Last Meals • The Havok Journal

by Nick Orton

A bittersweet home-cooked meal the night prior

An elephant in the room ignored one last time

The last goodnights whispered for a time

A quiet beer in the solitude of the night

A final family breakfast at a solemn table

Small talk to distract from this today’s reality

Reassuring promises and tears held at bay

A spoiled appetite and a cigarette with coffee for lunch

The last meals are the most bittersweet

The final sunset of normalcy

Before the sunrise of uncertainty

(Left to right) U.S. Army soldiers from the 4th Combat Aviation Brigade, 4th Infantry Division, command group drivers U.S. Army Spc. Stephen Barbee, 24, Dacula, Ga., 4th CAB, U.S. Army Pfc. Gaylen Twiss, Pine Ridge, S.D., 4th CAB, and U.S. Army 1st Lt. Daniel Ball, platoon leader, Company B, 404th Aviation Support Battalion, 4th CAB, unload boxes of food Dec. 25, 2010 from a Black Hawk UH-60 helicopter belonging to Task Force Mustang, 4th CAB. The food provided by 1st Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain, was distributed to three outposts in Kunduz province to soldiers who would have eaten meals ready to eat, commonly referred to as MREs, for Christmas dinner. Source.

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Deadlined Poetry is a literary side project of two brothers getting a lot wrong and a little right along the way. Featuring poetry of life, pain, humor, and times in a “peacetime” Army and Marine Corps. Occasional poetry can be viewed at: @Deadlined_Poetry (Instagram). “Nick Orton” is the author of the two poems “Predestination” and “Laughter and Pain”

Nick is an active-duty member of the US Army and logistics officer. He has had a long-standing love of writing and has begun his own writer’s journey. He has authored the book “Tales From The Grid Square Volume I,” a collection of 240 stories from across the branches of the US Armed Forces as well as foreign militaries of strange events and instances. He can be reached through the Instagram account @Tales_From_The_Gridsquare or email: TalesFromTheGridSquare@gmail.com.

As the Voice of the Veteran Community, The Havok Journal seeks to publish a variety of perspectives on a number of sensitive subjects. Unless specifically noted otherwise, nothing we publish is an official point of view of The Havok Journal or any part of the U.S. government.