mine,
to me it is like seeing
the face of your own child smile
for the first time;
every time I start writing
and the words flow
and come fast like the water
of a raging-river,
the light and the energy
that binds everything together
starts to shimmer;
every time I am inspired
I can feel something inside of me
fighting to break free of me
and explode like a cannon;
every time of every writing
of a new poem is like witnessing
the golden light of an unending dawn.

I still have to pinch myself
to believe how lucky I am;
I still have to look in the mirror
and marvel at all that I have seen,
all that I have experienced,
and all that I remember from my life;
I still have to find a way every day
to use the power of what I know,
but that which other people
might not at first understand;
I still have to daily accept
the awesome feeling of pride that I feel
in myself at all that I have personally achieved
and done – especially when I flick through
and I re-read and remember
all the poems that I have written
that have been published in my books…
I still find it incredible to believe
that not only do I have one book
of my poetry and stories published –
but, in fact, instead of one,
as I write this, I am looking at the cover
of book number five.

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My Poem ‘The Man in Blue’

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

Where to start, how to begin;
the first time is always the most memorable,
like the first time that you see a shooting star;
the first time for everyone is always different
for everything – however, just as seas settle,
and nerves turn into waves of excitement,
after that first time of complete and utter
scarily real reality grasping you
by the heart and taking your breath away…
something amazing happens,
something exciting rises in you
like an internal sun,
something makes sense
beyond words could ever explain.

Anyone can begin anything;
some things have a time limit,
and some things don’t;
anyone can capture the essence of a feeling,
and if you truly do not want a feeling
or a time to fade there is always a way
to make sure that it won’t.

There are some people
who read the last page of a book
before they ever read the first;
there are some people
who come into something
at the end and work their way back;
there are some people
who believe they are cursed;
there are some people
whose first word in life
is also their last.

As I have lived,
as I have grown,
as I have breathed deep
and ventured far from home,
I have seen things beyond my wildest dreams,
I have met the most beautiful angel of Earth
that I have ever seen,
I have been inspired,
I have walked through fire,
I have found a reason to live,
I have discovered that in life
it doesn’t matter where you are –
what matters the most
is who you are with.

We are all people of colour;
we all wear the shades of ourselves proudly,
because we consciously or sub-consciously
want to tell people “this is me”;
we are all exhibitionists, in our own way –
even if we do not always choose
to be the first one to show
our dance-moves on a dance-floor;
we all have some idea
of who and what we would like to be.

There are some offers
that you simply cannot refuse;
there are some people
who you could never say no to;
there are some colours
that no matter what
will always look good on you;
there are some who focus
on the little things in life
and the continued happiness of the few;
there are some people who are just like me…
and just like everyone has their favourite colour,
and in every way embodies
the empathetic qualities of their favourite colour,
I am definitely quintessential
man in blue.

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My Poem ‘The Writer Type’

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

I can always tell
another writer when I see them;
I can always tell poetry
whenever I read something
that someone has written;
I can always tell another poet
when I hear them speak
with so much passion,
energy, and depth of intuition
in their voice;
I can always tell
and I always know
when a writer has an idea
for something to write in some form,
because I have that feeling
multiple times a day –
and when you feel that need to write rise,
as a writer, you just know in yourself
that what is on your mind
needs to flow unabated
as a matter of necessity and destiny,
and not always as a matter of choice.

I have a sixth sense for creative people;
I have an instinct for the inspired;
I have been a member of the church of poetry
for years now, and I am its life-long disciple;
I have the greatest adoration for people
who can change the world with the power of words,
and to whom their love of language
is one of the greatest of all their desires.

I could sit with my notebook
at a table in Starbucks,
I could lay on my bed looking out the window,
I could sit on a bench in the park,
I could sit under the moonlight in the dark,
and be absolutely captivated and lost
in thought by the most incredible
and the most inspiring creation of my imagination –
as I try to interpret, convey, and convert
my thoughts into words
that perfectly capture
the constellations of my universe
into understandable verse.

When I write, it is a stream of consciousness;
when I daydream, there is never
any limit to what I can imagine;
when the rhythm of my soul takes me
and I give birth to a newborn of my own poetry,
I love the experience so much;
when the artistic animal
catches me its sights and its embrace,
there is nowhere to run…
which to me is my kind of fun!

I can always tell someone
who has seen the artistic light;
I can always understand
when someone says out-loud
that they do not know
why they are doing what they are doing –
however, in more ways than they can describe,
they just know that what they are doing
just feels right;
I can always follow the thoughts
and the emotions of someone,
and I love sharing my own
as I too spread my poetic wings and take flight;
I can always tell ‘the writer type’.

My Poem ‘Two for Joy’

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

Trust and connection,
familiarity and intimacy,
understanding and love,
that incredible and amazing feeling
that makes you so happy.

A look, a smile, a sound, a laugh,
a shared energy of meaning and identity,
that stimulates a feeling
of fluttering butterflies within your heart;
a shared song, a duet, a pairing and an enlightening
of the best of each other that you yearn to feel
and want to show and share with everyone
watching both near and far away;
a poem inspired to be written
in the same way that the melody of a song
needs to be played.

Glances, kisses, touch,
timeless love that makes you feel lost;
when you know that you have found your One,
nothing and no one else matters,
because to you what they mean to you
is as precious and as phenomenal
as interstellar dust;
they are your world,
they are your life,
they are a part of your soul,
they are your light.

I have always believed
that true love is like a force of nature;
while gravity pulls you down,
love lifts you up;
I have never wanted
and I have never been able to keep
my feelings from bubbling over;
while you are worrying about what may
or what may not happen,
there is a divine dance
and a biological transition taking place –
that is quietly magnifying
and setting into motion
the opening of a stream
and a waterfall of extreme emotional expression,
that will make every part of you
feel even more addicted, obsessed, and in love.

When you are one,
you can feel sorrow;
when you are one of two,
there are things about you
that you only want the One you love to know;
when you are up at night,
or waking up first thing in the morning,
when you are in love
there is only one face and one voice
who you want to see and hear
with your eyes, with your ears, in your mind –
because they always have the rejuvenating power
to sustain and keep you alive
and protected from ever being destroyed;
when you see two people together as a couple,
or when you see a male and a female bird,
or any pairing of two animals
who adore each other
and who want to be with each other,
think of the one that you love
who means the most to you,
and remember the first line
of that memorable rhyme:
“One for sorrow, two for joy…”

My Poem ‘The Rhyme of the Constant Writer’

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

There once was a writer called Mark,
who, more than anyone,
loved a walk through a beautiful park;
he wrote all-day, everyday;
and when he wasn’t writing, he was thinking;
who could write an entire short story
about the memory of a beautiful Summer’s day,
or a sonnet with thirteen lines
that perfectly and succinctly
expresses exactly what he was feeling.
When he was not doing his job,
Mark would write poems –
even when, and especially when,
he was in a library,
or walking around a bookshop,
Mark would have so many thoughts
and ideas running through his mind,
he had to write them down anywhere he could,
as fast as he could,
before they left him again.
To this day, Mark still wonders and marvels
at how inspired he is,
almost every second of every day –
and where all the inspiration he uses comes from,
not even Mark truly knows.

Mark was a writer who had his favourite things
that sparked his creativity,
and like most writers, and like most people,
Mark had his own unique routines;
Mark just loved creating and writing
all kinds of stories, and even as a boy
Mark was imagining places
where he had not yet been.
It was a preoccupation for Mark
to look around and ask questions,
and to make connections;
being in his own world
was where Mark felt the most comfortable,
because he could make something amazing
and magical in his mind,
and be a true master of invention.

Mark was someone who went somewhere everyday
to chase the light and answer the call of inspiration;
every morning when he woke up,
Mark would look out of his bedroom window
and be so enthralled by what he saw –
everyday it was like waking up in another dimension.
Mark regularly sat down with his favourite
caramel-coated coffee,
and a slice of lemon cake,
and would spend hours writing poetry,
and feel like he was still dreaming
even when he was still wide awake.

Mark was a writer who loved being a writer,
but Mark was also someone who loved
watching films at the cinema;
Mark loved books, and must have read over a hundred;
Mark was someone who never had a moment
when his mind was not, in some form or another, in over-drive –
even as he was drifting off to sleep
in the dark in bed at night.

Mark listened, Mark heard;
Mark observed, Mark learned;
Mark was a peace-maker,
but Mark was also a fighter;
Mark was at his happiest,
and at his most inspired,
when he had a pen in his hand
hovering over his notebook,
and writing the rhyme of the constant writer.

My Poem ‘Cogito ergo sum’

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

When I wake up every morning,
I know that I am poet,
and I want to be a writer;
when I see something,
I am inspired by an idea,
I become, I feel, and I connect,
with what fills and stimulates
my mind and my consciousness;
I take what has been inspired into being
and I run with it all the way
to the end of my imagination;
I find a way to connect the dots
in an imaginative way,
and express what I see
with undivided focus.

I can look at the world
and see any reality that I can imagine;
I can hear a song
and dream of a place, while still awake;
I can see something,
and then get this rush of excitement
deep inside me, that overflows from me,
that feels like I am
about to take a leap from a mountain;
I can feel things
that no one in the world,
no matter how good an actor they were,
could ever fake.

If I were not a writer,
I do not know who I would be;
if I did not write poetry,
I would not be me;
if I were not inspired
and excited about the world
as much as I am,
I think I would be missing a piece of my soul;
if I did not give myself fully
and wholeheartedly to what was right in front of me,
and what made me feel free,
then I would never know or remember
the feeling of the sun on my skin,
and every rainy day
would always be one that was cold.

The first place to start from,
and the first person to know,
is always the place,
and is always the person,
that you know better than anywhere, or anyone,
and you can always rely on the first instinct
and the first thought that comes to your mind;
there is no place you can go
and not see the person in the mirror,
from whom you can never hide;
if you want to know who to be,
if you want to know what to do,
if you want to have faith in something, or someone,
but you just can’t decide what to believe, or who –
close your eyes, know yourself,
and recite to yourself
one of my favourite, and one of the most profound,
latin phrases you could ever know the meaning of:
cogito ergo sum.

My Poem ‘Live Long and Prosper’

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While growing up we all have heroes
who we see, who we watch, who we listen to,
and who we want to emulate,
and while growing up
there were no greater heroes or role-models
who used to keep me captivated, interested,
in-awe, and excited,
to follow their continuing adventures,
where no man has gone before,
than the crew of the Starship Enterprise –
and when I got home from school,
it was to the final frontier where I journeyed off to
on my television and in my imagination –
and to this day every episode and story of every series
of my favourite universe, canon, fan-base, and franchise,
never fails to fill me with the same feelings
I had as a boy imagining being a member of the Enterprise’s crew –
and every time I watch an episode or a movie now,
I am, and I will forever be, captivated.

Captain James T. Kirk, the commander of the ‘Enterprise’
in the Original Series of ‘Star Trek’ in the sixties,
was a natural leading man, and a hero that
wherever he would go thousands would follow –
because William Shatner played him so expertly and perfectly,
no one else could truly be or inhabit such a role
as he did in ‘Jim’ Kirk;
however, it was always ‘Mr. Spock’, played timelessly
by the late great Leonard Nimoy,
who I used to to be more drawn to and fascinated by –
and like another fictional hero of mine, Sherlock Holmes,
Spock used knowledge and logic to be the source
and the answer to most of the problems
he and the rest of the Enterprise crew came face to face with –
and Leonard Nimoy was Spock in every way, shape, and form,
and the knowledge now that Mr. Spock and Leonard Nimoy’s light
has gone out from the world is a loss to everyone on Earth.

Leonard Nimoy, and Mr. Spock, leave a legacy
in so many ways infinite ways for everybody to see,
remember, and be inspired by.
I have always been a life-long Star Trek fan,
and every time I hear that someone from my favourite TV show
has died, I honestly do want to cry.
I just wish I had had the chance to meet Leonard Nimoy;
I just wish I could have been able to tell him
how influential he was to so many people, and always will be,
and to tell him how important he and his message
was to me as a boy.

I will always be inspired to reach for the stars;
I will always look back on my childhood with a smile on my face,
and remember my favourite half-Human/half-Vulcan fondly,
because to me his spirit will forever loom large.
I will never stop watching, reading, imagining,
and I will all my life be inspired by the voyages
of every crew and every starship, especially the Enterprise,
travelling and exploring the final frontier;
I will always remember the amazing Leonard Nimoy,
and this poem is my lasting tribute to him.
And as Leonard Nimoy’s Star Trek character Mr. Spock
was frequently fond of saying, in his name:
I promise to live long and prosper.

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My Poem ‘Heart of a Poet’

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

The heart of a poet
is one of the most beautiful, amazing,
wonderful, things in the universe;
the heart of a poet is one of the most pure,
enlightening, electrifying, and special,
miracles of life, that blesses whom it belongs
with a mastery of the most spectacular
and gorgeous of words;
the heart of a poet is always open,
and it feels things and experiences
exceedingly more deeply than usual;
the heart of a poet is like an open wound,
like an open book, and on each page
that the poetry of the poet is written on,
with every word of every verse,
the ink from the poet’s pen
flows like that of the poet’s own blood,
and every drop, or full-stop, is undeniably magical.

The heart of a poet was brought to life,
and beats every day of its life,
because of the the muse, the spark,
that inspired it right from the start;
the heart of a poet has its own distinctive
and individual rhythm, and a signature mark of the poet,
that anybody, no matter when or where,
can feel and see, even in the dark;
the heart of a poet aches to touch the heart of another,
and begs to be touched;
the heart of a poet always bounces back,
even if it has been hurt, or crushed;
the heart of a poet is bigger on the inside,
and even during an entire lifetime
it is impossible for it to completely be filled;
the heart of a poet is at home anywhere –
in space, in the air, under the sea,
breathing in the openness and beauty of a sunny afternoon
looking at the staggering scenery of nature
that surrounds a countryside field.

The heart of a poet is sensitive to sights, sounds,
smells, touch, and emotions;
the heart of a poet is one of life-long love and devotion;
the heart of a poet is better described of as a fire;
the heart of a poet is capable of unbelievable generosity,
and its greatest hope is to be inspired, and to inspire.
The heart of a poet is not given away easily,
and, like trust, you must earn the gift of the bond it forges,
and it should never be taken lightly, or for granted;
the heart of a poet is always scarred,
overactive, unique, and haunted;
the heart of a poet is able to transform
any full-grown adult into a big kid;
there is nothing in the entire world
you will ever encounter, see, read, hear, and touch,
more phenomenal and epic,
than the immortal heart of a poet.

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