There are a few things<\/p>\n
They never tell you in the guidebooks<\/p>\n
Things they don’t want you to know<\/p>\n
About this paradise we call home<\/p>\n
They don’t tell you about the three inch flying cockroaches<\/p>\n
That fly by night and hit your window glass<\/p>\n
with a large thunk<\/p>\n
Or the clicking sound the geicos make at night<\/p>\n
When you try to sleep<\/p>\n
They don’t tell you they poop everywhere<\/p>\n
That they glide up your wall<\/p>\n
And they own you house and home<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
They don’t warn you about the cane spiders<\/p>\n
Six inches across<\/p>\n
That glare at you and then run<\/p>\n
Way too fast to be caught or killed<\/p>\n
They\u00a0haunt your dreams and steals your calm<\/p>\n
The first time you find one in your bedroom<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
They don’t warn you about red dirt<\/p>\n
Blown through open windows<\/p>\n
How it gets on everything<\/p>\n
You dust and it comes right back<\/p>\n
Like it never left and how after a few weeks<\/p>\n
You let it win.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
They don’t tell you about the trades<\/p>\n
That blow sand on you on a beach afternoon<\/p>\n
Blinding you, beating at your skin<\/p>\n
Or the blistering sand that burns your toes<\/p>\n
If you dare to take off your slippers<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
They don’t warn you that so much perfection<\/p>\n
So much beauty<\/p>\n
So much perfect weather can eat at you<\/p>\n
Make you pray for rain<\/p>\n
Or Snow<\/p>\n
Or a colored leaf to drift from the tree to land at your feet.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
They don’t tell you that one day<\/p>\n
That fantastic rainbow<\/p>\n
Swept across a sunlit cloud<\/p>\n
Would become almost\u00a0ho hum<\/p>\n
That after the thousandth perfect sunset<\/p>\n
You don’t seek them out anymore<\/p>\n
They don’t tell you about the rats or the mice<\/p>\n
Or the small cockroaches that fall out of trees<\/p>\n
They don’t talk about any of that in the guidebooks<\/p>\n
They don’t want you to know the truth<\/p>\n
They want you to come<\/p>\n
To spend your money<\/p>\n
To wander the beach<\/p>\n
And savor the rainbowed sunset<\/p>\n
To feel the trades caress your face<\/p>\n
To feel the warm sun kiss your skin<\/p>\n
If they tell\u00a0you about $10.00 milk<\/p>\n
about $4.00 gas<\/p>\n
About rent so high it hurts to pay<\/p>\n
You may not come<\/p>\n
They sell you the hula<\/p>\n
But it’s just a dance<\/p>\n
The luau\u00a0is just a meal<\/p>\n
Ah Maui, you are seductive<\/p>\n
As tempting as any heaven<\/p>\n
As hot as any hell<\/p>\n
I would hate you if I didn’t love you so.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
There are a few things They never tell you in the guidebooks Things they don’t want you to know About this paradise we call home They don’t tell you about the three inch flying cockroaches That fly by night and hit your window glass with…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":31,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marathon-poem","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11707","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\/31"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11707"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11707\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11823,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11707\/revisions\/11823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}