Write this by pen. Don’t type into any device, in case.
Don’t forget this is a mental health condition—
you are suffering from a psychological disorder.
There is nothing wrong in benefitting from
watching others suffer. Voyeurism is not a crime,
not as long as you don’t get caught.
Who knows more about hunger than you?
The hunger claws at your insides relentlessly,
digs at the hollow of your belly.
Learn to use the crisis in a formative, generative way.
Besides, morality is subjective.
You have a right to try every potential cure.
Let your own self judge.
Pay attention to their moves, and features
the way they hold up grass to the camera
their emaciated bodies
bones sticking out through tightly stretched, rough skin
the pits that are their stomachs.
But don’t forget to look into their eyes—
ablaze with the cavernous, burning hell inside.
Don’t panic, herein lies your remedy.
Sit up straight. Try long breaths.
Don’t turn away your face
when the mother undresses her child
when they huddle together, a bundles of bones
when the man crawl on four limbs like a dog
Don’t feel guilty. Your first responsibility is yourself.
Their faces gnawed away, their ribcages........
Don’t despair of humanity, yet.
Click and scroll. Scroll and click. Till you find her video.
She looks at the camera for a moment,
her hands busy sifting through the garbage,
then ducks her head into her knees.
Take the stew to the table, to let it cool a bit.
She separates small bits of stale, dry bread
that looks like chipped pieces of stones.
They are so much a part of the garbage
you can’t distinguish them as something edible.
Place the knife and forks sideways on the plate.
She collects them like a treasure, remonstrating,
like an old woman—they throw away food,
they don’t think to give us, unfeeling people.
Let your glance linger on the stew.
Look at her hands, bony and graceful; and yours—
blackened, chipped, eaten away.
and your tongue do the beggar dance in your mouth.
On camera they point to her plastic bag.
—What will you do with it?
—We will boil it in water, then eat it.
She is full of invention.
Cut a large chunk out. Place it in your mouth.
Move your tongue around it.
Envy the dignity with which she handles her hunger.
Make your teeth wait
before you give them the permission to chew.
Chew, slowly.
Pretend you are not really interested.
She looks upwards, tells the camera, simply—
Allah gives us sabr to bear the hunger.
Don’t cry.
Don’t
hate
yourself
Please.
Sobia Ali has an MA in English Literature. Her work has appeared in Atticus Review, The Indian Quarterly, The Bosphorus Review of Books, Another Chicago Magazine, Gone Lawn, The Punch Magazine, Queen Mob’s Teahouse, trampset, Litro, Lunate, Manawaker Studio Flash Fiction Podcast, Kitaab, ActiveMuse, The Cabinet of Heed, Ombak Magazine, Tigershark Publishing, Secret Attic, Indian Periodical, Dream Journal, Literary Yard, The Short Humour Site, and is forthcoming in The Aleph Review, Sahitya Akademi’s Indian Literature, Close to the Bone, Blotter Magazine, and elsewhere. She is currently at work on her novel.
