Too Close To The Sun…
writing
My Poem ‘Mr. Traveler’
Being above the clouds
is like being a part
of something magical;
seeing the blue above
and the light below,
to me will never stop being
a dream come true;
being bound for somewhere
on the other side of an ocean
is something truly wonderful;
seeing the world from up high
to me is breathtaking –
and when I look out into the distance,
and when I look down to the Earth,
a shape, a face, a thought,
a memory comes to me out of the thin air,
and I feel blessed by the touch of the divine,
and I feel drawn to the destination
I will arrive at soon.
We all travel and we all leave a slip-stream;
those who travel by plane know
that the fastest way to travel
is by catching a ride on a jet-stream;
we all know that thrill that we feel
when we go to somewhere we have never been;
those who have chosen to journey
to the other of a rainbow know
that if you choose to take a leap into the unknown
you may see things that no one but you
will ever get the chance to see.
Astronauts rocket to space every day…
passengers travel to countries every hour…
those blessed with vivid imaginations
dive and fly to and through new worlds of creation
every minute in a infinite number of ways…
every second when every heart of ever human being beats
it is like the constant opening and closing
of the petals of the universe’s most beautiful flower.
I have been flying since I was a child;
I have been to magical lands,
and I have always come afterwards
with an further understanding of the allure
of the call of the wild;
since I was a kid I have been dreaming
about being a space-traveler;
I do not travel far that often –
however, whenever I get the chance to defy gravity
by any means I always jump to it
and I always embrace what it means
and I never take for granted how lucky I am
to be a Traveler.
My Poem ‘The life of an idea’
Sometimes it comes like water-drops;
sometimes it comes like a flood;
sometimes the idea is born
from that instant when the words
just don’t want to stop;
sometimes creativity takes time
to grow from the seed
that you planted or sowed
before it can be something
that you, or anyone else,
may someday choose to look with love,
and go with it on its journey
wherever it goes.
A writer waits… a writer looks…
a writer listens… a writer finds things
in the outside world
and then takes them inside their mind
and then generates and regenerates
all that they have seen, heard, and know,
and creates something brand new –
they write a story, they make connections…
they assume and they presume,
and then they fill their time
with the fruits of their imagination,
and they give their creations
a piece of their spirit,
and in doing so they give their idea a life.
Some ideas only have the life of an instant of time;
some ideas, no matter how hard you try,
you can’t let go of;
some ideas come into being from a single sign;
some ideas look up at us from below,
and some ideas look down at us
and are just waiting for us to notice them –
like the stars that can only be seen
when the sky is black above.
Ideas are like children –
sometimes you have to keep them
behind a boundary so that they don’t run away;
ideas can sometimes be like rockets –
they take off, but they do not know where they are going;
an idea can be like a loyal dog –
if you feed them, if you give them attention
and if you show them love,
every day they will always come to you when you call them,
and when you tell them to stay they will stay;
to an artist there is no such thing as too many ideas,
because to an artist no matter how many ideas there are
there is never enough.
There are Ideas that evoke and differing and varied reactions
depending on the person who is exposed to them;
for some people, their idea’s come more during the day
than they do at night;
there are ideas that come, and then they go in a flash,
and they are never seen or thought of again;
some people always have ideas every how of the day,
and there are some people who struggle
to come up with anything creative –
however, in my opinion, though at times
for an inspiration-starving artist
it might be hard to pull anything out of the fire,
no artist should ever feel discouraged…
because just as a new days
brings a brand new sunrise,
so does a new moment bring new ideas –
though each and every idea
may have a different time of life.
My poem ‘A world of 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 ‘The Blender Analogy’
Reality is fiction…
fiction is reality,
after it has been ingested,
digested, and blended-together
with the thoughts, the feelings,
and the memories that a writer
has been storing away for a rainy day…
when the clouds come together,
and when thunder starts to rumble,
and when lightning starts flashing and striking,
and when there is the most
almighty down-pour of creativity
that rains down upon a once blank page…
that feeling, that moment,
that perforation that happens
when you rip out a page from the book of reality
and you change a word here and a name there,
and you make it your own
and something completely brand new…
it’s intoxicating, in all honesty…
it’s poetry… it’s a thing of beauty…
it’s life in a nutshell… it’s wonderful…
and as the artist, it is an amazing thing to look at
and to marvel at when all is said an done,
and when it is now yours
as well as someone else’s…
I would think that it must be a similar feeling
to that one might have after they have
sampled a part of a song that already exists
and they have repackaged it as a purported “new song” –
people have been doing it for years, right?
It can’t possibly be wrong?
Call it a stew… call it a pie…
call it a soup… and see all the similarities
to all the things that contributed into making
or influencing something –
but also remember that every-thing in life
that happens, and everything that everybody does,
is inspiring – even the seemingly accidental mistakes
that happen can, and mostly are,
just the fertile ground from which
new things may grow out of…
just recently, I heard an author
recount something that his rock-star wife
had said about the creative-process of making art,
and what they essentially said was:
that creating something, artistically or otherwise,
is like throwing seemingly different
and unconnected things into a sort-of “imagination-blender”
and turning it up to full-speed –
and I love this explanation and description so much,
because – speaking as someone who has written
one or two short-stories in my time,
and more than one verses of poetry –
I can honestly tell you
that there is no better way
to describe the creative-process
that I have ever heard
than that of “the blender analogy”.
My Poem ‘In and Out’
Art is in my blood…
I have been making art
since before I knew that I could;
inspiration has been flooding my brain
since before I knew that I had
such a magical world within me
called “imagination”;
art is a part of everybody’s day,
but sometimes to find art’s true meaning
you have to stop looking
and allow yourself to embrace
the gift of pure-procrastination.
I believe in destiny –
which means that I believe
that everything that we all do
we do because we are meant to;
I believe in karma –
which means that I believe
that actions and intentions
have consequences,
and we should all try to focus
on the light in our life
and not the shadows
that want to pull us into the dark;
I believe in true love –
which means that I believe
that no matter who you meet and when
there is a heart out there
that you are meant to
give your all to,
that belongs to someone
who has always been meant to be with you
and has always been meant to love you;
I believe in humanity –
which means that I believe
that no matter how many differences exist right now
there will one day come a time
when we will see ourselves
in all our forms as what we are:
a masterpiece of form, function, and art.
Hope has taught me to stay optimistic,
even when I am surrounded by impossibilities;
poetry has taught me how to ride out a storm,
and to survive and understand life
through the magic of language and words;
imagination has taught me
that the number of worlds and realities out there
yet to be discovered totals in the realms of infinity;
love has taught me that the most incredible
and breath-taking adventure of a life-time
awaits everybody who has yet to be intoxicated
by the timeless obsession and addiction that has no cure.
We all breathe in,
and we all breathe out…
we all have things that we need,
and we all have people whom we could never live without…
we all feel inspired,
and we all sometimes feel pains of doubt…
but the most important thing to remember
and to act-out is to not stop feeling
and expressing ourselves,
because that is the reason that we are all born
with the senses that we are born with –
learning how to use those senses
to their fullest is what life is all about.
My Poem ‘Morningstar’
To me, writing is like driving;
to me, writing is like flying;
to me, writing is like diving;
to me, writing is like searching;
to me, writing is like remembering;
to me, writing is like imagining;
to me, writing is like smiling;
to me, writing is like crying;
to me, writing is like sharing;
to me, writing is like exorcising;
to me, writing is like star-gazing;
to me, writing is like trying
to capture something breathtaking
that almost defies explaining.
When the morning-star rises
it calls to all of us;
when the morning light shines
life below the surface of the Earth
is tempted to break-through the dust;
when the morning air is inhaled
into a near-infinite number of lungs
every-thing breathes in each-other;
when the morning colours reveal themselves
is when something amazing
and unexpected always occurs.
When I write
I look out,
I see things,
I feel something
and then I think…
when I write
sights and sounds become emotions
and meaning is transformed into words
that feel like they are
ready to be spoken on the tip of my tongue…
when I write
an entire new world of wonder
is built with every blink…
when I write
my imagination and my thoughts
race, explode, and flash brightly
like the lightning of a thunder-storm…
to me, writing is akin to watching
and experiencing in all its epic-magnificence
the great gift of seeing the sun rising.
The planet Venus is so far away
but shines so bright in the sky
that it is often mistaken for a star;
it isn’t until you see something up-close
that you can know if it is truly
all that you wished for it to be
when it was far-reaching and yet fascinating;
it isn’t every-one and every-thing
who gets to inspire and change the course of a life,
when in perspective to most things
they are but a dot in the dark;
I have been inspired by many things
since I first began writing,
but to me nothing and no-one
could ever compare to the beautiful shining face
of my angel who I see each and every morning.
My Poem ‘Heart of a Mustang’
When my pen drops to the page
there are times when I have no idea
what I am going to write;
when we take the first steps of many
we often do not know
where the path we will walk will lead,
but we know that what we are doing feels right;
when a moment of spontaneous inspiration hits me
it is often by surprise;
when something is worth doing
it is always worth opening your eyes to do it,
even if the time is a long time before sunrise.
Some things come naturally;
some things come over time;
some things appear as if magically;
some things roll off the tongue
like a memorable riddle or rhyme.
Life is mostly organized these days –
however, there are times
when the world is as wild
as the wild-west of America ever was,
perhaps now even more so;
people are mostly civilized these days –
however, there are times
when there is an imbalance in a society
that shows itself in everything that you see
no matter where you go;
life on our planet
is for the first time in human history
in the hands of those who hold the keys
to the tumblers of wealth and power
that control our destiny;
everyone alive today is spoiled in so many ways –
some people look, but do not see;
some people in need
need only to put their hands together and believe.
Some people strive all their lives
to stand out from the crowd;
some people find it hard to be confined
because their heart was born to beat and stay wild;
some people have the greatest gift –
and that, to me, is their way of being heard by many
without having to be loud;
some people have the remarkable ability
to stay calm and make sense in a split-second
what even the most-learned of person
cannot at first understand;
some people have been hoping and praying
and have never given up on the reality
of having the same thing
that has filled their imagination
since they were a child;
some people who wear the expression
of the quiet and the innocent,
in my experience, are keeping hidden
and tamed deep-inside
the feral heart of a mustang.
My Poem ‘Be Like Mark’
I am Mark.
I love writing.
I love making art.
I love thinking.
I love imagining.
I love believing deeply.
I love going far –
over oceans of water,
and to the ends of my knowledge
and my imagination that always takes me
further away than the night-sky’s
farthest stars.
I am in love.
I live to love my angel of heaven on Earth.
I have explored.
I have marveled at the beauty of above.
I have seen many sights
that I will always remember seeing all my life –
however, there is no perfection
that could ever compare to my muse,
to my Melissa.
I am a dreamer.
I always have and I always will
see the guiding-light of hope,
even on the darkest of days.
I am a true-believer.
I know things, and slowly-but-surely
I have come to realize
that no matter who you are
or where you are from
the world can be important to you
in a myriad of different ways.
I am unique.
I return to the same places week-after-week.
I value people.
I love hearing and I love learning
about the new stories
that come into being.
I love how the happiness of those who I love
and care about makes me feel.
I remember so much,
but I am in no way smart.
I know that anyone can make something
even the size of the entire world
fit on to the head of a pin,
or make it as large and as incredible
as the universe is both beautiful and dark.
I have felt an intense understanding
of how all life works
and what everything means, many times –
while sitting on the porch of a house in Tennessee,
or while walking through New York City’s Central Park.
I would not ever advise everybody
to live like me, or to do all that I have done –
but what I would always tell everyone
is that things happen as they are meant to happen –
and if you truly want to live your dreams, and be happy,
then, even if it is for just one day in your life,
choose to be just like me, and be like Mark.
My Poem ‘V’
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.
markthepoet.me 