Hunger
by Gillian Wallace
These are
the empty lines of a home, these are
the black windows looking
for lamps. The cupboards are
the life raft you cling
to. You've fed
them cans and boxes for so
long, hoping to sate
them with twists
of dried pasta. You know the panic
of cutlery when a plate
is empty. You remember
it from your childhood, the years
of bologna carved
into fried sculptures. When you check
your pools of forgiveness have
dried up, only
faint rings of salt are left
in withered grass. It's a desert
where you step, the bones
of trees holding
a box labelled
rage that you can't
reach. This
is what Eden looked like after
hunger chose
the soft curve, sucked
flesh until juices
ran down its face.
Gillian Wallace’s poems have been published in various journals including Descant, The Antigonish Review, Room, and This Magazine. In 2009 she won Arc Poetry Magazine’s Diana Brebner Prize, and in 2010, she was named a “Hot Ottawa Voice” by Ottawa’s Tree Reading Series. Gillian has her PhD in the psychology of religion. Her thesis was on the origins of evil. She occasionally edits her poems online at http://gillianwallace.ca.