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I have loved music for as long as I can remember;
in all honesty, I have loved music
longer than I have loved poetry;
I have loved music, I have been changed by music,
I have felt more alive than ever
when listening to music,
I have been overcome with emotion when listening to music;
I have closed my eyes, been taken,
carried far, deep, and high-
as if I were swimming in the voice, the lyrics,
and the sound of the music, the energy of the music,
and drifting peacefully, contently, effortlessly,
free like a feather.
Music has been a big part of my life since before I could talk;
music had me running before I could walk;
music sent me to sleep and coloured my dreams;
music awoke me every morning as a child,
and within the heart of my soul
it has always been and will always be.
I must have heard thousands of songs;
I must have heard hundreds of artists,
singers, musicians, and bands;
I must have dreamed that I were John Lennon
playing guitar and singing along with the other Beatles
about fifty times, bu I could be wrong;
I must have had more favourite songs in my life
than I could count with the fingers on both of my hands.
I love songs, styles, speeds, of every type,
and possible genre, and classification, of music;
I love songs that take a hold of both my mind and my heart,
and make me feel epic;
I love songs that have unique, poetic, empathetic,
sometimes tragic, lyrics;
I love songs that are nothing short of celestial magic.
I love female voices;
I love male voices;
I love instruments;
I love voices that are soulful, special, lyrical,
incredible, unbelievable, beautiful, different;
I love who I am when a song makes me want to dance;
I love when a song puts me in a trance;
I love what I think about when a song is playing;
I love where I go within myself,
as I sing along to every song,
and as I repeat every line without mistake,
it is almost as if I am chanting or praying;
I love a song that to me is nothing short of perfect;
I love life, art, inspiration, memories,
feelings that were made, created, felt, captured,
made infinite, because of, and for,
the love of music.
When we stop looking back,
when we stop spinning around
and making ourselves dizzy,
when we stop being haunted by ghosts from the past,
when we stop worrying about everything we can’t control
and get to work on getting busy,
when we stop ourselves from being hacked by the opinions
and the fears of other people,
we can truly enjoy every second of life to its fullest
and be happy.
No one does anything,
no one goes anywhere,
without a reason,
or without something
that only they can bring;
no one would do anything
unless they cared about
what it means to be there.
People follow their dreams,
people work hard from the time that they are children at school,
at college, at university, at finding their passion,
at finding their calling-
people join groups, people become part of teams,
to be of something, to talk about something,
to have something of importance and meaning in their life,
which then connects them with other people of the same way of acting,
thinking, feeling, and then ultimately to everyone else on Earth,
and that is what we all search for and find always,
and most of the time in the last place that we would ever think to look;
life is not always a straight-line of events and connections
as it sometimes appears in the story of a film, or in a book.
Life cannot possibly come with detailed instructions,
or a blueprint to follow-
life is way too random and spontaneous for that;
life should not just be a checklist of what you want to do, and when,
because life has a funny way of showing you that that is not how it goes,
and sometimes you have to strike-out more than once to get a home-run
with the help of a good swing and a great contact
between a baseball and a baseball bat.
If you constantly focus and become obsessed with reaching the end
and achieving everything you have written down
on your personal list of things to do,
you can sometimes miss things along the way
that will make your journey that much more satisfying,
when you do wake up one morning
and realize the dream that you have just woken up from
was in fact memories of the life that you have had and have;
sometimes you can even forget who is the real you,
and that is why we all must expect, hope for, believe,
and make the most of, the good things ahead.
Flash! Bang!
Light and sound!
In the dark there is a beautiful and magic explosion of colour-
like a supernova, or a cosmic strand that you pull down from above
that makes you rise off the ground;
or like a rainbow shattering and showering the world,
as it lights up the sky with dazzling and spectacular sights,
and mesmerizing sounds that take you back in time
to memories of you when you were a child looking up at the stars
and then being amazed and held in wonder by sparks of magic
that remind you of the thoughts that go through your mind every second-
you couldn’t replace those moments even if you were to try,
you couldn’t feel any more special
unless you had felt and been touched by the hand of heaven.
The only thing that I can compare to the sight of fireworks
exploding above me in the dark night sky,
is the sight, the sound, the feeling, the heart-pounding sensation
and intoxication of being in love-
because when you are in love your heart feels like a firework
exploding and making you feel like you have been transformed
into a constellation of stars,
and as endless and infinite as the minds eye;
and you only hear and see that one person in the crowd,
because everything and everyone else is just a buzz.
I see the lights;
I feel the vibrations;
I fly as high as a kite;
I walk with the protection of what I know for sure, and what is for real;
and I run gladly with a fever,
as if I were carrying a life-changing contagion.
I put my hand to my chest and I feel deep love, and deep pride-
like an American celebrating the freedom and independence
they are gifted and guaranteed, and which every American remembers
and celebrates every year on the 4th of July.
I feel deep love and I do not mind that that love
sometimes makes me feel intensely, and at times it can even hurt,
because what it means to see, experience, live, and love,
looks and feels as magic and wondrous as exploding fireworks.
From out of nowhere the vortex appeared,
in the blink of an eye there was a bright flash of light,
the second that I saw it I fell into it,
I was travelling faster than light, faster than thought-
the entire universe spun, flashed by,
and became simple and confined,
and then expanded without barrier
and became infinite and clear,
and in an instant I was somewhere else, at another time,
lying on my back, awake, with memories I never knew I had
and I could not remember creating.
Finding myself, finding my feet,
standing up and looking around and at myself,
and every time I looked and I saw what was within me,
I saw a new horizon, a new view, a new world,
that I could see in every detail and in deep colour.
I know where I am, I know who I am;
I know what the vortex was;
I know when this is,
and because everything feels new but familiar at the same time
I don’t feel confused or lost.
I have been here before, and I will come back again;
I am walking in my own footprints,
and I know the memories they bring back of a time before-
like I know the face of an old friend.
Sometimes where I am feels like a beach of white sand
that I am standing on and facing out at
a blue, green, and gold-kissed ocean;
and at other times it feels like I am in the middle of a busy city;
at times it feels like I am in motion;
while at other times it feels like
I have been shocked into stillness,
as if having come in contact with a surge of electricity.
I am reliving my own memories and experiences,
and then I am floating above all and marveling at the beauty below me;
I am constricted within the shell of an egg,
and then I am breaking out of my own translucent bubble
and racing through a forest of trees.
Extraordinary thoughts occur to me.
Gorgeous sights reveal themselves to me.
Dreams become reality.
Time stretches infinitely.
The temperature changes from really hot to freezing cold.
I feel like I am a child
about to be pushed out into the light of the world,
and also at the moment of the end of the universe,
after coming out the other side of a wormhole.
Today, tomorrow, every day,
when the sun is in full-glow,
when it is two feet deep of snow,
I look to you and I always know
that you are there for me,
and when I do leave your sight
I know that you still look in my direction,
and you think about me whatever I am doing,
and wherever I go.
I have vivid memories of you, of us,
when I was a child I remember you pulling me on sled,
I remember you trying to catch me as I ran wild,
I remember you carrying me in your arms
and putting me to bed;
I remember us looking at each other on more than one occasion
with the biggest and the widest of smiles,
I remember us looking up at the sky
and watching the airplanes of the nearby airport fly overhead.
When I was a kid I was always asking questions,
and you always had the answer I was looking for;
when I was growing up, and even now,
your words, thoughts, and influence,
send my imagination off on a tangent,
and leave me wanting to know and to hear more.
Your face, your voice, your spirit, your heart,
is like no one else’s and is unmistakably you-
everyone who knows you only knows
and speaks good things about you,
because you always put everyone else before yourself,
and when people look into your eyes
they see an entire ocean that is so full and deep,
and the most beautiful and the bluest of blue.
I am the luckiest man in the world to be your son,
I have always been the luckiest boy on Earth
to look at you and to look up to you-
because, to me, you are more than just my Dad,
and today is not just another day.
I have looked to you all my life,
and you have given me more than anyone has ever had.
I am forever standing in-awe of you
and of your shadow, and I will always love you
and see you as who I want to be when I do truly grow up,
and my one and only hero, today, tomorrow, everyday,
especially today, as I join with sons and daughters
from all around the world to celebrate you
and to give you the gift of my love, my respect, my time,
and me, today on Father’s Day.
It’s always strange looking back at old photographs
of yourself for some reason,
we sometimes feel more comfortable looking at picture of others-
it’s a weird moment of reflection that occurs,
and a wave of deep introspection that engulfs you
and helps to resurface memories and emotions
you have felt which are closely associated
with unforgettable thoughts that you had
and lived every second of that you dream about sometimes
when you are under the covers.
Looking at old photos, reading back old diary entries,
experiences, and memories, that you recorded,
but forgot about-
looking and finding a piece of your past
always reminds you, and always reminds me,
instantly of where I was, who I was, what I was thinking,
and what life was showing me and guiding me to
with its many sign-posts;
reading a note that we once wrote,
and which ended up being left intact for us to find again one day,
now and forever reminds me again and again
that things happen for a reason and are meant to happen
beyond any doubt.
I have been to many places,
and I love to go back to these same places on a different day,
at a different time, with a clutch of new colours
to my life and me in-toe.
Every day, everyone, and every place is different-
even though they and we may look and feel the same,
everything and everyone changes,
life in fact dictates this for its and our own survival,
and that is the best way to think
and the best way to go.
I look back often, because memories are important to me-
as are the people that I have met, all and every one.
I take pictures of lots of things, and self-portraits of myself
everyday to record and make a moment and a memory last
for as long as it can.
I look forward, and I look around me, every day at
the people in my life, and who I see every day with my cyan-coloured eyes.
I write and capture as much as I can.
I am inspired, and I share every hello that makes me smile,
and every goodbye that makes me cry.
There are things that happen to us that are incredibly
and intensely personal, and they should be kept
and they should stay that way-
but I do believe that there are a great many things
that happen to all of us that must be shared,
because they too can light-up the life
and brighten the face of someone else and make their day.
The world can seem like a smaller place now,
because we can share any-thing and every-thing
with literally millions of people simultaneously
all around the world in an instant;
the world feels more interconnected,
and our lives have become more interlaced,
and sewn-together like a patch-work quilt.
Ever since I was a child I have always felt
someone’s presence before I saw them,
and ever since I went to school, and I started meeting
new kids and I started making friends,
I instantly realized the importance and the power,
the brilliance and the magic, of strangers,
friends, and unique once in a life-time memories.
Life begins, and passes you by in a flash
that can seem, when you look back,
to have all happened in the fraction of a second.
There is more that happens to us than we realize,
and there is more to see than could ever be seen,
by you and by me,
but I just enjoy and live every second
as if each and every one was my last on Earth,
and I love the gift of life and living free
so much that I have to write when I can
about the poetry in my heart, and all around us-
when I sit down and share with as many people as I can
the exposure of the world that I see
in my poetography.
Like the moment when you first open a book
and you read the dedication on the first few pages;
like the moment when the clouds above you in the sky at night
clear and reveal the distant and beautiful stars;
like the first thing you see and feel
when you first meet someone
who you have been waiting to meet for ages;
like the experience and revelation that you live through
in a split-second when you look at someone
and right-away you feel as if you know them
and have seen yours and their future coming in clearly-
like a photograph from the surface of Mars;
like a water-drop in a cosmic sea
we are always creating ripples in the world
and in each other’s lives,
and I am constantly being touched by the effect of people
who live beyond the horizon, who do amazing things every day
that always get back to me.
Thank goodness for books.
Thank goodness for connectivity.
Thank goodness for shared memories and experiences
of first touches and first looks.
Thank goodness for divine poetry.
Thank goodness for the heroes we hear about
but will never know personally.
Thank goodness for stories told literally, orally, visually,
with heart, soul, and love,
that are constantly being sent out for other to find
like a message in a bottle that washes ashore
after being carried for miles across the sea.
Thank goodness for finding something new to talk about
everywhere we go.
Thank goodness for awesome and deep music that takes us away.
Thank goodness for everyone who comes our way.
Every day I drop my stone into the cosmic water,
I dream, and I make a wish;
every day I cast my line out far and wide
like I am trying to catch a fish;
every day I send out a signal and I listen for a reply
to come in via my psychic satellite dish.
Writing, to me, is like breathing.
Reading, to me, is like inhaling.
Experiencing, to me, is like dreaming.
Seeing, to me, is believing.
Talking, to me, is like walking.
Proposing, to me, is the end of all of your searching,
when you know you have found the one person in the entire world
who you believe was born beautiful and who is like a miracle
in every way, and who will never need perfecting.
Pull over to the side of the road once in a while,
look up at the sky, and dare to dream
and wish upon the star in the sky burning brightly
for your entire life that is the sun,
enjoy the good things that happen in life,
and endure the bad, and if possible find every
and any moment to have fun.
Go to a vast lake, stand on the coast of a deep ocean-
look out and don’t be afraid to see who and what you want to see,
look up to the infinite, unexplainable, and beautiful,
and feel like you are an important piece of an epic puzzle
that connects you to everything and links everything to you,
and know that you yourself are both a deep and sparkling ocean,
as well as a magical and influential water-drop in a cosmic sea.
A picture to remember us by,
a photo to look back on
and relive the happy memory
of a shared experience and a shared time;
a shell from the beach where two people used to walk
hand in hand and barefoot in the soft wet sand;
a ticket stub from a trip to the cinema you took with someone
to see a great film late at night;
an old receipt from your favourite restaurant,
a birthday card, a letter, a message-
a tangible memento that you can still feel
and still remember when and where and why and with whom
this meaningful and special thing to you
became a memento to you, and became so important to you
because of its connection with that someone that effected you
and always will, or because it just reminds you of the days
when you and your life were in their prime,
and everything felt perfect and right.
When times get bad,
when the waves of the sea of reality get rough,
when instead of looking forward you want to look back,
when you want to appreciate something in all it’s greatness,
when you want to remember the instant when you first fell in love,
when you want to go for a walk in the park of a relationship
when things were at their best,
when you are stuck inside on a rainy,
it’s good to take out and look at things-
things that may be spread all over your house
in places where you can constantly look to and know they are there,
things you always carry around with you in your pocket,
or things that you have collected together in a scrapbook for yourself
to look at and remember-
and that is why it is so important to keep what you can,
and don’t throw everything away.
I think photo-albums are amazing;
I think keeping a diary or writing in a journal is a fantastic thing to do,
and I think it is a brilliant way to record days, events,
and recollections of moments in your life;
I think a scrapbook is the best thing to start with a child
when they are just beginning to understand why certain things
and certain times mean more to us than others,
and why certain people constantly pop-up in the memories we have
and we return to, because it teaches them early-on,
and will remind them every time and always,
why we replay and know all the lyrics to the songs we remember and sing,
and that everyone can live on, as can we, after we die.
It’s sometimes only when we are alone
and looking for some reassurance about something
that we choose to look, re-read, remember, recall,
where something in our possession originated from
and who gave it to us-
it could be a faded photo;
it could be a worn-out piece of paper
with someone’s unique handwriting on it;
a t-shirt that you refuse to wash
because it still has someone’s smell on it;
it could be a precious, special, memory,
from which there are no souvenirs, or photos,
or anything that you can ever hold in your hand,
because it was so brief, instantaneous,
and because you simply did just have to be there to understand
the true meaning of the moment-
they are the very best, and they are the incredible,
and irreplaceable, mementos.
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.
“So what are you thinking and feeling right now
whilst you’re out there amongst Nature?”
I feel free! I feel open! I feel hopeful! I feel me!
I feel like I could touch the sky with my finger
just like I am touching the muddy ground with my booted feet.
I feel warm! I feel energized!
I feel home! I feel blessed
as the beautiful and golden sunlight touches my eyes!
As I walk through the forest though it is cooler
because the sun is radiating and being absorbed by the surrounding trees.
I can hear birds and the rustling of unseen animals all around me,
but they are so high and fast they are the dwellers
of this fertile land and sky that I cannot see.
Coming back here brings back so many memories!
Coming back here reminds me of so many happy times,
and it is like they are still there to be remembered
and felt by the touch of the cool but magical breeze.
Walking the fields, walking over the crisp brown leaves
and sumptuous green grass,
I have this sensation of feeling like an animal feels,
I have this urge to walk and run and forge my own path.
Everything is bright, everything looks new.
Everything I see is bathed in light,
and even that which is in the shadow cast by something else
retains it’s beautiful natural colour and hue.
The country lanes I walk have no natural footpath,
so I must walk on the road.
Cars and 4×4’s race past me and create a splash
as they drive through the puddles I too pass through-
out here there is no such thing as a Highway Code.
Out here where I walk there are little oasis’s
of rarely seen and hardly touched patches of Earth
that resemble my kind of heaven.
Out here you can hear nothing but your own heart beating in your chest,
sweet birdsong in the trees, and the faint sound of an airplane
flying high above in the sky that is skirting and almost touching
the atmosphere and making dreams a reality
and the passengers on it feel as if they are light as a feather.
The Life, the Light, the Tears, of the Poet of the Sphere 