It\u2019s a foreign country. I don\u2019t speak the native tongue, recited as grease under the fingernails and steel-toe boots to work the pedals. Key\u2019s got a tricky switch. Once it starts, there\u2019s a guttural rev. More power than I have a need for, got nothing to haul in that big back bed. In the interior: weather mats on the floor, smooth from wear; they know their place, like the women in my father\u2019s life, catching the rainwater from his shoes; an old rag in the middle console, actually a tank top he must have once worn over his now-tumored torso, and two clippers in the cupholder used to cut fishing line more often than any jagged hangnail. Fishing swivels jingle in the door, close at hand because who knows when he\u2019d have a chance to cast out for the one that\u2019s yet evaded him. Fold the seat forward; find his toolbox from which to pilfer a Phillips, along with a blue tarp to serve as a make-shift shower curtain in the near-to-him house I\u2019ve just moved into. There\u2019s a straight pole. Do I still remember how he taught me \u2013 to rig a line, bait a hook, avoid the craggy shore? Now beside his things is a stain where I placed the strawberries from Foodland. I didn\u2019t wipe the blood that leaked from that delicate fruit; now the blemish has dried black, reminding me of everything that will rot and bruise when he\u2019s gone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It\u2019s a foreign country. I don\u2019t speak the native tongue, recited as grease under the fingernails and steel-toe boots to work the pedals. Key\u2019s got a tricky switch. Once it starts, there\u2019s a guttural rev. More power than I have a need for, got nothing…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4718,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-114456","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-miscellaneous"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114456","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\/4718"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114456"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114456\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":114464,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114456\/revisions\/114464"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114456"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114456"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114456"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}