Free School Meals
Empty bellies leave young minds malnourished,
A famine of learning that’s all too rife,
Starving children of their chances for life,
Who might well, properly fed, have flourished.
Free school meals then? Except, nothing is free
For this world in which all necessities
Have a price, and hunger is a dis-ease
Caused not by a lack of food, but money.
Capital, driven by insatiable greed,
Will not, shall not finance gratuitous fare
If it can’t claw back the cost from elsewhere,
Driven to meet profit’s demands, not need.
For now, only air is an oddity,
Not made and sold as a commodity.
D. A.