Hunger

Lauren Folk

Do you long for the homes of others? 

For kitchens with cabinets full 

of collectible plastic cereal bowls 

and chipped glasses from cartoons 

you never watched on Saturday mornings; 

for unnumbered bedrooms and 

quilts made by gnarled hands 

that never touched your own; 

for bathrooms you can’t navigate in 

the dark or with your eyes closed; 

for smells you don’t recognize, 

scents of a different existence? 

Do you long for the desperate 

and welcoming strangeness 

of the lives of those who are 

neither you nor yours? 

You fall asleep in the car and a voice 

tells you to hold the sun. 

Wake up on a nice stretch of highway 

and you want to get out, 

drift deep into the woods 

like a leaf or a wave and find 

the place where the martens 

can tell you about restlessness and hunger.