Hunger

By KOLBUS MOOLMAN

And God gave the man little wingless birds,
small as a shock,
to eat while He was away.

And a cup the size of a scab,
in case His return was delayed,
and the rain ran out.

But the man ate all the birds on the first day,
he was so hungry, and by
the second, the scab was picked raw.

Now the man has nothing left
to live on except
the dirt under his fingernails.

He does not know what he is going to do
when the third day comes
and goes without Him.

 

 

Kobus Moolman is an award-winning South African poet and playwright. He teaches creative writing at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Durban.

Click here to purchase Issue 04

Hunger

Related Posts

Poetry Feature: Poems from the Immigrant Farmworker Community

MIGUEL M. MORALES
Days into the promise of a new year, resolutions plentiful, blossoming, / seven farmworkers were shot and killed harvesting mushrooms in Half Moon Bay. / Those of us who sprouted from families, whose hands and backs worked the land, / waited for news of our farmworker siblings.

A White House against a blue sky, with a watertower on top.

Two Poems by Liza Katz Duncan

LIZA KATZ DUNCAN
First the marsh grass came, then the motherwort, / then bitterberry and honeysuckle. Blackbirds, / gulls and grackles built their nests. / Mourning doves call from the eaves / of the old factory, closed during the Depression.

sunflower against a backdrop of sunlight

August 2023 Poetry Feature

L.S. KLATT
My neighbor really has nothing to do / but mow his grass & watch television. / It’s the quiet life for him. The adhesive / bandage of his tongue comes out as / rarely as his partner. And the dog? I / could say anything about him & no one / would know the difference. That sounds / cruel.