sympathetic hunger

one says to the other:
eaten I've not in days equaling a month and two.

the other says to one:
eaten I've never... I think I might be just as unfortunate as you.

the one complains:
you understand not a bit
for food has already before graced my lips.
I sit in agony
deprived of food at my fingertips.

the other bows down out of reverence untrue:
Do pardon,
I am mistaken.
The torment your fleeting fast inflicts is far more than I could begin to imagine.

Better suited am I to have starved my whole life...
I dare not eat, then live two days and a month drowning in strife.

Foreign is the pain in your gut now hollow;
you pang for delicacies of which you've already swallowed.
you've gone on and on about meals and the bliss that followed.

Indeed, my mouth does not water at details of how you once dined.
At this I will kick up my feet, relax, recline--
for my life of complete starvation surely surpasses the hell that is thine.

-unkown