Anne walks on the warm pavement,
\nwishing for cooler weather,
\nglad to be out of the weeds by the tracks
\nwhere she hangs out in an old shed by day.<\/p>\n
She steps up on the sidewalk,
\nchecks to see if the bank’s front entry
\nis empty. Yes. She sighs, relieved.
\nThis is her space, in front of wide oak doors,<\/p>\n
if she gets here first.
\nShe likes this part of town,
\nclean, patrolled, as safe
\nas she can expect. Sometimes<\/p>\n
a boy she went to school with
\nfifteen years ago is the night guard.
\nHe’s not ashamed to say hello
\nand offer her a sandwich and a bottle of water.<\/p>\n
There’s a 24-hour station nearby
\nif she needs to use the restroom
\nor escape unwanted advances. She slides
\nthe strap from her shoulder,<\/p>\n
opens the satchel, and spreads a towel
\non the fairly clean concrete.
\nShe takes out a hardback copy
\nof The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy<\/p>\n
and settles in for the evening.
\nShe doesn’t sleep. She doesn’t dare,
\nbut the book keeps her company,
\nand she always knows where her towel is.<\/p>\n
Her knife, too. If she needs it. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Anne walks on the warm pavement, wishing for cooler weather, glad to be out of the weeds by the tracks where she hangs out in an old shed by day. She steps up on the sidewalk, checks to see if the bank’s front entry is…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":665,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,1136],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-110201","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-half-marathon-poem","category-official-marathon-prompts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110201","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/665"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110201"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110201\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":110785,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110201\/revisions\/110785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110201"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110201"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110201"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}