By Ethel D. Mack

Hunger is like a disease eating

away at you and your interior organs,

leaving you with little self-control.

While you’re slowly deteriorating

you start to drift into a stage of

weakness, as the pains of hunger

start to take its toll.

Hunger is not something you

practice or preach.

Hunger is not something we try

to teach.

It falls amongst us one at a time.

It sneaks up on us as though

we’d committed a crime.

But there is always someone trying

to point you to a way of hope, love,

and some tender care.

(Because) knowing, as well as I do,

that hunger is not a joke, because

having this pain is too much for one

to bare.

Not aware of the fact that there

are people, places, and things to help you survive.

Being hungry puts you in a lost

place; the only difference is now you’re

trying to stay alive.

This poem originally appeared in the Fall 2013 Issue of The Wall Newspaper