"People Are Starving" by John C. Mannone

People Are Starving

John C. Mannone

Wall-to-wall people

standing and waiting

to be fed, so many

eyes empty—hollowed

out bowls. It’s always busy

at the end of the week.

            Fridays are good,

people are hungry,

aromas—opulent as soup

lines. Many mouths

gape open for bread.

            It was a sin

to leave anything

on my plate. So, I say

grace in the booth

at the Italian bistro,

            kneel into

the stained glass

dish in front of me

with a broken piece

of bread to sop up

a dishful of olive oil

pressed with bits

of crumbled oregano

and basil, garlic granules,

coarse salt and parsley

            in remembrance

of bitter herbs.

Red pepper clinging

in the back of my throat.

I choke

out a moment of silence

for my own guilt

from which I was once

delivered, but still starves

            an empty heart

full of unholy words,

panging from the

wall-to-wall hunger

            in my soul.

Poet’s Notes: I came early for dinner at Carrabbas Italian Restaurant before it became a crowded Friday evening. People lined the walls, so to speak, and I had a flash of the soup lines in a larger city in which I had once lived. Thoughts from my Catholic upbringing seeped in from my subconscious, like “it’s a sin to waste food” and “there are people starving all around the world.”

I didn’t know where the poem was going when I started writing it. I was as surprised as I hope you were. All that religious subtext up welled, and no doubt, from Amos stating that man doesn’t live by bread alone, but by the word of God.