Writing poetry is like making love:
if you have to force it, stop.

TOD HOWARD HAWKS

Simone, Simone
I'm all alone.
Simone, Simone
I'm all alone.
Simone, Simone
please come to me
and bear your breast
for me to rest
my weary head
and shattered heart
upon a part
so soft and warm.
Simone, Simone
I'm all alone.
Simone, Simone

Tod Howard Hawks

WHY DO WE LIVE?

Why do we live?
We die, but it is not the end;
it is but a step.
Life is an illusion,
but a necessary one.
The illusion of finite life
is the pathway
to reality, to infinity,
to Cosmos, to enlightenment,
which is PURE LOVE. Paradoxically,
the axiom we follow unconsciously
is know truth by untruth.
The journey to become PURE LOVE
takes innumerable lives,
but when we do become enlightened,
our soul, now PURE LOVE,
need never return to Earth,
but becomes forever one
with reality of PURE LOVE that
has no form, no beginning, no end.

TOD HOWARD HAWKS

You loved me.
I've hurt you.
I'm sorry.

It's all on me.
No one else is wrong.
Let them blame.

Is this enough?

I've cried rivers,
Become a desert.
There's no more life left.

Is this enough?

My friends are gone.
I took them for granted.
I stand alone and empty.

Is this enough?

I slap myself,
When a smile creeps.
I don't deserve it.

Is this enough?

Your needs come first.
Trample on me.
I am your slave.

Is this enough?

I've lost it all-
my tears,
my friends,
my happiness,
my respect,
my humility.

Is this enough?

Will you forgive me?

i think the
irony

befits such an
ending -

you,
settled

me,
altered

permanently
unsettled

a trace of
you forever

running through
my veins

i want to peel your skin back
and reveal your deepest sweetness.
to look at your veins
and memorize their paths.
maybe then i’d understand
why you are so rough on the outside.
it takes a lot of work,
digging your fingernails into the flesh,
pulling and pulling until you are bare.
but it is all worth it;
to visit your center,
to break past what conceals you,
and take you apart
slice by slice.

I lost, I broke, I burned to the ground,
Yet from my ashes, my crown unbound.
Through fire and fury, I carved my way,
Not for the world, but for the price I’d pay.

With sharpened mind and heart untamed,
I faced the void and felt no shame.
I reach for heights no soul has known,
Not for praise, but to claim my throne.

Where meaning blooms through love and pain,
Where every scar is gold to gain.
I’ll fall again—that truth I own,
But in each fall, my strength has grown.

I rise for me, for kin, for fire,
To light the path and take it higher.
Not for envy, nor for fame,
But for love, for will, for the name.

So let them watch, let them see,
What man can be when truly free,
When fire transforms to endless light,
When loss becomes the fuel for might.

Golden I rise, no crown I need,
The gold within is all I’ll heed.
I build, I climb, I break the chain—
For in my soul, the gold remains.

If I cry enough tears
would they please,
kindly drown me
in my sleep?