Hannah Alder
10-12 year old category (poetry)

Untitled

I lean against the scratchy brick
Entranced with hunger
As street vendors call out,
As the smell of hot dogs wafts towards me,
My stomach rumbles like oncoming thunder
The people hustling past don’t give me a glance
For they’ve got work, family, friends to get to
Food to get to
I manage to weakly call out,
“Please, my family is starving. Could you spare a penny,”
To the sorry coo of the pigeons, also vying to be noticed above the crowd
As the sun sets, I become one of these commuters, rushing home to my empty fridge
and my starving children
I’m afraid to open the door, to call out
“No luck today” to my children’s disappointed gazes
I push the door open, knowing that though my stomach is yearning for just a bite of
anything edible,
It will come up empty
We journeyed through the cold, the barren terrain, for this
We kept going through the dark, awaited the inexistable light, for this
Our lives were uprooted, our children miserable without anyone to lean on, for this
Just to starve,
Just to beg,
Just to become one of the many hungry on the cold, damp, dangerous streets of what
we now call home

Kaycee Baker
10-12 year old category (poetry)

Tuesday Full Of Love

“Taco Tuesday!” My mom says every single Tuesday You think it’s boring but it’s
not. It isn’t because it’s not Taco Tuesday

                                                                                     You know what it is?
It’s a Tuesday Full of Love. Look around the table.
                                                                                                The coffee benches, the white
table, but best of all the writing on the walls.
                                                                The Kitchen is the Heart Of the Home

When mom brings the tacos and the nachos
The smells of beans, the queso sauce, even hot sauce
                                                                                                   The first bite takes you to your

soul
And the second heals it. Tuesdays Full of Love
Always make people want to be social.
There is too much love.

                                                                                                      All you can hear is the

                                                                                                 Laughter
                                                                                                                   Giggles
                                                                                                                                 Love

The energy
The aura
Of the kitchen can tell you

                                                                   Kitchen is the Heart of the Home

Chloe Gibeon
10-12 year old category (poetry)

Hunger

Its green eyes glint
as it tears bellies with sharp claws.

Some people  fall
its teeth
sunk
deep
into
flesh.

Some people
beg
for
just
a
drop.

Some people gorge
but
they keep it for themselves.

They don’t know
hunger’s green eyes
the pain of the claws.

Gabrielle Guzman
13-15 year old category (poetry)

Croquetas

Whether in winter or summer, my family always makes croquetas de queso,
We make the dough, grate the mozzarella, and prepare the onions and parsley,
Together we eat in happy silence, with smiles shooting across the table

We share this delectable snack with our friends during holiday potlucks,
I fill my plate with a variety of foods lined up at the tables and savor each piece of food
While experiencing the community that holds everything together
Each bite is a welcoming hug of trying new things and holding on to the creations of others

Maybe it is just our way of holding on to our heritage,
Although it never truly had the same ingredients my mom must have used in Bolivia.
Now we either search through specific Latin American markets or just resort to substitutions
To try to get the “real thing” but I cannot even remember having an authentic croqueta from
Bolivia when I visited six years ago
This modified childhood favorite snack is now intertwined with my heritage identity.

Even in the mourning of my grandmother, my grieving mother still makes croquetas,
Despite the grief and confusion, the croqueta is still warm
As if you could feel all the memories
Of her always sharing this frequent experience with us

When I go on the subway, I see a middle-aged man crossing from each cart,
He speaks in Spanish and asks for money for his family and says they are hungry,
After giving spare change I know is not enough but is as much as I can give, I let out a quiet
prayer,
For all the families to be fed
To feel the fullness of community and love within each bite of food they take
To sense that blessed security
And to enjoy the same gift of food I feel with croquetas and even more

Paulina Milewska
13-15 year old category (poetry)

Untitled

How could mother nature be so selfless,
To bless us with her curves of canyons,
Her breath of oxygen,
Planting of gardens,
As a mother does,
Led us to a city
We led her to her grave
Singing songs of rue
Melodies of gray.

To repeat and preside again
When her daughter came to our feet
Her last whisper a cry;
Her cry we saw a keg,
The fruit of her eye she sacrificed;
Her sacrifice we saw a well.
Her body rotted to our roots
Serving as a compost for our wrongs
It will decompose alongside its soil.

Her fruits die,
Roots break,
Wrongs engrave hearts.
One day,
When each of us owns a sculpture
Depicting our wrath
We will find it to be our home,
Food as the second,
Earth as the third.

Avril Wei
10-12 year old category (poetry)

Untitled

The aroma pirouettes around the room,
Fighting for space in between the teeth
Against the middle school rumors,
There sits the stories right beneath.
My rice and chopsticks,
Leaning against the sides of my lunchbox
Fueling me in between the licks.
Rice goes with anything, is

Amicable, can be
Partnered with anyone anywhere
Working with her sister grains to fuel the analytical and philosophical,
Singing the rhythm of teamwork as the settled stomach
Growls no more and enters the paradoxical.
It is the seed to every great tree to have ever grown,
Feeding to the golden streaks of erudition
It was the start of the first touch of man to moon,
The starter of every competition.

Where Atlantic meets Pacific,
To the conquerors that once seized,
Friendship bonds-the allies in between,
The dumplings, the taco, the spaghetti, the shawarma, all together at ease.
Being passed down,
Billions of recipes,
Survivors with a crown,
Through the generations, on and on.

Bloodlines and friendships,
Working together to pass it up through tide and time
All around the world
Together to create the juiciness of lime.
Together like rice,
Working together in the city of New York
Combinations like numbers on a dice.
The best community with so

Many

Different

Stories.

Rana Musleh
16-18 year old category (essay)

As I am writing this essay, I am barely halfway through the month-long fasting period of Ramadan. For the last two weeks, I have been waking up at 6 o’clock to start my day of fasting. We eat before the sun rises, then we pray for our commitment to our fasting in addition to our daily prayers. After school, I spend hours preparing our nighttime meal which we cannot eat until after sunset. By the time I finish my food and all of my other responsibilities, I am only able to sleep five hours a night. During the day I feel uncontrollable hunger, my stomach burns and I feel weak. Despite not wanting to expend energy on commuting, schoolwork, and my other usual activities, I must continue with my regular schedule and responsibilities. Hunger is always on my mind, and it makes me lose focus.

My non-Muslim peers have some understanding of what Ramadan entails, and even though they have their religious traditions of fasting in some form, to them, the month-long fasting period where we cannot eat or drink at all from dawn to dusk seems incredibly intense, difficult, and even radical. The point of fasting during Ramadan is to feel empathy for others who are not able to provide for themselves and face hunger and starvation every day. It gives our donations and religious morals meaning because we can better understand the pain and hardships of people who are hungry every day, all year. In the context of what others are experiencing for their whole lives, fasting for Ramadan seems almost inconsequential. Not only is it only for one month, but I am also able to eat between dusk and dawn. To me, fasting for Ramadan is a small sacrifice; I only give up food and drink for part of the day, and part of the year.

When I talk to my friends about fasting, they ask about how it feels and affects me. I tell them about the perpetual headache that never goes away and the difficulty I have concentrating on my daily tasks. Our talk transitions to food. How do I break my fasting and what role does food play during Ramadan and the festival (Eid-Al-Ifter)? To me, food is more than just a basic necessity for survival. It is a means of bringing people together, fostering connections, and creating shared experiences. Whether it is a family dinner, a holiday celebration, or a community event, food plays a central role in bringing people together. When we sit down to eat with our loved ones or with members of our community, we are not just feeding our bodies, but also nourishing our souls. The shared experience of preparing and consuming a meal creates a sense of belonging and fosters a deeper connection with those around us.

Eid is a very special time because we use our food customs to bring people together. During this time we always give to those who cannot afford the necessities to celebrate Eid, and give out food to whoever is in need with any extra that we have. Being “full” is not just about what we eat, but also about the emotional and social fulfillment that comes from sharing food with others. It is about the sense of satisfaction and contentment that we feel when we are surrounded by people we care about, enjoying a meal together.

Food also plays a critical role in addressing issues of food insecurity and hunger within our communities. At my local Mosque, we provide services where people can pick up food to celebrate Eid including wheat, rice, meat, dates, and even decorations. Dates specifically are a very important part of the fasting tradition, so we want to make sure that every practicing Muslim can fully participate in Eid with the necessary food. It’s not just about having something to eat, it’s about engaging in a cultural practice of filling oneself, with food, with love, and with God.

Finalists