Poetry X Hunger
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Hunger is a worldwide scourge. 
​This section includes poems recently written by poets from
​around the world.   

Poem by Kate Gold

4/23/2025

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The Language of Angels

A calico cloth, laid out flat, like so much of your lands.
Thousands of stitches but nowhere near enough in number to measure the lives
taken.
The tiny drops of blood from a finger pierced by sharpness.
Nothing in the ocean of blood that has been brutally spilled.
Frustration at the lost thread, slipping from the needles eye.
Nothing, when you must pack your few belongings and move on, Again, again,
again.
Exasperation at my slowness, my lack of skill.
Nothing, when you must begin each day and find some thread of hope to do what
needs to be done for the children.
Hunger that causes me to consider putting aside my stitching.
Nothing, when I have ample food in my cupboard and you – you are slowly starving
as you feed your children first.
I sleep in a safe, warm, comfortable bed, whilst you huddle with what remains of your
family under a few blankets for protection.
Today I sewed the name of young woman with the same name as my own
granddaughter.
Aisha, 25 years old, someone’s daughter, someone’s granddaughter. Maybe
someone’s wife and someone’s mother.
In many ways I prefer the reverse side of the sewing. The strange, angular shapes.
The knots and loops.
And I choose to believe it is a language known only by angels.
That they might fast-track these souls into the presence of God. Where they might
know peace, love and acceptance.
Far, far away from the angry egos of bitter, old men.

#StitchTheirNamesTogether – a project with women all around the world stitching the
names of those killed in the Palestinian genocide. A small way to remember, to
honour.

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Kate Gold is a painter and poet living on the edge of Dartmoor and has written poetry since a child. After she studied poetry as part of a creative arts degree, she took her writing more seriously, honing and developing her writing skills. She went on to achieve an M.A in creative writing (poetry) In the past Kate worked as an art, poetry and creative writing tutor in HMP Bristol and ran writing workshops in community settings. Much of her poetry is inspired by her love of the wild beauty of the natural environment and her experience of caring for the dying. Her first poetry pamphlet was published in 2022 by Jawbone Press in Dorset.

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Poem by Pulkita Anand

4/21/2025

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Hunger

Certainly, it’s everywhere, right? All over the world?
Yes, someway or the other. I read a report about it. I saw it in the street today. 
Oh! I met it last year while travelling. I saw the eyes filled with it.
I watched a documentary last week. Does it quench? It depends on gnawing a hundred holes.
Was it in the past? Yes, of course. Though things were different, so what?
Though you distance yourself, you ignore it, you overlook it, you avoid it somehow.
Yet, it remains at the corner of your heart, in the prick of your heart, in your searching eyes, in the crevices of your brain.
Reflected in anger, frustration, impatience, shrieks, stress, sentences, sights, rights.
Sometimes in silence, sometimes out of sight. Condemned to live by comrades of dying.
At times it becomes unpronounceable.
What else?
Suppose we are able to measure it, then what?
Escaped to be entrapped. In any case, shot in war.
Faces, could you recognise any?
Carrying continuously, from here to there. Keep a low-pressure area on the surface life.
Can it be divided?
Licking the pavements, swallowing the insults, digesting the injustices, biting the bitten heart.
Leaving nothing for the vulture, nothing to be eaten, except plastic.
On the other hand, the world goes by and we move on.

Published in The Poetry Lighthouse.

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Pulkita Anand is an avid reader of poetry. Author of two children’s e-books, her recent eco-poetry collection is 'we were not born to be erased'. Various publications include: Tint Journal, Poetry Xhunger, Origami Press, New Verse News, Green Verse: An anthology of poems for our planet (Saraband Publication), Comparative Women, Origami Press, Asiatic, Inanna Publication, Bronze Bird Books, SAGE Magazine, The Sunlight Press and elsewhere.

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Poem by Bhuwan Thapaliya

3/26/2025

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Buckwheat husks

A flock of dehydrated birds
suddenly fell from the sky,
bellies hollow, wings frail,
beaks open against
the famine-worn wind.

Below, the fields lie cracked,
dry buckwheat husks scattered,
like forgotten dreams decomposing in the dust.

The air trembled
with the shrieks of starved children,
ribs pressing against withered skin,
like the frail walls of a bombarded house
waiting to collapse.

Desperate mothers stirred empty vessels,
sobbing to their ancestral deities,
while weary fathers walked endless miles,
chasing water and food.

And then,
she knelt among the fallen birds,
cupping them gently,
as if holding the last embers of life.

Her fingers, thin as candle wicks,
scattered grains of unseen buckwheat.

With a mantra,
she breathed life into the windless air,
and one by one,
the birds rose--
their wings slicing
through the stillness of despair.

I stood,
mouth dry as the barren earth,
feeling small,
like a child
watching a goddess
stitch the torn sky.

How I wished
she could revive me like the birds.
How I wished
she could drift my hunger away.

How I wished
her touch could quench my thirst,
her smile could fill my stomach
in this famine-ravaged land.

​She looked at me,
eyes kind yet weary,
and shyly smiled--
her smile fluttered,
like prayer flags
weathered by the winds of the Himalayas.

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Bhuwan Thapaliya is a poet from Kathmandu, Nepal. He has authored five poetry collections, including his most recent work, Slipping into Another World, published by Ukiyoto, and Safa Tempo: Poems New and Selected, published by Nirala Publications, New Delhi. Beyond his writing, he actively engages with the global literary community, having read his work and attended seminars in countries such as South Korea, India, the United States, Thailand, Cambodia, and his native Nepal.

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Poem by Mary Ellen Warren

3/20/2025

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Blueberries on my porridge 10 times removed

Carefully I spoon frozen blueberries from the self-sealing pouch,
Purchased from New World frozen food section,
Stocked by part-time underaged and retired night staff,
Offloaded from the Gilmore’s frozen food behemoth in the middle of the
night,
Coming from a central depot, previously shipped from the Hastings
factory,
On to my porridge.

Thanks sorters and the pickers from far and near Flaxmere, paid for
performance,
Not to forget the bankers, advertisers, and human resources,
presumable well reimbursed.
The blueberry plants imported from North America,
Where I found them in ‘57 growing wild on “Blueberry Hill” Sudbury
Canada.
Food for thought, now to add a sprinkle of Chia seeds.

First published in 30 Years of the Hawke’s Bay Live Poets’ Society, Seasons’s Voices, 2022

BIO: The Canadian Shield is their Maunga, the Niagara is their awa. US poet Billy Collins is an ancestor-in-law. Aotearoa New Zealand is their home.
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Poem by Chris Campbell

3/7/2025

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Cold Crooks by This Fire Pit

A pigeon naps by a dozing man,
their heads are tucked in. One to its chest,
the other under cardboard. How long

will they stay a duo by this fire pit?
These cold crooks, thieving flames.
A chip wrapper folds in wind.

Whose meal was that – and when’s the next?
It must be hard to live without respite.
Pigeon’s feathers twitch, man’s grunts

dampened by coats, one trainer beside his head.
A helicopter whirrs. Crew searches for convicts.
Nearby, a woman fist bumps anyone

in sight. She thumps of optimism, even
near this pit, as graffiti warns against the 9am-5pm.
Suits jest on their way to lunchtime drinks.

​Pigeons fly up to 700 miles in a day –
more if they break their trip. This one chose
to doze here. Still half a day to go.

Click to hear the poet read the poem.

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Chris Campbell, from Bristol, UK, was Highly Commended in the 2024 Cobh International Poetry Competition and shortlisted for Canterbury Poet of the Year 2023. Chris' poems appear in publications including Magma, Prole, Ink Sweat & Tears, The Waxed Lemon, Indigo Dreams’ The Dawntreader and Black Bough Poetry. He has two pamphlets published, plus a collection of poems called ‘All Island No Sea’ (Alien Buddha Press, 2022).

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Poem by Laura Grevel

1/23/2025

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                                           The Lonely Side

                                                                 My name is Homeless
                                                                 I carry myself in this bag
                                                                 On this lonely side of the street

I walk down the street on my feet
I smell their fear when we meet

I look down at shoes not at eyes
I hear the repulse in their sighs

I want for the meat of their teeth
I feel the quick cringe just beneath

I thirst for the taste of their wheat
I sink with their stare at my need

I ache with the need to entreat
I cry at the heat of defeat

I live the long nights of that shame
I’m sore with the fingers of blame

I know that they would me delete
I walk down the street on my feet

                                                                 On this lonely side of the street
                                                                 I carry myself in this bag
                                                                 ​My name is Homeless

Click to hear the poet read the poem.


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From the USA, Laura Grevel lives in Europe. She is a performance poet, fiction writer and blogger. Her writings have been published widely. Laura often reads at international online literary events.
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Poems by Vincent Stevenson

1/9/2025

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Food Bank

Another working day,
Twelve hours with the elderly,
Waiting for my pay,
Loving family tenderly.

Nothing to report but,
Dreading the journey home,
Claiming income support,
No credit on my phone.

Another payday loan,
Council flat is dank,
In shadow seeds are sown,
Waiting at the food bank.

Britain Needs Gurdwaras

There are 300 Gurdwaras in the UK,
A little-known statistic,
If you’re hungry, they will feed you,
This gift of community ensures survival,
Filling hearts and bellies.
All ages, all creeds, all needs, good deeds,
No questions asked, just humanity with a smile,
Our flesh and blood are the same, just different,
A first world country, leaning on community efforts,
Dedicated volunteers lift spirits,
When there’s nowhere else to go,
What happened to social mobility?
Rising beyond origins, carving success?
A lost term among hidden beneficiaries,
As teenagers we talked of eradicating child poverty,
Eradicating world hunger, yet here we stand,
Poverty and hunger in a first world country.
Politicians shrug shoulders – let’s set up a working group,
A Royal Commission to report back in five years,
Some subjects are too big for one lifetime and a million politicians,
There’s enough food for us all, you know, not just the few.
Gurdwaras show society the errors of its ways,
They offer true leadership, true ambition, true humanitarian love.

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Born in Manchester, England, Vince first started writing poetry influenced by the 'punk' poet, John Cooper Clarke in the mid-1980s. Since then he has travelled extensively and enjoys writing about both beautiful and disturbing things. Coming from a tough background, Vince recognises the difficulties of ordinary people. He works as a trainer helping people overcome the fear of public speaking.

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Poem by Mike Douse

1/7/2025

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Loaves and Lilies
​
There is this Chinese proverb stating that, when you have only
Two pennies left in the world, you should buy a loaf of bread
With one and a lily with the other. Which is a good illustration
Of an admirable message – feeding not only the stomach but
Also the soul… man cannot live by bread alone… those sorts of
Sentiments. But there is now a higher truth that involves altruism
And our common humanity: spend one of your pence on a loaf
For yourself and the other on a loaf for a faraway fellow human
Who is desperately hungry. Involving a lack of lily, conceivably
Compensated for by my sense of virtuousness – of having done
The ‘right thing’. But here, for me at any rate, there is a bit of a
Problem. Call me greedy or selfish if you must but I favour the
Lily before me to the temporarily satiated individual, unknown to
And distant from me, noble though my gesture might have been.
So, what to do? Possibly fourteen of us should share the lily in
Question between us and dispatch a baker’s dozen loaves to a
Zone of famine – and there are multitudes of those. But, here
Again, that doesn’t work for me: I want my lily, not a share in a
Lily but sole ownership thereof. Any other ideas? Well, how about
We clear the fields and we provide the grain and the agricultural
Implements and some fertiliser, thereby enabling those starving
People to produce loaves (possibly alongside lilies) themselves?
Which involves some initial sacrifice on my part (half a loaf is
Better than no bread) but, in a year or two, I would not need to
Go without my lily and my conscience would be clear. What’s
That – the rich landowners have seized the land? The villagers
Have eaten the seeds? There’s no money to fuel the equipment?
The fertiliser fails to meet environmental standards? Let us face
It, there are some questions without answers, some problems
Without solutions. I’ve certainly enjoyed my daily bread but I see
That my lilium convallium has finished flowering. It must now be
Deadheaded, pruned, cut back, and mulched in readiness for the
Year ahead and so I’ve just no time to think further about hunger.

BIO: MIKE DOUSE has worked in education internationally since 1963. His publications include An Enjoyment of Education, One World One School, and numerous journal articles and conference presentations, along with four collections of his poems: Old Ground, Gone to Ground, Grounded and Groundhog Nights. He is living happily ever after in South Wales with his dear wife Patricia.
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Poem by Deirdre Hines

1/4/2025

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The Recipe

may take its name from the country of birth                                                                                             or from the author, but depends on                                                                                                           the right amount of ingredients in                                                                                                             the right order: no higgledy piggledy.                                                                                                      Although tastes have proved as fickle                                                                                                        as simile, the seas dishes sail in                                                                                                                   are groups that rise and fall in frequencies                                                                                              that follow whales feeding in plastic fields.                                                                                              Between the poetry and metaphor,                                                                                                             between our finger and our mouth,                                                                                                              hangs an image of a starving child                                                                                                              above rivers of uneaten flavour.                                                                                                                  The lost recipes of Eden live                                                                                                                     in golden grains of singing wheatfields.

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Deirdre is an award winning playwright and poet. Her first book of poems 'The Language of Coats' was published by New Island Books and includes the poems which won The Listowel Poetry Collection Prize. 'The Mermelf-A Fable for Our Times' was published by Austin and Macauley in April 2024 and is a verse novella for younger readers.

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Poem by David C. Brydges

11/14/2024

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Green Light in the Wasteland
​
This morning's news is that food bank usage
has skyrocketed this Canadian Thanksgiving.
I’ve had my breakfast and am feeling thankful.
My hunger is for everyone to be fully fulfilled.
Yet the garden of plenty is not feeding us all.
In the corner growing is a shining hope seed.
Planted to keep the night from becoming day.
Let’s nourish this plentiful spirit that those who
have less can be filled with the dignity of more.
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David C. Brydges was an autodidact solo scholar and lover of the liminal. His kept "Poetry as Insurgent Art" by his bedside as a constant companion and reminder of how we need to listen and heal our planet with words of hope.  He passed away in 2025.

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    Abha Das Sarma
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    David C. Brydges
    Deirdre Hines
    Denish Moorthy
    Doreena Jennings
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    Mary Ellen Warren
    Mike Douse
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    Nicole Gayler
    Patience Gumbo
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    Rose Mary Boehm
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  • Hunger Poetry
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    • Hunger Poems
    • World Food Day Poetry Competition >
      • 2021
      • 2020
      • 2019
      • 2018
    • Maryland Poets
    • International Poets
  • ART
    • ART Inspired Poems
  • News & Blog
  • Young!
    • Poems by Young Poets
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  • Library
    • Extent of Hunger >
      • Global Hunger: Progress & Challenges
      • Hunger in the US
    • Historic Accounts of Hunger >
      • Africa
      • The Americas
      • Asia
      • Europe and Russia
    • Historical Poems
    • Interviews
    • Recent highlights
  • Contact/Submit/Take Action
    • Submission Guidelines
    • Call to Action
    • Resources >
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