Hunger (original) (raw)
The continued presence of hunger should be a reminder to everyone that we have failed to recognize our duty as human beings. This is something the hungry already know, but which they are unable to put into words. But they speak in other ways. They speak with their eyes, and in the way they carry their bodies, until exhaustion overtakes them. Then they speak in silence. And still we do not hear. Instead, we devote our resources, energy, and finances to ever-expanding military operations. We have money for bombs, but not for schools, medicine, or food. You would think in time that we would learn, and maybe we will. But we really shouldn�t wait any longer. Because if we bring an end to hunger, we will also be helping those who are overfed and out of touch with reality.
Hunger
Long ago,
on a street corner
in the city where I was born,
there was a dump truck
full of large green cabbages
parked in the mud.
The driver of the truck
raised the bed,
forming a mountain of cabbage
on the ground.
Suddenly, from nowhere,
several dozen women appeared,
as if they had been waiting
beneath the pavement itself.
In exchange for their tears
and in some cases
a few small coins,
the truck driver,
an unshaven man in his sixties,
handed cabbages to the women.
A short while later
the cabbages,
the women,
and the truck driver
were gone.
But hunger remained.
For a long time,
hunger remained.
Note: Poems, Slightly Used, a growing collection of work first published in my blog, Recently Banned Literature, can be found here.
POETRY COLLECTIONS IN PRINT
Available from Cosmopsis Books of San Francisco Winter Poems
by William Michaelian
ISBN: 978-0-9796599-0-4
US 11.95;∗∗11.95; 11.95;∗∗8.95 at Cosmopsis Books
52 pages. 6x9. Paper.
Includes one drawing.
San Francisco, June 2007
Signed, numbered & illustrated copies Winter Poems displays the skills and abilities of Mr. Michaelian at their most elemental level, at the bone. Wandering amidst a barren world, a world scraped bare, he plucks the full moon like fruit from the winter sky, goes mad and befriends a pack of hungry wolves, burns his poems to keep warm. He is a flake of snow, a frozen old man, a spider spinning winter webs. Spring is only a vague notion of a waiting vineyard, crocuses, and ten-thousand babies. The author is alone, musing, reflecting, at times participating. But not quite alone, for he brings the lucky reader along. I�ve been there, to this winter world, and I plan to go back.
� John Berbrich, Barbaric Yawp
Another Song I Know � Short Poems
by William Michaelian
ISBN: 978-0-9796599-1-1
US 13.95;∗∗13.95; 13.95;∗∗10.95 at Cosmopsis Books
80 pages. 6x9. Paper.
Includes Author�s Note.
San Francisco, June 2007
Signed, numbered & illustrated copies Another Song I Know is a delightful collection of brief, resilient poems. Reading them, one by one by one, is like taking a walk through our common everyday world and suddenly hearing what the poet hears: the leaves, a coffee cup, chairs � and yes, even people, singing their songs of wisdom, sweetness, and light.
� Tom Koontz, Barnwood poetry magazine
Also by William Michaelian POETRY
Winter Poems
ISBN: 978-0-9796599-0-4
52 pages. Paper.
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Another Song I Know
ISBN: 978-0-9796599-1-1
80 pages. Paper.
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