The Voice of Hunger

In the hut of the poor, even dreams are halved —

Torn between sighs and silence,

Like broken lullabies caught in cobwebs of the night.

How long will words remain alive?

When hunger drapes the body like cloth,

And sleep drips from a leaking ceiling,

While dreams hang sharp — nailed to the wall.

Today again, a child asked his mother:

“Has bread gone away on holiday?”

And the mother, hiding hunger in the stove,

Cooked silence with her eyes.

Hunger is not just an empty plate —

It is dignity stripped from the edge of the meal.

A dancer with anklets of dust,

Her rhythm echoes in every alley.

It is Time — the ancient musician —

Whose songs end in mourning notes.

One night, on the roadside,

A mother wrapped herself in dreams,

And her child, staring at the moon, whispered:

“Ma… is that bread?”

And the moon quietly hid its face.

Around a mosque, ten more rose —

But silence was the only call to prayer.

While in the alley beside, a child sobbed,

Having already bowed in the prayer of hunger.

How long will we call it a trial from God

While hoarding the means to end it?

When God’s name fills your wallet,

But bread finds no space?

This hunger — it’s not mine alone.

It’s a poem burning in stove ash,

A dream withering on a school bench,

A child with debts inked in his gaze.

Where are those schools, those sacred places

Where hunger was unstitched through syllables?

Where before the holy text,

Children were taught humanity?

Here, hunger fears no prayer mark —

It bows daily in silent rituals,

And sleeps each night

In the ribs of a tired laborer.

This poem is for that child

Who paints bread in his colors, not toys.

This poem is for that mother

Who kept her arms empty,

Lest fate eat the bread meant for her child.

Hunger — not a scream, but a silence

That strangles the throat of the day,

And shouts into the ear of the night:

“Did you eat anything today?”

A beggar’s child on the footpath

Licks the moon, mistaking it for bread.

While his mother, starved for days,

Does not hum lullabies —

She wipes her tears gently,

As if washing the word “Ameen.”

Beneath a mosque’s shadow,

Ten prostrations lay hollow —

And the eleventh, a hungry man,

Didn’t complain to God, but to bread.

The stove won’t light. The salt in talk has gone.

Even love now seeks the scent of bread.

Every promise, hot like the tandoor’s lid,

But inside — only smoke. Only smoke.

Hunger ticks in clock hands,

Marking only the poor man’s noon.

For the rich, it sings them to sleep.

For the poor, it steals away dreams.

O Time — you composer of ages —

Why does every tune end in hunger?

Why does every song fall silent

On an empty plate?

We wrote books on God

But none on hunger.

We built mosques

But forgot the schools

Where children once learned:

“A is for Allah… B is for Bhook (Hunger).”

Where the first lesson was:

“Hunger is not a test — it’s a crime.”

And when the world ends,

When the sky falls and people kneel —

Bread will matter more than prayer.

And that child, who once wept on the sidewalk,

Will recite to angels

The poem only the hungry can write.

This poem is not mine —

It is a translation of hunger —

A scream wrapped in metaphor,

Still alive in the grave of language.

For hunger never dies,

It only moves —

From body to body, from age to age.

It’s no longer just an ache in the belly —

It’s a silent scream

That crashes into walls,

And falls into courtyards,

Into a mother’s empty lap,

Onto a pile of trash,

At a school’s locked gate —

Where children beg for bread, not books.

Slowly, under sleep’s cold blanket,

Hunger doesn’t rest — it whimpers.

Every breath is wrapped in a question,

Every silence — the ring of an empty plate.

One day, I heard the muezzin call —

And behind it, a child weeping.

He placed a coin on the mosque’s step

And prayed:

“O Lord, place a handful of flour in my mother’s hand today.”

I kept hoping his prostration

Wouldn’t end in bread…

That an answer would fall from the sky.

But no… perhaps God

Filed that plea in an office

Where applications only open

For a chosen few.

Have you ever heard a school bell

Ringing inside a crying child’s ear?

No — because there, no lessons are taught.

Only a page of hope,

Which hunger eats — day after day.

A laborer says:

“Tomorrow’s wages will bring two loaves.”

But when tomorrow comes,

It only brings a coffin.

And those who have everything

Call hunger a divine test —

While children’s questions

Sleep like graffiti on forgotten walls.

At one table, five dishes steam.

In the laborer’s hut —

Even a dream lies sliced in half.

____________

Published under International Cooperation with "Sindh Courier"