My Poem ‘Keep Writing’

When it’s 4 o’clock in the morning,
and everyone around you is still sound asleep;
when you are up and awake and already imagining,
still dreaming, thinking, creating, writing,
and you feel comfortable to open the door
to the place inside you that leads to your soul,
the place where everything you can imagine
is just waiting to be let out and allowed to run and leap;
when an idea comes to you,
when you can already hear the melody and voice
of a beautiful and exciting new piece of music;
when you feel something that seemed so small once
begin and never stop growing inside you,
the feeling, the experience, the time, you,
are heart-racing, away;
the silence, the noise, the close, the far,
feel like they are all inside you, and connected to you,
and I can tell you that when I have those moments
and I am touched by true inspiration, like I am every day,
it is absolutely breath-taking and epic.

There are times in your life
when you can’t say what you want to say,
because words simply fail you;
there are times when I say everything I want to say with one word-
I realized once that the more powerful thought and idea of anything
can be found when you seek out the far-between and the few.

Never give up on love;
never turn your back on something that means everything;
never doubt your heart,
and never even think to stop the flow of what makes you who you are;
never stop looking, never stop talking,
never stop cooking, never stop doing,
never stop believing, never stop watching;
keep being inspired, keep being inspiring,
keep being too awake to be tired, keep calm,
and do what everyone keeps telling me to do…
keep writing.

My Poem ‘Where it all started’

Every adventure begins with a dream;
every epic starts with a first step;
every day begins with a sunrise
that you may not always see;
every ocean starts with that very first drop.

Every singer starts by singing into a hair-brush;
every author begins by first writing in a diary;
every musician starts with an imaginary instrument-
like an air-guitar- while listening to their favourite music
full-blast, and being told to turn the music down
with a bang on the wall, or a hush;
every song-writer begins writing songs as poetry.

Every driver starts by having a go behind the wheel
of their parents car;
every life full of language and conversation
begins with that first word;
every humanitarian, or doctor, starts every day of their calling
with the oath ‘to do no harm’;
every disease that was ever thought to be wholly-untreatable
will one day be found to have a cure.

Every happy life begins with that first friend;
every band began with that first practice-session;
every new beginning started with an end;
every great relationship began with a question.
Every fortune started with that first penny;
every chain began with that first link;
every thing about who you are and who you will be
goes back and can be traced to who is your family;
every change of perspective begins by you considering
a possibility that you never thought to every think.

Every collection begins with that first item that you treasure;
every place of peace and serenity started as the place
where you always wanted to be when you were a kid;
every passion should always be a pleasure.
Every singer, every musician, every poet, every astronaut,
every teacher, every vet, every soldier, every inventor,
every gardener, can always go back
and point to the time, and they can always tell you what,
and where it all began, and where it all started.

My Poem ‘All in the signs’

There is no sound,
there is nothing to be heard;
there is a couple sitting at the next table from me
in the cafe I am in
talking completely and fully without words,
and the beauty of their silent conversation,
even though I do not mean to pry in any way,
has me not only lost for words
but also lost in thought,
and I can feel my heart start to pound.

I can’t hear a word that they are saying to each other,
but I know that that is because their voice
is not meant to be heard by me-
they could be saying anything to each other-
but what I do know, just from observing the looks
that they are giving each other,
is that this couple is in love;
I recognize and I have seen this unmistakable,
silent, and mutual, connection of spirit
in myself and in others a thousand times,
and it never fails to read, at least to me,
like the most beautiful, natural, and special, poetry.

The eye-contact, lip-movements, and hand-gestures and signs,
they are making is entrancing,
the way they are so compelled and in-awe of each other
and do not need or want the attenton of anyone else
in the entire world is mesmerising-
I am not afraid of confessing.

I wanted to be a part of their conversation,
but I also, secretly, did find it cool that I and everyone
was an outsider because we couldn’t understand their code
and are not meant to.
I must admit I did smile at the thought of them
having so much privacy, and the gift of one to one communication
without the potential of being evesdropped on.

They looked like they only had time
and only had eyes for each other,
and that truly touched my heart and made me happy-
the joy they were feeling about talking to each other,
sitting facing each other, of one mind and intent,
was noticeable, palpable, and wonderful to see.
Communication on every level of society and by every means
all around the world in a million different ways
has always fascinated me,
and the gift of being able to reach out to someone,
especially someone that you love, in some way, in any way,
no matter who you are or how it is done
never ceases to fascinate me.

The couple that I was watching had their own language,
their own code of communication that even I could see,
surpassed the language they had been taught
to share what they want to say;
and it occurred to me after I left the cafe
that they have a code, everyone has a code,
and even I have mine-
my language, my code, is that of patterns and poetry;
and I also realised that if I or anyone wants to be a part
of any conversation, I and they have to learn and read
what is being said all around us every second,
sometimes silently without a sound,
because the answer to what is being said is
all in the signs.

My Poem ‘The Journey’

It all begins at the Birmingham Moor Street train station,
on Platform One, as I stand behind the yellow line,
and the yellow painted words ‘MIND THE GAP’,
as I wait for the 10:01 train to Stratford-upon-Avon.

I love train journeys,
but I dont make them that often-
the last train journey I took was on the New York Subway
last year, and I loved every second;
for me, going somewhere, anywhere, even if it is somewhere
I have been before, but not for a while,
is always an adventure, is always inspiring, is always fun.

It’s a rainy day, but the wet weather doesn’t leave me undettered;
the cloudy sky above looks like a black and white photograph
from another world.
Travelling by rail- through the green countryside of the places I know
so well, and seeing them and passing through them at high-speed-
gives me a new perspective of them, and I love the places I know
even more than before, and their importance to me
has never rung more true than the last time I heard the sound of a bell.

Walking the streets where Shakespeare walked,
seeing and hearing all the people who are visiting England
from all over the world,
seeing tourists of all nationalities excited about being in Stratford-upon-Avon,
William Shakespeare’s home, as much as I am, makes me smile-
and as I look and listen, see and think,
the streets, the history, and the infinite stories of so many people
jump out at me, and their latent voices talk,
and this place of inspiration I can already feel inspiring me,
and the magic of words and language that I can feel everywhere is undeniable.

I love returning to a place I have been to before, but with new eyes,
a new heart, but with already magical accumulated experiences
and memories that I bring with me and walk with me always.
I feel more at peace here now than I did before,
I keep expecting to turn a corner and actually bump into Shakespeare
still walking these roads and paths, like me,
like I am doing today, and he and I actually looking at each other
in the eyes as our mutual spirits exchange a powerful poetic connection-
like two kindred spirits- as we two hear the voice of nature
and life’s beautiful call.

This place is a writer’s paradise;
this place is an artist’s dream;
this place is a people-watcher’s place to be,
because every thing and everyone
is worth looking at more than twice;
this place is a great place to visit, feel, and to be.

Sitting and having my lunch in The Black Swan-
with a roaring hot fire to my left,
the theatre right in front of me outside the window,
and to my right the rippling river Avon-
I sit, I look, and I don’t want to leave.
The rain is stopping now.
The blue sky is returning.
I am reflecting on the day I have had,
and the journey I have taken,
that has inspired, compelled, and availed me.

The last place in Stratford-upon-Avon that I visit
is Holy Trinity Church- the place on this pilgrimage
that I wanted to revisit and pay my respects to the great
master of language, and my eternal inspiration and idol,
the one and only William Shakespeare.
Standing before Shakespeare’s grave again,
I feel introspective-
my mind, for the first time in a while, is quiet,
and as I bow my head before his grave and monument
I feel the connection between he and I so unwaveringly and so clear.
And as I leave his church I feel something amazing come over me,
and my mind feels as turbulent and changeable and full of colour-
like heights and depths of the atmosphere.

When the end of the day came, and I was on my way home on the train,
I left Stratford-upon-Avon reinvigorated with hope, optimism,
and inspiration from so many things that I saw, felt,
and experienced for the first time and again while I was there-
the moments that will not easily be washed away,
and I just wish I could have shared my time there with someone else;
but as I think that, as I am writing about my day
and as I re-read what I have already written,
I realize I have and I am sharing everything with someone else-
with you who is reading this now,
because you are interested in me and my life
and the things that inspire me like nothing else,
and because, first and foremost, you are just like me,
and because you care.

Today has been amazing.
Today has been about me meeting Shakespeare,
and about William Shakespeare meeting me.
Today has been fun, exciting, enlightening,
and in a word: inspiring.
Today has been, and will always be,
the day I found something I have been waiting to fine for a long time-
today was an adventure, a pilgrimage, a trip back in time,
that like a great book that you never want to close or put down
opened my mind wide, and like my life so far-
every second surpassed the last.
It was the most epic, great, and amazing journey.

My Poem ‘Language’

To me, language is the single greatest invention of all time.
To me, the ability to be able to communicate on multiple-levels,
in many great and wonderful ways, is life at its prime.

The power of language, what it can do, what it has done,
has given rise to everything on Earth-
from the creation of all life on our planet,
to the next steps in human evolution as we know it, and beyond;
language will go on forever, its journey will never end;
language is in a perpetual state of rebirth.

The reason why language will never die
is because it is always re-inventing itself-
it never stops, it never tires;
language reverberates through the air like a shockwave,
and travels at the speed of light between peoples, cultures,
instinct, and consciousness, every nanosecond of every day,
transmitting on every frequency through the atmosphere, and back again,
and down incalculable lengths of cables and wires.

Language fills our world, language built our world,
language maintains our world, and is the source
of our collective well-being.
Humanity is absolutely besotted, obsessed,
and could not live without language-
we love to find new ways of saying things
that have already been written about and said countless times;
sometimes we like things spelled-out perfectly for us
so that there is no confusion,
and at other times we like to simplify things as much as we can
by abbreviating.

Music has been heralded as the “universal language”,
because of how it makes us feel
and because of how it can communicate,
sometimes centuries after it was first written, created, sung, and played,
an expression, a feeling, a message, a moment in time,
of a musician, a singer, a song-writer, or an artist,
that has been captured to out-live and endure beyond it’s inception.
When you hear a song or a piece of music being played
again and again, over and over;
when you hear a song when you are a child
and people are still playing that same song on the radio
when you have children of your own,
you know that that song, whatever it is, is special-
it has a life-span and a longevity and a power to it
that stays and will stay with our children and their children to come
as they grow older.

Language is everything.
Language is on every billboard, on every sign,
on every TV show, on every street.
Language is the reason for every letter, for every email,
for every message, for every text, for every tweet.
Language is every face, every person,
every piece of clothing, every style.
Language is every look, every thought,
every tear, every smile.

Language is constantly evolving.
Language is not in decline, language is not dying.
Language is asking questions of itself and the world, everyday,
and it is perpetually problem-solving.
Language is the foundation of every pattern,
the needle that guides and sews the thread of every stitch.
There is nothing more amazing in the entire universe
than the magic that is language.

My Poem ‘Morphology’

My thoughts, my poetry, my life,
is so precious to me.
When I think of something,
when something completely random and unprovoked
pops into my head;
when I pick up my pen
and I write down something that inspires me for some reason,
even if it is a single word,
I can’t tell you how content I feel;
when something as complicated and nuanced as a thought
becomes real because ity can now be seen, spoken, and read.

I wrote my first poem
because I wanted to tell someone that I loved them.
It was the best feeling in the world
when the words first started to come to me in my hour of need
and began flowing from me to the empty page.
The time that I spent writing that first expression of my feelings
for someone who I didn’t know, other than that I loved them,
was, and still remains, one of the most awe-inspiring, fulfilling,
incredible, and magic moments, of my life.
The words just flowed so easily,
like a stream of pure inspiration and love-
and since then I have been in love with writing and expressing
thoughts, dreams, feelings, memories, in all ways and words.
Sharing the essence of something,
using the limited conduit of words and language
to impress upon someone what remains to be imagined,
relived, interpreted, pondered on and about, questioned,
in the same way that you ask yourself and others for days afterwards
how a magician was able to accomplish their spell-binding illusion.

Words are magic. Writers are wizards.
Most people don’t remember what they said, when, or why,
but a writer can never forget-
it is in their nature to tell the world stories of the greatest depths,
and of the most soaring of heights.
It is in a witer’s DNA to create a world
that is of its own space and for its own time,
but a writer strives to be enduring, to live forever,
to write an eternal epitaph that continuously makes people think
and re-read what has been written and read,
and changing the way that they imagine the words
coming to life in their head.

You can’t capture everything in words,
in pictures, or in music, alone;
but with the gift of memory, connection, curiosity,
and an undying need to never let even the smallest of insights of life
from falling through our fingers,
we leave great artifacts for future generations,
scattered like pieces of a vast mosaic,
that to be fully-understood they need to be read, seen, and heard,
as one, and together.

My Poem ‘The Second’

The second day, the second language,
the second thought, the seconds between the minutes,
matter more in life than the firsts-
more so than anyone realizes, recognizes, or every really admits.

The first is the beginning, but the second is the real start;
the first is always amazing, because it is something new,
however the second is what will carry you forward,
and keep to the beat of your heart.

Everyone has a second language, that is learned, but sometimes overlooked,
but which is of greater significance than your native-tongue-
it is a truth that we perhaps take for granted as we get older,
but I know that it is a gift that is not lost on the young.

To give something a second thought
denotes that what you are considering is important,
and not to be dismissed on first look-
their are some who read something once,
watch, or go somewhere for the first time, and then never again,
and missing something vital that they may see
if they gave something another look.

Every second of every day is so flitting, and short-lived,
they are gone before you know it, and pass-bye faster
than the blink of an eye;
but they are moments to collectively remember-
because that way they out-live those that made them,
and they will never die.

It is impossible to remember everything in life,
our memories are like light that has passed through a diamond;
however, I value with all that I am, every day, every year,
everything that has ever happened, to the second.

My Poem ‘Family’

Whether near, or far away-
Family is the gravity that binds everyone together like clay;
from Homo sapien hunter-gathers, to our present day society,
Family is the spice of life that is also known as variety;
Family is a connection to one another that is literally not skin deep,
Family is the language that you can speak to each other while still asleep;
Family is a love that vibrates from your DNA,
Family is a game that you don’t need to know the rules of how to play;
Family is where you return to when the path of your life twists and turns;
Family is the teacher which everyone looks to, listens to, and learns;
Family is the sail that rides the winds of the good times and the bad;
Family is the love that is constantly reciprocated by your Mum and your Dad;
Family is a touch, a feeling, an indistinguishable and necessary part of me-
to me, above all else, there is nothing like Family.

My Poem ‘Fluency’

The authenticity of real life is a poet’s portal to new rhymes,
but the fluency to interpret the pattern’s that are there at all times
is a gift that, from my perspective, is a true poet’s reason to write:
to experience the wonder’s of the world, and see nature’s light,
and then with all the inspiration that a poet possesses
create something with a heart and a soul, and delivery it to the masses.

No matter the poet, no matter the circumstance,
in my opinion every writer has an adherence
to find, and interpret as best they can, the truth of the moment:
that which binds all, is accounted for, and was always present
when the poet infused the depth that created their snap-shot in the first place:
the reason they picked that picture to try and define like that of clock face.

To me a poet is like a photographer who takes a photo with their soul-
who sees something with their eyes, but who seeks to record, and often extol,
the spectacle that they have seen, experienced, and felt,
and relive with words that moment in a way into which a reader could just melt.
A poet should always strive to excite the mind of their reader,
to make them a part of the picture and not just an observer,
to make them feel what they felt when they connected with what they saw,
to give the reader a reason to return after they withdraw:
a promise that what lies in the sea is not everything that washes up on the shore.

eloquentia