{"id":16920,"date":"2021-05-31T11:00:57","date_gmt":"2021-05-31T16:00:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/?p=16920"},"modified":"2021-08-01T00:11:44","modified_gmt":"2021-08-01T05:11:44","slug":"the-great-hunger","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/archives\/16920","title":{"rendered":"The Great Hunger"},"content":{"rendered":"

2021 Porch Prize Winner in Poetry <\/em><\/p>\n

The ghosts of your dead relatives laugh when you say you are not political <\/span>
\nthe ones who starved to death<\/span><\/p>\n

When you were a fish you were hungry<\/span>
\nyou ate what and when you wanted and didn\u2019t think much about it<\/span>
\nThen the ghost of a half-eaten fish<\/span>
\nstarted to hunt you<\/span>
\nAnd you were haunted by the word, the words of angry stars<\/span><\/p>\n

Once when you were human you were Irish <\/span>
\nYou thought you were not political <\/span>
\nYou thought you just didn\u2019t like potatoes<\/span><\/p>\n

you grew up thinking the Irish couldn\u2019t cook<\/span>
\nbecause there were no family dishes<\/span>
\nthe starved don\u2019t pass on recipes<\/span>
\ninstead they send the hunger <\/span>
\nyou inherit the hunger and call it your appetite<\/span><\/p>\n

Words whispered over the pots your ancestors stirred<\/span>
\nare painted on walls in your dreams<\/span><\/p>\n

what your father devours gracelessly, his granddaughter eschews<\/span>
\nshe won\u2019t eat leftovers because she wants something new<\/span><\/p>\n

what you cannot stomach as a child will<\/span>
\nCome for you in the desires of your descendants<\/span><\/p>\n

when they said grace, you thought it quaint faith, that it meant nothing <\/span>
\nbut that grace was sent to you, along with the hunger<\/span><\/p>\n

you go to parades and parties and one St. Patrick\u2019s Day your non-Irish cousin drinking protestant whiskey makes a joke \u201chow can you not feed yourself when surrounded by water\u201d you tell him you were once a fish it\u2019s not so simple as you think<\/span><\/p>\n

you feel instant, murderous sympathy towards those starved victims, your ancestors<\/span>
\nit has been seven generations so instead of waging war you try<\/span>
\nto love potatoes you tell yourself \u201cstart with the skin and work your way in\u201d you even become vegetarian<\/span>
\nyou tell yourself you are good and you love animals so much not because you are one but because you are so peaceful<\/span>
\nbut what you are feeling is the memory of being hunted<\/span><\/p>\n

a rumbling that is not hunger but heartache<\/span><\/p>\n

like that time you stayed with your mate waiting for his broken bone to heal<\/span>
\nbut he was eaten instead<\/span><\/p>\n

and you remember the long loneliness<\/span><\/p>\n

Don\u2019t let guilt stop you from eating what they couldn\u2019t<\/span>
\nplant it in new earth, reap it in its time <\/span>
\nsalt it<\/span>
\nDip it in fat and devour it<\/span>
\nsay the grace they can no longer say<\/span>
\nlet it echo back in time to them, lighter than potatoes<\/span><\/p>\n

and don\u2019t eat alone, let someone love you for God\u2019s sake <\/span>
\nmind your own late blight <\/span>
\nlet yourself leave shore to find the one whose chewing you can tolerate <\/span>
\nstop pretending there is not that one person<\/span><\/p>\n

Let us tell you what\u2019s not political<\/span><\/p>\n

who you want to eat with, the heart, who you would hunt and cook for, the way someone\u2019s mouth looks eating fries, who you would kill for and who could kill you with a crumb, and it would be fine.<\/span>
\nIt would be sweet. It would be meat.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/h6>\n

 <\/p>\n

Rina\u00a0Kenney lives outside of Philadelphia, PA. She earned an English degree from Penn State\u00a0and spent most of her twenties working with women and children in crisis. \u00a0The experience of losing multiple pregnancies and then raising two daughters reignited her love of writing. She\u00a0writes poetry and\u00a0has completed a spiritual memoir\u00a0about pregnancy loss and grief.<\/h6>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

2021 Porch Prize Winner in Poetry The ghosts of your dead relatives laugh when you say you are not political the ones who starved to death When you were a fish you were hungry you ate what and when you wanted and didn\u2019t think much about it Then the ghost of a half-eaten fish started […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2247,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[63,68],"tags":[25],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Jypy-4oU","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16920"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2247"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16920"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16920\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17156,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16920\/revisions\/17156"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}