night slides into
smooth desolation;

The towered sky has
abandoned its former
lover.

tonight is an eating night;

it chews and gums
at the dark movements
of our hands

as a spray of flame
crosses the horizon and
bursts into many long
dragons;

the purple
quietude is vicious
in its applause

a gaze into a wavingly
hot otherworld
shining beneath
a monochrome skin,

groaning for its
meat of color;

and in the otherworld
an other-man,
with a gray hat and
face, looking

at the soulless mimic
forms which gazed
back at him in identical
agony,

as if they too knew
the cost of a life

The poem is not for a contest. It is for sharing.

The poem is the prize.

TOD HOWARD HAWKS

It matters not what others think of you,
but it matters greatly what you think
of your real self.

TOD HOWARD HAWKS