You must have been hungry, the one drowsy evening, crickets silenced at your closeness. You must have been able to smell the casserole, wrapped in an orange bottle in the old woman's bathroom cabinet, desire same as thanksgiving dinner, parents smacking your wrist to wait for prayer before you can eat You must have been hungry, imagining the white potatoes on the bedroom nightstand, hands shaking— need calling to crush them into a powder, breathe in the butter of mashed potatoes. You held your prayer loaded, heavy in your palm, as you broke open the door, like a can of biscuits, threatened to spill the old woman’s red cranberry sauce into floorboards if she didn’t feed you what you wanted. While you rummaged through her pantry, taking ingredients used to keep her alive, she called the police on you— taking away the kids you left at home with strangers that destroy futures. But you knew about that. No one cried when you got arrested. You were hungry. They hold their prayers to your head, hoping to pull the trigger someday.
Korrine Key is a poet from Elmwood, TN and a graduate of Cumberland University. She received a Bachelor’s in creative writing with a minor in English. Her work has been published in the Novus Literary Arts Journal and the New Square Journal; she has also worked as an editor for Novus. Korrine is continuing her education at Texas Tech University, working on her MFA in Creative Writing with a focus in poetry.