{"id":111266,"date":"2022-06-25T14:30:22","date_gmt":"2022-06-25T18:30:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/?p=111266"},"modified":"2022-06-29T00:48:35","modified_gmt":"2022-06-29T04:48:35","slug":"desert-lover","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/2022\/06\/desert-lover\/","title":{"rendered":"Desert Lover"},"content":{"rendered":"

Desert Lover<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Walking through<\/p>\n

the alleys of old Bisbee,<\/p>\n

I thought I saw<\/p>\n

the ghost of an ex-junkie<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

who captured my attention<\/p>\n

in these same streets,<\/p>\n

twenty-three years ago.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

A face like Richard Gere\u2019s\u2014<\/p>\n

eyes wandering<\/p>\n

inward, as if bored.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Cheap boots caked<\/p>\n

with layers of dust,<\/p>\n

probably given to him<\/p>\n

by an ex-girlfriend.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Always, his shrill fixation<\/p>\n

on his one<\/p>\n

great achievement:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

a novel picked up by a<\/p>\n

major publisher, then<\/p>\n

out of print<\/p>\n

five years later,<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

with no further plans<\/p>\n

for distribution.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

His inability to stay in bed<\/p>\n

for more than an hour<\/p>\n

after sex. And, most of all,<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

his uncanny communication<\/p>\n

with extraterrestrials,<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

who somehow couldn\u2019t<\/p>\n

keep their hands<\/p>\n

off his genitals.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Who could blame them?<\/p>\n

Neither could I.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Desert Lover   Walking through the alleys of old Bisbee, I thought I saw the ghost of an ex-junkie   who captured my attention in these same streets, twenty-three years ago.   A face like Richard Gere\u2019s\u2014 eyes wandering inward, as if bored.   Cheap…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4286,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-111266","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-half-marathon-poem","category-miscellaneous"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111266","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\/4286"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111266"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111266\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":124208,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111266\/revisions\/124208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111266"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111266"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111266"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}