poetry

My Poem ‘The Wolverine’

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

They call me ‘The Wolverine’;
as wild on the inside
as I am on the outside;
I am both the dreamer
and the dream;
as strong in body
as I am in mind,
and just like an animal
who lives by their instincts
I live a life pushed to its limits.

I may heal fast, but I never forget;
I may remember the past,
but I am not bound by it;
the world may get dark,
but I can always see a light;
I may not be like a dog with a bark,
but I do have a bite.

I can be both the leader and the follower;
I can be both alone and in a crowd;
I can be both a wanderer and a watcher;
I can be both at home surrounded by nature,
or in the sky far above the clouds.

All wild things have claws;
all fighters sometimes are called to war;
all survivors sometimes have to dig deep;
all who eventually learn how to swim
sometimes have to sink beneath.

Confidence without arrogance;
wise, but still able to listen;
strength without losing breath;
having vision,
but still able to adapt and act
after being struck by inspiration.

The wild one can also be the quiet one;
the person can sometimes be
more dangerous than the weapon;
the vivid can also be the invisible;
the real can sometimes be the most impossible;
the protected can also be the free;
the most extraordinary can accomplish
all that they can imagine,
and there is no one who will ever stop
being who they were meant to be
more so than The Wolverine.

My Poem ‘Above and Beyond’

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

Some people fly all the time,
while some people have never left the ground;
some people have always dreamed
since they were a child
about leaving Earth
and looking back at our planet’s
divine blue and green light,
while some people have delved deep
into the human soul
and have exposed and made loud
the voice of a heavenly sound;
some people have only had one love
in all their life,
while others have had to search
many countries, many miles,
for many days, over many nights,
to find the one whom for them
was their love at first sight.

Reaching space for an astronaut is not the end,
it is only the beginning…
diving deep for a diver is an adventure
into a beautiful and magical realm
that we as a species will never stop believing
has a captivating call;
conservationists want to preserve our planet
and its many species,
and they understand that for Earth
to continue to be the beautiful jewel that it is
as many of the life that now lives
must continue existing;
writing for a writer is an obsession,
and the perfect decoration
for a writer’s home and sanctuary
would be books on bookcases on every wall.

Our planet would die without our sun;
humanity would no longer be human
without our unbreakable connection
to planet Earth, and our reciprocal duet
of the same song;
every story that we tell each other
is distinctive of who we are
and where we come from;
what we see always has an effect on us
and on our lives –
whether we look far or deep,
below our feet,
or above the clouds
above and beyond.

MarkTheAstronaut

My Poem ‘There with you’

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

When I’m talking to you,
and I know that
there is something wrong with you,
I can’t tell you
how that makes me feel –
I just wish that I could kiss you for real
and take away your stress and your pain,
I wish I could go back in time
and step back inside the photo-frame
to when we were together
and happily sitting with each other in the sun;
I wish I could take away the agony
that torments you… with all my love.

Why do the sweetest have to go through so much?
Why must I be so far away now
when you are all that I can think about
and all that I want to touch?
Why must an ocean keep us
on different continents?
Why can’t we just got back to the moments
when we used to sit on the porch?

You need me, and I need you;
you are my everything
and the best thing that has ever happened to me,
and I would give anything right now
and always to forever be with you;
I should be there when you need me the most;
I wish I could package myself to you
as simple as sending a gift to you by post;
I know that I can’t be there now,
but I promise you that I am on my way;
you are my entire life,
and I just wish that there
were more words to say
all that there is to say about you,
my angel of light.

I’m here for you, babe;
I will always be the one
who you can rely on;
if I lived just around the corner
I would be there
by your side right now,
and there would be nothing
that could stand in my way –
because you are my only one.

I wrote this for you;
I want to be with you;
I would do anything
to have my arms wrapped around you;
I will be there with you soon,
and I can’t wait –
because all that I want to do
and the only place where I want to be
is right there with you
for all of eternity.

My Poem ‘The Foreseeable’

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

No matter how much the climate changes…
no matter the year, the decade, or the century…
no matter the faces of the famous
displayed online or printed
on the black and white newspaper pages…
no matter how we interact with one-another –
face to face, or by using the most
up-to-date technology…
some things will never change
and will always stay the same…
no matter what the names are
of the games that people love to play…
days and dates will always continue
to mean something –
especially on those occasions
when people can celebrate
and enjoy light that never stops sparkling.

Many of us are creatures of habit –
I, myself, have walked the same way,
done the same things,
listened to the same music so many times
that people could probably
set their clocks by me –
some may wonder what it is
about my almost daily-routine
that stimulates me and keeps me
from repeating my actions
to the degree that they become boring;
however, all I can say
is that no matter how many times
I go to the same place,
or I do the same thing,
every single day
I see something,
I hear something,
I learn something
that I never knew before –
and, to me, each new day
and every new person that I see
is a mystery to observe and explore.

Routine keeps the world turning;
repeating keeps an engine from stalling;
re-reading keeps a person’s thoughts running;
reevaluating everything you see
keeps the world exciting and inspiring;
reminding yourself of why it is important
to do some things regularly
remedies any and all short-comings
about you or your life
that you feel there may sometimes be.

For the vast-majority of our lives,
most of the things that happen to us
are predictable;
we all can have a so-called “ordinary day”,
during which there will be something
that will happen that will be remarkable;
our life’s cycles are some of the most
special and personal things
that we can always rely on and fall back on,
and they are what make our lives
feel full and wonderful;
the world will consistently remain
changeable, recyclable,
and indomitably-incapable
of not trying to reinvent itself
without breaking its own mould –
and in doing so
everything and everybody
will always have a part of them
that will be both random
and foreseeable.

My Poem ‘One Life Only’

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

The meaning of life
is not to be rich –
the reason you are here
is to find the one
with whom you are meant to be with;
the reason for the waves of the ocean
is the same as the reason
that everybody has emotions;
the reason why we change
when we fall in love
is because we are always reminded
subconsciously of the instant of our birth,
when we opened our eyes and we looked above,
and we came eye-to-eye
with the first face that we saw –
every day of our lives
we want to feel what we felt,
and we want to find the only other person
who could ever compare
to the first love of our lives
that we naturally and instinctively adored.

A little-known thing
that as we get older we all forget…
a seemingly small but significant moment,
like a sunset…
the knowledge that the more that you give
the more that you get…
the thing that will remain
ingrained in your brain
even after your body’s last breath…
the last thought
that will pave the way
to heaven after death…
that which will build
the landscape of the world to come next…

What you do with your life is your choice –
the repercussions of your actions
will be your true voice;
when you are low,
when you reach the wall of “I don’t know”,
when you feel pulled in every direction,
when you want to make what you do for pleasure
and what you do for love
your one and only profession,
when you can live
and be there for someone else,
when it finally dawns on you
that the most important people
in your life are what make up
the true riches of your wealth –
then you will know what you have been missing,
then you will know you have a world of everything,
then the sun will shine even on rainy day,
and then you will live the dream
that will never fade away.

If we could all go back to the beginning,
if we could all go back to the start,
if we could all know the self-titled song
of our lives that we have been singing along to
since day one,
if we could put our present
back inside time’s wrapping,
if we could find earlier
the one with whom we share the same heart,
we might find our life
slowly coming undone –
so, don’t think too much
about the road less traveled,
don’t think about wanting your life
to fly by, or to get older quicker…
take every day slowly;
don’t think, just do;
find the one for you,
even if you have to search the entire world;
let things happen as naturally as possible;
build a home of bricks, not sticks;
don’t worry about the why of things,
just make the most of your
one life only.

My Poem ‘Christmas Time’

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

“So this is Christmas,
and what have you done…”
sang John Lennon on the radio
as I sat with my pen and notebook,
as the sun shone through the windows
and reflected off the chrome panels
of a nearby building;
I was near an open door all the while –
but not for a second did I feel cold;
the Christmas songs kept playing,
the air was cozy,
and everybody around me
was locked in their own world;
the Christmas colours and lights
were bright and bold,
and just as I got to the end
of the first verse of my new poem
a familiar voice sang loud:
“Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!”

I sit. I stare. I blink. I smile.
I write. I think about how much
I have in common with the life of a sundial –
because I too would be nothing
without the light of the star from afar
that gives my life meaning
and endows me with all that I need
to be who I am supposed to be.

As Louis Armstrong sings
of the “trees of green”
and the “red roses too”
and the blue skies of our “wonderful world” –
I know, I see, I remember
all that he sang about
and what I too believe makes out planet
standout from any other
in the entire universe;
so often, I become both lost and overflowing
with words to describe
all that I see and all that I feel;
I do not know who I would be
if I could not write the language of my heart
on a page in connected verse of poetry.

“White Christmas” starts to play,
and instantly I am back in time
and I am imagining things that happened
so many years ago –
I remember the snow of my childhood,
I remember the happy times I spent with my family,
I remember imagining that if anybody
were to walk on the surface of the moon again
then of course I would;
I remember seeing true beauty
in fallen snowflakes
and knowing that there was more to me and to life,
and twenty years before I would ever have thought
to write anything that I would now
consider in any way poetic.

One last song plays
before I have to leave the place where I am now;
where I am going next I do not know for sure,
because I do not have a fixed plan –
however, as I think of a title
to sign-off my brand new chain of rhymes,
I decide to use the last words
of the song that I hear…
and as my poem is about the world of today,
about me, and is in itself a snap-shot of life –
this poem is about this moment,
and at this moment it is definitely
Christmas time.

My Poem ‘The Bright Side’

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

There is no such thing
as total-darkness;
there will always be
those who have more
and those who have less;
in a dark-blue sky
there is nothing like
the pure white light
of the moon’s crescent
to fill you with awe
and relieve you of any stress.

When the sun rises after a long night,
when the moon appears like a ghost in the sky,
when dawn calls, when dusk falls,
when ocean-waters become a mirror,
when candle wicks burn
and their flames flicker,
when eyes open, when eyes close,
when the world of the day has awoken,
when the aroma of the air
is as distinctive as the smell
after a thunderstorm
or as unmistakable
as the pungency of burnt-toast.

With the first observance of fire
followed a basic understanding
of the human heart,
and what lies and burns
at the core of every living thing;
when humanity first saw lightning,
it must have automatically
occurred to our ancestors
that it must be the energy
and the work of the gods
who dwelled in the sky above;
when the first language of expressions
and signs was first devised
and replicated over and over again,
it must have been phenomenally exciting;
when the first heart ached for another,
that was when humanity first discovered
one of the greatest forces in the universe –
the power of love.

Most people, and most things,
do not get a choice about how and when
their story will come to an end –
every sunset, every sunrise,
could be someone’s last;
over time truly is how and when
you find out who are your true family and friends –
and every day that comes and goes,
and who it is that you see
when you look around yourself,
is when and how you find out
who is your eternal star and sunshine –
and they who will always be the one
to show you life’s
ever-present bright side.

My Poem ‘Halo’

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

Appearances can be deceiving;
no one in real-life
carries around a profile of themselves
of things about them
that other people might need
or want to know;
some things that we should believe in
sometimes do take time to fully sink in;
not all demons have horns,
and not all angel’s have halo’s.

Everybody is different;
everybody shows their feelings in different ways –
some people are always truthful and upfront,
some people are masters of turning a phrase,
some people can keep a secret,
and some people can’t;
some people live a life of regret,
while others do everything that in front of them
and commit always with all their heart.

Just as some people show their love
with a simple gesture of a poem and some flowers;
just as some people ask for nothing else
from their partner but love;
just as some people capture another person
and give them the gift of their likeness
as they appeared when reproduced
in a photograph or a painted picture –
there is no one-true universal symbol
of compassion and love
that could ever compare
to that which makes a heart skip a beat…
for some that might be a ring,
a story written just for them,
or perhaps a message of white
written in the blue sky above.

When the universe began with a flash of light,
when existences’ clock started ticking,
when the laws of nature were first ingrained
into every particle of stardust,
and all of space and time
spectacularly escaped from an opening
smaller than the size of the tip of a pin…
when the universe contracted
and then made its first life-giving push…
all things began,
all things multiplied,
all things became part of an unfinished plan,
and all things were forever bound
to the reason and the meaning of life…
birth, life, death –
and in that order, by design.

When you stand outside on a Winter’s night,
and you look up at the stars,
it looks as if the stars above
are falling all around you
and have turned themselves
into flakes of snow;
when you look into the eyes
of someone who loves you,
or when you are touched
by the hand of a hero;
when you see something amazing
that transcends the language of all words…
you will see in all its glory
the light within the soul and the heart
of someone that is as beautiful
and golden as the ring described to be found
above the crown of an angel of heaven,
that is the symbolic sign of purity of spirit –
that manifests in humans
in their thoughts and in their actions,
which represent their own divine halo’s.

My Poem ‘The Gift of Ideas’

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

Ideas are like a tower;
thoughts have a structure;
dreams are like a castle of clouds;
wishes are like a beach
of long-forgotten shells;
memories are like photographs
that have faded over time;
old photo-albums
are like old songs
that remind you of people
and places from your life.

Eyes open; flowers blossom;
light shines; heart-rates rise;
life grows; the dark is exposed;
the clouds part;
a miracle becomes real
as the music starts –
and like the composer of an orchestra,
you put together the pieces of picture:
sometimes the music is loud,
sometimes the instruments are distinctive,
sometimes the players are both known
and unknown –
perhaps just one face in a crowd;
sometimes, most of the time,
what comes seemingly from the most random
reasons and places
are the most impressive,
even to the dreamer of the dream –
because they are so wonderfully inventive.

Things are not always obvious;
the seemingly unconnected
may have more in common with one-another
than they appear;
just like people,
some things sometimes speak
with a similar-sounding voice;
sometimes even a thing of extreme beauty
can bring someone to tears.

Ideas can be like a lost puppy
that you find walking the streets
without an owner;
ideas about people and things
sometimes change and can be
like the highs, the lows,
and the speeds of a roller-coaster
that go in every direction
before finally coming to a rest;
ideas can be like reconnecting
with a long-lost sister or brother;
ideas are one of life’s
most amazing and incredible gifts.

My Poem ‘Finding Your Place’

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

Finding your place in the world
is an adventure in-and-of itself;
finding the place
where you are meant to be
can literally be a way
for you to feel things
that you have never felt;
finding a place that feels
like a part of you,
as you do of it,
is like finding a perfect oasis –
and there is no more perfect haven
or heaven on Earth to a poet
than a place where they
can be surrounded
by their literary companions,
contemporaries, and heroes
who are as intriguing as people
as they are fascinating and fantastic
as that which they wrote.

Thrill-seekers love roller-coasters;
book-lovers love libraries;
artists love galleries;
music-lovers love stereos,
headphones, music-players,
and they love the visceral
live experience of a concert;
people without fear
love to jump without looking,
and they love to let go
and be free of gravity
and push the limits
of what is possible
as far as they can go.

I found my sanctuary
when I first fell in love with writing;
I found my inner-author
when I first collected together
my poetry and crafted my very first
anthology of the world
that I had been living and observing;
I found my spark of inspiration
when I was first touched by a divine light
that came directly from the sky
and our nearest star;
I found a new world
hidden behind an invisible veil
when I began to believe
that I had a gift of insight
that could help other people
to see things and to inspire people
to make their mark.

I have met phenomenally-gifted people in my life;
I have dreamed dreams that may keep other people
awake for days and nights;
I have walked in the shadows of giants,
and I have been carried away
by the gaze of Angels’ light;
I have broken though clouds of confusion;
I have prayed that one day
I would never have to stop
caressing the love of my life
and my muse’s beautiful face;
I have questioned life,
and I have searched the inner-
and outer- universe for answers and reasons –
however, just as I was searching
and asking to be shown my ultimate fate,
while looking up at a shooting-star
streaking through space,
where I was always meant to be
and whom I am meant to be with
were already calling to me;
and that is why I would always want
people to remember and to realize
that one day, sooner or later,
near or far-away,
as long as you keep doing
what you have been doing,
when you are supposed to
you will find your own place.

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