Voice

My Poem ‘Busk for you’

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

Strumming guitar strings,
a phenomenal voice
singing into a microphone,
an amazing and captivating
reverberation of sound –
a singer, a guitar player,
an artist, a hopeful dreamer,
an entertainer, someone with a gift
who is now standing at the centre
of a circle of people,
playing their heart out,
and singing every song as if they mean so much to them,
and as if every song were a song that had be written for them;
entrancing, inspiring, amazing,
making everyone stop and stare, smiling,
and even moving a black man
in a white hat holding a basket-ball
to stop in his tracks
and start dancing like Michael Jackson.

It always amazes me how much and how deeply
music can move and touch someone,
it has always enthralled me no-end
the connection that people form with certain songs;
it has always brought me joy
to see the happiness on the face
of someone who just loves singing
and who loves playing their instrument;
it always inspires me to be up close
to share some time with the gifted
and the artistic people that I randomly meet,
who are wonderfully exceptional and brilliant,
because they are so different.

I have seen performers of every age,
colour, gender, and ethnicity,
performing publicly, in all weathers,
in every city and town that I have been to;
I have watched singers, violinists,
guitarists, brass-bands, choirs,
full-orchestras, change and effect
the very air and the atmosphere of somewhere
and share hope through their music;
I have been moved in so many ways
emotionally by every artist whom I have listened to;
I have always envied singers and musicians –
because, anyone can write a rhyme,
anyone can have an idea come to them,
and anyone can tell a story,
but only a singer or a musician
can bring words and notes to life
in such a way that elevates them
from a page to make them truly epic.

When a busker is busking
they never want to stop playing,
and when they are playing
they never want to rush;
when a singer and a musician
who loves what they do
gets the chance to play,
they experience a feeling of true divine love;
when an instrumentalist
is masterfully bringing together
all the notes before them
and combining them into one
perfect expression of sound,
they feel and they know their instrument
so well that both player and instrument
have for each other a mutual trust;
when a busker is playing on their street corner,
or in the open space
where they feel the most comfortable playing,
and where everybody knows that they are going to be,
all that they want to do
is play like there is no tomorrow,
and busk for you.

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Check out the amazing Esther Turner on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/esthermusic and on Twitter at @Esther_Ninja

My Poem ‘Venti’

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

My heart is big;
my imagination is vast;
my inner voice regularly
becomes audible when I write or sing;
my vision is a constant bridge
to the future and the past;
my cup is always full;
my love is for the most beautiful;
my reason for being
does not have one meaning;
my life has been blessed
by the truly amazing;
I feel deeper than the deepest well;
every poem that I write
I like to think of as both
a seed and a fully-fledged tree;
when I see things that inspire me
I just cannot wait to capture,
show, and share all through my poetry –
because every thought that I have
is always the same size
as my favourite cup of coffee…

My Poem ‘Good luck’

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

Everybody has their own
personal lucky charm;
everybody has something
to which they are
eternally grateful for,
and faithful to;
everybody has something
that they believe
protects them from harm;
everybody has a reason
for what they choose
and for the things that they do.

Everybody carries reminders;
everybody has a thing about them
that they are known for;
everybody is living a life
of ‘finder’s keepers’;
everybody sometimes has their doubts,
but everybody also has their own way
of assessing, testing, understanding,
and making sure.

Everybody has something
that they would not leave their home without;
everybody has their own comfort threshold
and their own comfort shroud
that protects them from the extremes
and pressures that they sometimes feel
bear down on them;
everybody has a moment
when their voice is quiet,
while their thoughts are loud;
everybody can do the best thing in the world
for someone in need, and that is to take the time
to stop, talk, and listen.

Some people who we know well
are like a good book;
some people who can make us smile
at any and all times of the day
are the true people who want the best for us,
and they are the ones above everybody else
who we should always trust;
some methods of attaining serenity
and peace in your life
are both abundant and rare –
however, you can tell them apart for who they are
with a simple feeling,
because they have a magic touch;
some people need lots of things
to complete their lives –
however, the secret to happiness
in anything that you do
is to take any and every pleasure in it,
and one day something surprising
might reveal itself to you
and hold you in good stead
for the rest of your life
and be a natural and true
charm of your good luck.

My Poem ‘Civus mondus’

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

Every country,
every city, every town,
everywhere where people look,
see, listen, hear, sit, stand,
and walk around,
every member of every society
is a part of the whole
as well as an individual;
no matter where on Earth a place is,
it is the people who populate it
and who make somewhere
the place it is known for –
and with those people
there are rituals and archetypes of behavior
that distinguish someone
as a piece of a mosaic of a regional picture.

The place someone chooses to live
is telling of who they are;
the speed at which time and life goes by
is different all over the world;
there is always someone
who stands out from the crowd
of a connected group of people
for a reason, because in some way
they shine like a star;
there is always someone
who at alternating times of the day
leaves you both vocal and lost for words.

Order always rises from chaos;
differences of opinion
always generate a wave of change;
language, fashion, normality,
evolves and shifts and can cause
ground-shaking disturbances
like the Earths moving
and colliding tectonic plates;
peace can follow a prolonged period of rage;
sometimes modern life can feel like a race.

Just as you can’t stop a flood completely,
you cannot ever stop the world from spinning;
just as you can’t stop the rain from falling,
you can’t silence a people and species
who were born and are meant
to use their gifted, miraculous talent
to never stop talking and communicating;
just as long as the sun continues to shine
there will always be blue skies,
the world will never be truly predictable
or ever boring – because
as long as there is a world, a galaxy,
a universe, there will always be for everyone
the gift of something.

Choice is both the problem
and the solution to everything,
as the world continues its conversation
and delegation with itself
to find a mutual and universal understanding;
there will always be cycles of parallels
and juxtapositions;
as long as each and every one of us has a voice
and that voice can have an and every accent,
and can be expressed in any way,
we will all always be worldly
and universal citizen.

My Poem ‘Deathly Silence’

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

It is very rare
to actually hear the voice of a writer;
every writer is known for their writing style,
their preferred subject matter,
and by the way that they describe something in words;
however, you don’t always get to hear a writer
‘speak’ in their own voice –
to tell you about themselves,
and to get the chance
to introduce yourself to a writer –
because, most of the time,
writers are what they write:
most writers are the characters that they create.
Who a writer actually is as a person
is something that, as a reader, we may never learn.

Most writers enjoy the solitude of their own space,
their own time, their own breathing room,
to be able to successfully descend the elevator
into themselves, and their imagination,
so that they can focus on the puzzle they are figuring out;
most writers have an idea
about what they want to write about,
and what they want to say,
as soon as they begin –
however, if you were to ask a writer:
‘did it turn out exactly as you planned it?’ –
they would most likely laugh in your face;
because writing is a journey,
and, like all great journeys,
unexpected things tend to happen along the way.
Things of great importance should never be rushed,
and a writer will tell you
that “something is done when it is done” –
and allowing for mistakes,
and accepting that sometimes
you might need to change things, is a big help.
In my experience, and in my understanding,
a writer writes much –
however never gets the time, or the opportunity,
to say exactly what they want to say.

Being a writer is like being a god –
who has the power to create new worlds,
and bring to life new characters
and people out of thin-air.
Meeting a writer is an exciting moment –
one filled with genuine adulation, awe, and love,
and you just feel so lucky, fortunate,
and it genuinely feels magical to be in their presence.
No writer will ever truly die,
no author could ever truly be forgotten –
because their stories and creations
will always be somewhere out there.
Even the most amazing, supreme, incredible,
inspiring, prolific, writers
only have a short time
to be who they were born to be,
and to let their voice be heard
by the few or the many,
before they say goodnight for the last time –
and following their sad,
and their always untimely passing,
there always follows a ghostly, magical,
and deathly silence.

In memory of Terry Pratchett

My Poem ‘The Psychology of Silence’

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

Silence speaks louder than sound;
silence is where true discovery is made;
silence is where truth is found;
silence is full of infinite space;
silence is where you can hear a heart beating,
or a heart breaking;
silence is a no mans land where no one can hide;
silence is waiting; silence is a tide.

There is no sound in space;
there is no sound in a vacuum;
silence has no face;
silence can hurt you.

Words on a page rise silently;
words written in ink have depth deeper
than the paper they are written on;
words are not the only poetry;
words are a way of transition.

If you can convey an intention, a feeling,
an emotion, a meaning, without making a sound,
or without the aid of anything
other than that of you and yourself,
you truly understand and are on the same wavelength
as that of nature;
if you can say something with an action
rather than with an empty sentiment,
then not only can you be a powerful presence
on the present, but also, more importantly,
a talisman for the future.

The planets of our solar system
orbit around the sun unheard;
if you were listening from high above
you wouldn’t be able to hear anything,
but you would know that humanity was there
by the tiny lights that we all make
from our place on the surface of the Earth;
everything, everyone, has a silent story
that speaks for itself, and themselves;
epic people and fantastic worlds
can be spoken to and journeyed to
within the pages of every book on every bookshelf.

A therapist uses silence as an essential tool
to open a person’s mind;
a fisherman uses silence and patience
in unison with their bait to catch their fish;
an artist uses silence along with the paint on their canvas,
and if need be could make great art blind;
anyone can decipher anything with knowledge and common-sense;
everything is there to be something
to something, or someone, else-
that is what I found and interpreted
when I analyzed what struck me
about the psychology of silence.

My Poem ‘Constant Companion’

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

A best friend who is there
whenever you need them;
a tried and true way
that you can always rely on;
a gift that means more to you
than you could ever fully mention;
a constant companion,
who is the best person in the entire world you know,
and who keeps you in time with reality
like a pendulum.

A constant light;
a comfortable feeling;
a voice that keeps you talking
until way after midnight;
a face you can turn to in your hour of need
that you can’t stop remembering.

An infinite moment that you want to return to
and forever exist in;
a time shared beyond compare;
a kindred soul, like that of a twin;
a place you can go back to
when you think you are nowhere.

A person who is a part of you;
a constant gravity in your life
stronger than the Earth or the sun;
the reason you are who you are,
and why you do what you do;
you who are always there-
my constant companion.