by Robin Bond

Created on: April 30, 2008

They say they are starving,
while they rub their hands,
and stand
with their face against the glass.
Their bellies ache,
and they contemplate,
removing it early.
Their needs are alarming;
the detector cries,
and their eyes,
dilate
as they fan the smoke.
It's burning! They scream,
take it out,
what a waste!
How did it burn right in front of their face?
Though their concern rests not on a wasted beast,

rather on the feast,
they will not have.
They run the tap to boil something quick,
and splash cold water upon their face.
They sing a song of pity, and lick
their wounds endlessly.
Somewhere a child sits, alone,
toiling for hunger.
Crushing the seeds the earth gives him,
in replacement of his mother,
whom it stole.
He hums a tune, or breaths it,
but it's slow,
he bleeds it-
He needs it
to carry on.
He has no alarm to remind him
of his fire,
he has but merely a flame.
In a tent nearby a child calls him,
does it matter he has not a name?
The earth awaits his mother also,
so with a stick,
he shares his wealth
with his newly found brother.
How did it not burn right in front of their face?
How did the flame become another?
With calloused hands, they sip their bowls
of fullness,
and they're thankful for their feast.
Belly-unfull, they skip, and dance to their song,
unaware the taste of a beast.
Now off to find water, to drink, to extinguish
their fire,
and distinguished they seem,
dressed in rags without seams,
dreaming,
of a feast that will not come.

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