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The following poem was inspired by Dr. Jayne Shatz's artwork, The Empty Bowl, which appears on the Poetry X Hunger website--ART - Poetry X Hunger. Hunger Dance Why not give it to me now, my death certificate? Why wait until my heart stops walking, until my body tumbles over the cliff of consciousness? I haven’t eaten in days. Because I’m bed-bound, my son and daughter used to bring me food. Stop, I told them. You’re pulling bread out of your childrens’ mouths. It’s nighttime, my best time for resting and healing. The moon is full and the stars dance in a web of luna celebrations. Tonight, though, heat beats through the room, greases the bedrail, darkens the sheets with sweat. I pull up my shirt for relief and watch my ribs glisten in the moonlight, rising into their own constellation, ready to join the party above. The sound of my body shutting down is deafening. Still, I discover a small repository of strength. I extend my hand. Please, I say. Give me what you can.  Karl Kadie is poet and author of Revenge of Nature and The Burning House. His poetry has appeared in The Sailors Review, Poetry Ink Anthology, The Santa Clara Review, New Verse News, and many other publications.
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The following two poems were inspired by Diane Wilbon Parks' artwork which appears on the Poetry X Hunger website--ART - Poetry X Hunger. Full Empty Bowl Spoons…a fork… all with handles stretched and thin as a mother stretches thin her supplies for grateful gruel Mouths…open wide in hope and anticipation of sustenance that never shows except in drips and drabs that can’t sustain Faces…faces hue the spectrum shapes geometrically twisted like innards filled with pangs angry entrails spit parched accordion growls The big empty… the big empty-empty bowl holds naught but air so like the bellies of those who stare into its barren depths And fruit…and veggies… all outside the bowl so full of emptiness so full of broken-meal-promises and shards of sated dreams And eyes… eyes that stare in longing bulging squinting in their unrelenting seeking searching for even a tiny morsel A morsel… mighty enough to start saliva flowing in arid maws filled with too-soft teeth or none at all A bowl…a bowl wide enough deep enough to hold only but an infinitesimal smidgen of the soup we —the full-- discard daily Click to hear the poet read the poem.  T. A. was a seed planted in the Caribbean soil of Trinidad & Tobago on the cusp of the transformational 60s. He was watered and fertilized in the gardens of Brooklyn, New York and Hartford, Connecticut throughout most of the bell-bottomed, “blaxploitation-movie-era” of the 70s. Had trials by fire in the USMC in the late 70s to early 80s. Budded and bloomed in academia in the 80s and 90s, before his withering began at the turn of the 21st century. Yet, before he falls from the stem, and is ground once more into dust, he hopes to feed a mind or two. He relishes the thought of others being nourished by his expressions. T. A. is also thrilled to have narrated Mud Ajar, the latest collection of poems penned by Poetry X Hunger's founder Hiram Larew and made available to the public by Atmosphere Press.
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