They were like cut flowers, arranged but deranged in some basic way, which is to say, their smiles were frozen, never chosen. They did not cheer;Β Β they mirrored one another. They did not lead; they followed. Their laughter was hollow. Their problems stemmed from being cut from their emotional roots:Β Β They'd root for the home team, but it seemed they'd never grow, never know the joy of letting go, only the cant, the chanting of school yells, a fool's hell for not feeling. At best, their beauty was pressed and dried; Too bad they died, devoid of themselves. We must put them on our shelves to gather dust.
A graduate of Andover and Columbia College, Columbia University, Tod Howard Hawks has been a poet and a human-rights advocate his entire adult life.