her home was outside the village<\/p>\n
near the stables<\/p>\n
quiet, restful, separate<\/p>\n
she spent her time reading, or writing, or tending to her flowers<\/p>\n
she had a cat that liked to nap<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
she was the death tender<\/p>\n
summoned when necessary<\/p>\n
needed<\/p>\n
tucked away otherwise<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
she arrived smelling of star anise<\/p>\n
that left a taste on your tongue even after she left<\/p>\n
from breathing in, and breathing out<\/p>\n
the anointed scent of journey<\/p>\n
beyond<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
her breathing whispered Pachelbel’s canon<\/p>\n
the one in D<\/p>\n
the parade dirge<\/p>\n
keeping everything moving along as it should, as it would<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
the death tender\u00a0shook out\u00a0the thin veil<\/p>\n
that wrapped itself around the room<\/p>\n
so instead of haunting it was inviting<\/p>\n
silvery wisps of blessed light peaking through<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
she prayed in ancient prose to ancient ones who had long ago<\/p>\n
slipped into the light<\/p>\n
an ancient light growing brighter<\/p>\n
never extinguishing<\/p>\n
bringing ancient and present together in one star,<\/p>\n
the return home<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
after death<\/p>\n
the death tender\u00a0returned<\/p>\n
to her own home<\/p>\n
outside the village<\/p>\n
near the stables<\/p>\n
for now<\/p>\n
knowing one day the ancient would pull her through<\/p>\n
to return to being<\/p>\n
stardust scented anise<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
her home was outside the village near the stables quiet, restful, separate she spent her time reading, or writing, or tending to her flowers she had a cat that liked to nap she was the death tender summoned when necessary needed tucked away otherwise…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":803,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20902","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marathon-poem","category-miscellaneous"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20902","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\/803"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20902"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20902\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21106,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20902\/revisions\/21106"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20902"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20902"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20902"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}