Hazel,what an interesting poem,and it is so true!Those who have,many times, seem so indifferent toward those who are impoverished.
It's hard to imagine how someone could be imprisoned for taking stale bread or anything else(stale)for that matter,but prisons are filled with people who committed "minor offenses"just so(they)or their family could have one more meal.
A sad but very true poem,but I did enjoy reading it nonetheless.
Barbara Henry

Enjoyed both the story you wove and especially the style. sAYS volumes about how those with so much can treat those with so little with such coldness. Fantastic poem Hazel!

~a fellow human and poet, -Zach

Yes, the laws and punishment of the past were brutal. Some countries still practice such punishment. Most in the West don't. On the other hand, it seems that because of the lack of brutal punishment like this poem depicts, crime in the West has skyrocketed. America, as an example, has the largest prison population in the world and its a growing industry.

Very good, brought back a memory for me. In Halifax NS, there was a building called the D. Wolfe building. Back in the late 17 and 18 century,ships would sail down the harbour with passengers. These passengers were people like in your peom, they might have only stole a mouldy crust of bread. The people were taken through an underground tunnel to a cell in the D Wolfe building, they were starved, and abused, and there they spent the rest of their days in a cement cell by themselves. As a logistics officer for the government I was in charge of demolishing the building... the building that would give anyone the creeps. On one of the cells this was scratched by a women on the wall. My only crime was I got older.
Thanks for the reminder, of the good live really we have. Nicely penned.
Sue