Poetry
Mark The Poet – The Podcast: Episode #2
Hi, everyone!
I would like to extend an offer to anybody who might wish to become a part of Mark The Poet – The Podcast, perhaps in the form of a message that they would like to share, a story that they might want to tell, or perhaps a poem that they have written which they would like me to share or perhaps they might want record themselves, to send me a message so that I may include them and what they might wish to share in a future episode. If anybody would like to contribute to Mark The Poet – The Podcast, please contact me:
-Mark
Mark The Poet – The Podcast: Episode #1
Now available to listen to on Spotify and Apple Podcasts
My Poem “A Summer Like No Other”
The Summer season is usually
a time that most people
look forward to and plan for…
the Summer is usually when
people have once in a lifetime
experiences that they
have never had before…
the Summer season is usually
when people spend most of
their time outdoors…
the Summer is usually when
everybody is smiling
from ear to ear and embracing
the rays of the sun
that seem to shine a light
on certain aspects of life
that inspire moments of awe.
The Summer season is supposed to be
when people enjoy certain examples
of beauty as they come into bloom…
the Summer is usually when people
like to take their time
when talking to one another,
face to face, instead of feeling
like every interaction is just one long zoom…
the Summer season is supposed to be
when people feel optimistic,
and they are generally in a good mood…
the Summer is supposed to be
when most people are singing with joy
and not crying because they had got
a bad case of the blues.
This Summer has already been filled
with so many examples of good news,
as well as the ultimate example
of bad news which we all know about
which in truth has felt like
one long, continuous, and engulfing
cloud that has been the epitome
of a bad dream that has
unfortunately come true…
this Summer has been one that
will forever be etched upon
the psyche of everybody
far into the future…
this Summer has been a time
in the lives of everybody alive
that will be something spoken about,
chronicled, and remembered as a
Summer when the whole world
had to do what they had to do
to protect the most vulnerable
and to preserve as much as possible
for the next generation…
the events of this year
will haunt humanity like a spectre,
because this year has felt like
a Summer like no other, and memorable
in most cases for all the wrong reasons.
My Poem “Turnaround”
There are times when
there is a prolonged period
of inactivity, of inability,
of inaction, of hibernation
when some animals and some people
experience a status of stasis –
when life and time regresses
and even slows down to some degree;
however, for every time of hibernation
and rehabilitation there must come
a moment when there is a physical,
a psychological, and an instinctual
reawakening that initially may only
be a transitional period
between darkness and light,
between conservation and drive –
and when such a long season
of staying inside comes to an end
there can be momentary thoughts
and feelings of trepidation,
but no matter what anybody or anything
does in life there are sometimes
risks that need to be taken
to turn a world from upside down to
right side up and when you have to
naturally start looking forwards
instead of backwards –
especially when you want to see everything that may have changed
in the interim of a certain confinement
slowly but surely resume and restart,
so that the future of everything and everyone who you know has recently
been through so much will over time
restore and turn themselves around.
My Poem “Eyes”
I wonder how many people realise
that when they are staring into
another person’s eyes
that they are not only looking at
the windows into a person’s soul
but they are also seeing the most
external part of that person’s brain
which is constantly relaying multiple images
at the speed of light down the optic nerve
of each eye to the part of the brain
responsible for making decisions
and stimulating many simultaneous
reactions as a result,
and it is also true that you can tell
a lot about a person’s health
and their lifestyle by watching
the way that the iris of someone’s eye
moves, dilhilates, focuses and flickers –
and I think the fact that our eyes
have such a direct connection to
the way our brain operates,
the thoughts that we have,
and the storm of chemicals that
bubbles up within us perfectly
symbolises
why it is important to take care of your eyes
because they are vital in more ways
that some people might realise.
My Poem “We Can’t Go On Like This”
We can’t go on like this forever…
we can’t go on staying away from places,
wearing masks, and being socially
distant from one another…
we can’t go on living in insulated bubbles –
because if we do then we must
expect ourselves to over time
become suffocated from real life
and traumatised emotionally
as well as psychologically as if were
we prisoners who had committed a crime…
we can’t go on living a life as if one
that parallels those of the past –
because the destiny of humanity
is to be interconnected both emotionally
as well as physically, and if we are not
then I believe that we may one day
find ourselves regressing as a species and over time aggressively devolving
into even smaller tribes.
We can’t go on not exploring new things
and not finding ourselves somewhere
that we never expected ourselves to be…
we can’t go on not sharing new
personal experiences –
even those made under
the most extreme and
stressful of circumstances…
we can’t go on not living like
we need to live for our further development
so as to ensure that we live to see
the day when the entire world faces
all the threats that present themselves
together
rather than individually and country by country.
People can’t go on not working,
people can’t go on not providing,
people can’t go on as they are
and as they have had to
for far too long as it is –
however I know that everybody
around the world can collectively
agree that no matter what happens
humanity will survive what is going on now,
but in the long term we cannot go on like this.
My Poem “The Red Kites”
Against the bright blue of the morning sky
I see the dark silhouettes of many
birds of prey circling above
as they use the warm air currents
to fly, to glide, to quiver, and to hover
over the trees and the fields below –
and it took my a while to realise
who I was looking up at
and what I was looking up at,
however I instantly knew
that were not eagles, they were not hawks,
they were not seaguls, nor crows –
but it was not until I saw
the unmistakable reddish-brown
of the birds body and the black-streaked
pale grey feathers of their head,
and the forked feathers of their tail,
that I knew the identity of whom
and what I was looking at
and who and what were looking down upon me:
Red Kites, soaring like nothing
I had ever seen before,
gently drifting majestically
like princes and princesses of the air,
seemingly without a care, hunters,
acting on instinct and just being
who and what they were meant to be,
at the same time embodying the greatest
wish of life: the gift to be free –
and it was as I watched them
circle high above my head
that I wished I could be
just like the Red Kites,
because as they soared so effortlessly
they seemed as if they were like
something out of a dream
from my childhood and from a world
that my imagination brought to life
every day and every night.
My Poem “The Right Turn”
In times of crisis and confusion,
or at times of rest and relaxation,
everybody has the same people,
the same things, and the same places
to return to that have always had a way
of bringing them back down to Earth,
of settling them down,
of bringing something out in them
which has always helped to enlighten
and to illuminate a way to find
a sense of peace of mind.
Everybody either has a go to “something” –
good book, a favourite TV show,
a movie, a song, or a piece of music –
that always has this transformative
magic and power to be able to instantly
change a person’s mood
and even have an effect upon
how a person thinks, talks, and moves.
Everybody always seeks out answers
and wants to find simple solutions
to questions and puzzles
that play upon their thoughts,
but sometimes the most accessible,
acceptable, and easily digestible
explanations are hard to find
because sometimes you have to
firstly unlearn what you have learned.
Everybody always has paths
that they travel down that they
know better than others
as well as mental maps that they know
the landmarks of in such detail
that they almost seem ingrained
upon their brain like a tattoo,
because when the time comes to act
they instinctively know what to do,
how to do what they need to do, and who,
what, and where they need to be
to make the right turn.
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