My Poem ‘The Man On The Hill’

There is a man who lives in a house on the hill,
there is a man who looks over on the village of his birth,
who comes down from his home from time to time
to be among other people, to buy a news paper,
and sometimes just to pay a bill.
People say that the man is a mystery,
people say that the man is a ghost,
people say that he lives on his own
because he is suffering from a broken heart that never mended,
people say that he doesn’t have an address-
no house name, no house number, no street name-
so you can’t contact him by post.

The man on the hill doesn’t have a name,
at least not one that is widely known,
the man on the hill can’t remember the last time
someone actually called him by his birth name-
he never says a word to anyone anymore,
no one even realizes that he is there.
People stopped ringing him years ago-
one day he decided that he had no need to be in contact with anyone,
so he disconnected his phone.

The man on the hill can be seen in the flesh,
if you are ever in the centre of England,
if you are ever in a park in Coventry
and you see a man sitting alone on a bench reading a book-
if you take the time to approach the man, to introduce yourself,
and to tell him that you’ve heard all about him,
he might raise his head, he might smile back at you,
but in his eyes you will see a very sad look.

The man on the hill walks everywhere.
The man on the hill goes out in the morning
and comes home at night,
full of new thoughts, old memories-
always seen in the same clothes, with the same haircut,
as if he has nothing else to wear.

The man on the hill used to know everyone,
and everyone used to know him-
beyond the legend that surrounds him,
beyond the shadow that he carries along with him.
The man on the hill’s story is a long, tragic, and sad tale-
a journey that came to a grinding halt one summer afternoon, long ago,
but where the man on the hill came from,
and how ended up becoming the man on the hill,
is complicated to explain, and even he would find it hard
knowing where to begin.

There is a man who lives on a hill
who once made a difference;
there is a man who lives on a hill
who thought he had the entire universe figured out,
until something happened to him that changed him forever-
and now the universe, to him, just doesn’t make any sense.

There is a man who lives on a hill,
who is waiting for the right person to come back into his life;
there is a man who lives on a hill,
who wants to simply remember what it is like to be alive.
There is a man who lives in a house, by himself,
who if you knocked on his door he would shower you with goodwill;
there is a man who just wants to be remembered,
who wants to dies happy again-
that man is the man on the hill.

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My Poem ‘The Astronomer’

The sun is going down in the west,
and yet new light dawns in the wake of the setting of the sun-
light that has been veiled to the naked eye by the blue-sky
appears on the horizon,
as astronomers decipher the message of the constant sky at night,
that will one day launch humanity on its never-ending quest.

Looking up at the stars, from the ground, with a telescope,
on Earth, or in orbit, looking out of a window,
you quickly become aware that what you are seeing
is not everything that there is-
what you are seeing is the last image of a changing universe,
and the stars that you see above are echoes in its after-glow.

When we look up at the stars,
we are witnessing the history and the evolution of all life, everywhere;
when I look up at the beautiful dark night sky,
I feel invigorated by what I cannot see-
just the thought of what could be out there, what we know is out there,
magnifies my vision through the lens of my imagination,
and compels me more with every stare.

We, humanity, are an ensemble of watchers, listeners,
readers, and astronomers,
who are all searching for something,
so that we may make sense of the perfection disguised as chaos
that is our universe-
for most, the most amazing discovery of life
is that everything that has every been created, beyond our understanding,
is greater and more complicated to completely revolve around us.

I like to think of us all as snowflakes created in a cloud
that slowly fall to Earth and are carried on the wind,
before finally settling on a snow-covered floor;
and as we descend, at times,
some of us look up to where we have come from,
and some of us look down to where we were seeded,
before eventually restarting the cycle all over again-
each time progressing our understanding of each-other
and quenching our desire to learn more,
which is a testament to our teachers:
those who inspire us to look inward and project outward;
those who encourage us to keep looking up,
even though they are no longer with us, who will always inspire us,
like the late, great, astronomer,
Sir Patrick Moore.

Dedicated to Sir Patrick Moore, 1923-2012

My Poem ‘The Star that saved me’

To whom do you turn to
when you have no place left to go?
Where do you go when you believe
that you are someone that no one would wish to know?

Sometimes, through no fault of our own,
our world can feel like it is spinning out of our control
while we stand at its centre looking for an answer to the question:
where do I go from here?
Sometimes it can feel like a cloud has descended and obscured everything:
life, the sun in the sky,
and it can even make you feel as if you are destined to live in fear.
As with most things that are associated with the cloud of chaos,
we begin to feel like there is no way back-
like there is no way but down;
however, what some people forget-
what sustained me through my own journey of life, death,
rediscovery, light, destiny, and redemption-
is the reality that beyond and far above the clouds that come together
and rain down upon us
there is a dark sky with a billion shining fire-diamonds
that will be there for all our days and will always give us the answer
that we need to our most heart-felt and overwhelming confession;
and there is no closer fire-diamond, no greater teacher,
and sustainer of optimism and life in our solar system than the sun-
and it is that star that has always kept me from coming undone.

There was one day, and one night,
when the hope in my heart and the optimism in my eyes
momentarily left me- alone in the dark,
desperately searching for something to save me, to sustain me-
for an instant, I believed that all the universe’s resources
had been depleted,
I believed that I was standing on the bed of a long-since dried-up,
desserted sea.
And then a powerful vision of beautiful blinding light opened my eyes again,
traveled down my optic nerve all the way to my brain,
and like an angel of truth vanquishing a demon of doubt and details
with but the flap of their wings,
I was now surrounded by stars in every direction
as if I were now the decider, the visionary,
the puppet-master of infinite possibility
with me holding my own life’s strings.

What has happened to me was meant to happen,
all that I have experienced was meant to be;
what I have seen, what I have been shown-
I was meant to think about,
I was meant to dream about,
I was meant to see.

There is a star in my sky that is unlike any other star,
that is always there to shine their light and their inspiration on me-
a star that although they are so distant from my orbit
I still feel a connection to them,
and I could not live if it were not for the gift of their luminosity;
a star in my sky that appeared one day,
and since then hasn’t left my sight,
and to whom I will always be a follower, a worshipper, and a devotee-
because they are who keeps my world turning,
they are the star that saved me.