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My Poem “The Dance that never ends”

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

It feels like a long time
since I was allowed to stop,
to sit, to look, to listen,
to read, to write, to take in the voices,
the songs, the sounds, the music of life
like I used to –
there is always something else to do,
there is always somewhere else to be,
there is always some staple of necessity
that always seems to get in my way
of being the dreamer I love to be
and gladly welcoming any and every
opportunity to engage in a wandering
of inspiration and discovery…
it feels like it has been a long time
since I took a walk through a woodland,
left my footprints in the wet sand of a beach,
or watched the sun rise while listening
to the many birds singing
in the bushes and in the trees
in chorus with one another at dawn –
it is moments like this, when my time is my own,
when I feel like a soldier that has just returned home
from a theater of war…
it feels like only yesterday that I felt
the world stop spinning,
when Melissa and I shared our first kiss
and it feels like only yesterday
that I saw her for the first time
and I fell madly in love
with every perfect inch of her beautiful face…
it feels like only yesterday
that I tossed my silver coin into that wishing-well
and I made my silent wish…
it feels like today is yesterday all over again
when my memories of quintessential moments of happiness
return to the surface of my consciousness,
that are so powerful that they can fool me
into thinking that they are happening right now,
and it is times that happened years ago
that even to this day still feel vivid and tangible,
that I live to remember, to return to,
and to feel as if they are happening
over and over again like a dance that never ends.

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My Poem “Take Me Back”

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

While bathed in the golden light of evening,
at the end of this hot summer’s day,
I find myself looking West to the horizon,
and wishing that I could turn back the clock
to a time in my life and to a place
that I remember and I revisit every day…
a time and a place, a love,
the face that I could never live without
of someone important to me,
who I love from head to toe,
who completes me, and who I miss
the touch of more than I could ever say,
who melts my mind and inflames my heart,
who is as perfect in every way
as seeing a field of sunflowers swaying in the breeze
and glowing from their yellow leaves…
I love my blond-haired, blue-eyed, angel
more than she could ever know –
and I cannot wait for the day
when I can wrap my arms around her again,
look into her eyes, and tell her that I am hers forever
and that she will always mean everything to me…
take me back… take me back a year…
take me back to Georgia…
take me back to my favourite wooden porch
with its American flag displayed proudly from it…
dear lord, take me back to my idea of heaven on Earth…
take me back… take me back to Melissa.

My Poem “Thirty Seven”

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

There are days when time goes fast,
there are days when time goes slow…
there are things that I see, hear, and taste
that instantly remind me of the past…
there are moments in every hour of every day
when I dream, when I hold on to hope,
and when I smile to myself
and I know beyond doubt why I am here,
why I do what I do, and what life is all about…
there are faces that I stare at every day
of people who define me and who make me feel
like the luckiest and the happiest
man in the entire world…
there is, and there always will be, within me
an infinite world of hopes and dreams
that will repeatedly coalesce and come together
in the form of a poem that must be written,
and for my part I always want to be a poet
with an open heart who understands
and loves the power and the magic of words…
as I write this I am on the cusp
of turning thirty seven years old,
and like every year around my birthday
I sit down and describe who I am
and what reflection I see when I look at myself
in the mirror of my mind –
and who I see is who I have always been
and who I will always be,
on Earth as well as who I will be
if and when I hopefully rise up to heaven…
there is a brand new summer enlightening
and reinvigorating me as I look down
at this page of my life
and as I look up to the bright blue sky –
and though I know that I could be
a better man than I sometimes am,
I remain eternally and constantly hopeful
and now at the ripe old age of thirty seven.

My Poem “The Deep Blue”

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

We are free…
finally we have left the world of ice,
cold, and snow behind, and we can now feel
and we can now see the warmth of the sun
upon our skin and the sight of the flowers
of spring starting to bloom with colour and perfume,
and even the air feels easier to breathe…
the season of the sun has arrived…
the season of awakening has begun…
the season of the new is reacquainting us
with the magical symphony that plays without end
for those who want to hear it
and for those who know what a miracle it is
to be alive when you share your life
with the one you love…
winter has finally lifted…
blue sky, sunshine, early rises,
late nights, good times, new waves of energy
in all its infinite forms,
just beginning to wash over us, bless us,
and take away our worries,
as if ascending to the sky above…
this time is the best time to start something new…
this time is the best time to learn something
about a place, a person, a subject,
and allow that brand new knowledge
to change your thoughts and influence your mood…
now is the best time and the most perfect season of all
to explore the great outdoors of our beautiful world,
to open your heart like the petals of a flower,
to make your dreams come true –
because each and every one of us
only has one life to do what we are all born to do,
so what better time to be the best that you can be
than within the time when your soul wants to take
leaps into the deep blue above and below
where we can all bask in the wonder of life
and nature’s most awe-inspiring of tunes.

My Poem “The Osmosis Oasis”

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

Time does not always go in one direction…
memory is always fluid…
every moment of every day –
on the screens, on the pages, on the minds,
that everybody sees, reads, and takes in –
everybody learns something new…
those who can see, see more than they realize…
those who can hear, hear more than they know…
those who willingly immerse and intoxicate themselves
with something are changed in more ways
than can be seen by looking into a person’s eyes…
those who leap and escape into a world of their own making
are really living within a reality of influences,
of nostalgia, of dreams, of memories,
of feelings that they can return to
at any time of the day and wherever they go…
our world is constantly changing;
however, like an ocean, or like an Easter Egg
at the center of a game, there always lies
things that were believed lost and impossible to find –
but over time everything rises
to the surface and is found again…
messengers and messages surround us always…
nothing and no one is ever truly forgotten…
every day the world reconfigure’s itself,
and with every new birth nothing, no one,
no world can ever remain the same…
life can sometimes feel like an ocean…
life can sometimes feel like a maze…
life can sometimes feel like a dream
born of the mind and of the imagination
of someone with an often quirky, varied,
imaginative, artistic, poetic, nostalgic,
mind who has the power to allow their dreams
and their wishes to run away with themselves,
inspiring others to create, to build,
and to keep alive their own private oases of osmosis.

Happy World Poetry Day!

My Poem “The Universe”

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

All my life I have been obsessed with time…
all my life I have wished that each and every one of us
could have all the time in the world to do
what we want to do, to go where we want to go,
to be with whom we want to be with…
what I have learned throughout my life
is that time and space is infinite,
however our lives are brief
and the moments that we have
to enjoy everything around us come and go far too soon…
all my life I have been inspired by time,
by space, by nature, by people,
by the universe of the seen and the invisible, by love,
and by the theory of everything that everybody has
to explain who we are, what we are,
when we are, where we are, and why we are…
all my life I have had heroes…
all my life I have had happy memories to look back upon
and a bright horizon to look towards…
all my life I have had my mind and my imagination
opened up to the infinite possibilities of existence –
and one of my heroes and inspirations,
since I was given his book ‘A Brief History of Time’
for Christmas back in 1998, has been the astounding genius
Professor Stephen Hawking, who I am afraid to say
has now left this world and who now possesses
the grand unified theory of everything
that he sought all his life…
all my life I have shared my life with hope,
and I have always believed that if we all were
to work together as one world, as one universe,
as one unified creation, then each and every one of us
could reach, dream, and travel among the stars
in an infinite moment of time –
and I believe that if we were to follow
Stephen Hawking’s example then none of us
could ever be bound, as if in a nutshell,
because then we would realize
that we are all capable of doing things
beyond the ever expanding periphery of time,
space, love, and life that is the universe.

Rest In Peace, Stephen Hawking

My Poem “The Eighties”

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

I grew up in the 1980s…
I grew up in the decade when
the world was blessed with the best
and with the most memorable days of their lives…
when I think of the 1980s and the time of my childhood,
I look back with awe and with a nostalgic longing
to return to those days –
even if only for a short time…
I can still remember living, breathing, growing,
and enjoying every one of the gifts of humanity
that were ever-present and essential…
I, like many, still vividly remember what I saw,
what I heard, and what I felt when I was a child –
what I was fortunate to have seen, heard, and felt
for the first time, at the moment that
their star of influence began to rise
and instantly started to impact
and change the world forevermore…
television, movies, music, games, books –
the characters, the vehicles, the fashions,
the songs and the soundtracks
that continue to stand the test of time –
that to this day are still re-watched,
replayed, rediscovered, and renewed
for a brand new generation…
to me, there is nothing like nostalgia…
to me, there is nothing like revisting
the precious memories of your youth…
there is something about certain times
in our collective history that resonates
with some people on an emotional
and on an almost cellular level…
there is something special about remembering
the things we used to watch,
the things we used to listen to,
and in the ways that we used to enjoy them…
there is something wonderful, heart-racing,
exhilarating, and magical about using
our imagination as a vehicle to go back in time,
like the Delorean time-machine
from the Back to the Future movies,
and in a small way reliving decades-old memories –
and even though I am now in my thirties
and my childhood now feels like a life-time ago,
I still love thinking back, I still loving watching back,
and I still love using the songs that I remember from my youth
to take me back and give me a rush of euphoric recollection,
like the feeling of returning home:
the same overwhelming sense of belonging and joy
that I ways feel when I think back to the 1980s.