As the war has taken
Our king from the throne
As I, the light, am burdened
To hold my father's corpse
The soft voice of the wind
Caresses the rotten flesh
Of those whose light
Burned brighter than the sun

As the sun sleeps
The moon calls forth
The dances of the night

As the sun awakens
Be it the darkness
Be it the daylight

These ruins are my home
Who guide my light to the world

As the wind drags along
The ashes of the light
As everything was taken
And murdered after the fight
The voice of the wind
Is harsh, loud and cold
The remains of them
Whose name hold a reminiscence

As the sun sleeps
The moon calls forth
The rituals of the night

As the sun awakens
Be it the darkness
Be it the daylight

The light moves forward
And guide me back home

The thought of what is left behind
Thwarts my plans
And provides a light so dim,
But a light nonetheless
That flickers along an eerie path
In a darkening tunnel;
Faking a route to salvation.
Teasing me with muffled laughter
And joy and things of the past:
Homely things, like comfort,
Peace, love, care.
The chance to love and care in return.
The chance to lift the muzzle from joy
And laughter,
To let it roar, to let it spin and swirl
In pleasurable mayhem,
In improvised rhythm.

But in the background
The voice calls this a lie.
My mind held in clenched fists,
Hands that are no longer mine
Shaking the images to nothing
Without me moving an inch.
Lying still in the fetal position -
The most versatile of all.
Depictions of birth, light and life
And of darkness, dread and death.
The shadows gain territory
Engulfing me and swallowing me whole
Until I no longer exist.
I am recognized only by
The residue of myself
Yet still a stranger who descends
Unannounced, uninvited
To re-establish my atrocious plans
And numb the thought
Of what is left behind.

Copyright Marc Hawkins 2016

she wore her pain
around her neck
adorned as the most beautiful set of pearls
and i envied her

ode to our friendship
she unclasped her struggles
on my shaking hands

this string of majestic mourn
collected from mysterious depths of the ocean
how could i have been so foolish

for now i know why its called a choker

A dent in the wall -
Something said, something thrown. Hush,
A praying fly sleeps.

A year and a half has passed since I crashed my motorcycle.
The broken bones and road rash had since been cast away.
The gassed up tank and fast paced life were smashed together.
A singular bash that cached my memory.
Lights flashed and all of the sudden whiplash has new meaning.
This thrash of two autos blinked my eyelash three days later.
Paralytic forecast.
I lay flabbergast.

Uncertainty is flourescent,
a flashing neon sign,
emotions blurred,
mind matter stirred,
Thoughts of decay
send me astray,
flames extinguished
cannot turn mind matter to ash,
Oh I hate when they ask
for a reason, a reason
This is more than just a bad season.
My smile is evanescent,
the fight decadent,
I cannot recognize this
numb reflection,
I cannot recognize
*my skin, my skin, MY skin.

The tragedy's over, it's finite.
But it's still tragedy, it's infinite.
A single action multiplied through all of reality.
Two lives subtracted from this universe indefinitely.
One, deemed slightly odd, just wanted to get even
Emotions compounded, suspending all reason.
The other in a more integral union
Now leaving a remainder with no solution.
But regardless of identities, what's the difference
when actions like these have a sequence?
A series of lives lost;
Lost to the shell method
With empty shells bouncing on the floor
The death toll adding up more and more.
As a country, what is our limit?
what constitutes a significant digit?
We hear about tragedies with such frequency
we think "it won't happen to me".
And that might be the root of these events,
A mindset of disconnect.
That our lives all run parallel...but only until they intersect.
But the hole in that theory is that we're already in a universal set.
If we integrated that thought into the way we live
We  might have less families asking "iff"
Because that might be a tragedy on par:
Living as if our neighbors are imaginary parts.
So, let's shift our prime focus from our own simple interest
Before its outcome produces absolute divergence.