I would hurl words into this darkness and wait for an echo, and if an echo sounded, no matter how faintly, I would send other words to tell, to march, to fight, to create a sense of hunger for life that gnaws in us all. ~Richard Wright, American Hunger, 1977
I just noticed that July’s theme for NaBloPoMo is food.In my fiction, poetry and shorts there always seems to be an element of food.
I think most poets have at one time or another found food to be an inspiration, Robert Frost’s Blueberries comes to mind.
Blueberries
Blueberries as big as the end of your thumb,
Real sky-blue, and heavy, and ready to drum
In the cavernous pail of the first one to come!
And all ripe together, not some of them green
And some of them ripe! You ought to have seen!
Robert Frost
As does Denise Duhamel’s poem “Egg rolls”, in her poem we are reminded how important food can be at times when you don’t have money and are very hungry. I couldn’t find Denise’s poem online. But I definitely recommend buying her book Two and Two. It’s one book I read often for inspiration.
In the theme of hunger and food, today write about a time when you were very hungry and you didn’t have access to food. What did you crave? When you could eat what did you chose to eat. What food memories come across in your writings? How descriptive is your writing? Does it make the reader hungry for more? Or do they quickly turn the page. Good writing is like a good meal, you think about it long after the plates are cleared. Now get back to work!
Lovingly,
The Writing Nag