{"id":42600,"date":"2017-08-06T07:26:58","date_gmt":"2017-08-06T11:26:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/?p=42600"},"modified":"2017-08-06T07:26:58","modified_gmt":"2017-08-06T11:26:58","slug":"the-return-of-the-sun","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/2017\/08\/the-return-of-the-sun\/","title":{"rendered":"the return of the sun"},"content":{"rendered":"

the return of the sun<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

my beach blanket smells of lake plants and sun.<\/p>\n

I never knew I had a beach blanket<\/p>\n

in these years of body shame<\/p>\n

and black and white images<\/p>\n

from a life I did not want photographed.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

now I live in colour<\/p>\n

and the whole world smells like sunshine dried clothing<\/p>\n

and tastes like orange freezies<\/p>\n

and sangria.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

or the seductive taste of sweet strawberries<\/p>\n

or watermelon;<\/p>\n

the juices of both,<\/p>\n

or either,<\/p>\n

running down my chin in dribbles,<\/p>\n

reminding me of you<\/p>\n

and your sweetness.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Now I live in colour<\/p>\n

and all I want is to feel the sun on my skin<\/p>\n

and smell the heat of the day near water,<\/p>\n

fill my head with reggae,<\/p>\n

and read a library of books<\/p>\n

from the warm sands of some local beach.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I want to live Baudelaire by sunset,<\/p>\n

whispering his words,<\/p>\n

French and all,<\/p>\n

to the swooping bats<\/p>\n

or<\/p>\n

to a beautiful, receptive lover<\/p>\n

who will then take me in his arms<\/p>\n

and mouth<\/p>\n

and love me to collapse under the Milky Way \u2013<\/p>\n

our naked, blessed bodies<\/p>\n

glistening by starlight to show us what we are truly made of.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Now that I feel alive and loved,<\/p>\n

I need to taste the sun so often it burns my tongue<\/p>\n

so that my words are fire when I speak them<\/p>\n

or your mouth ignites when I kiss you<\/p>\n

or you burst into flames when I take you in my mouth.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I have walked too oft in the shadows these past years,<\/p>\n

Now it is time to walk in the sun.<\/p>\n

R. L. Elke<\/p>\n

\u00a9Aug 5\/17 prompt 23<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

the return of the sun \u00a0 my beach blanket smells of lake plants and sun. I never knew I had a beach blanket in these years of body shame and black and white images from a life I did not want photographed.   now I…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":712,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42600","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marathon-poem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42600","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\/712"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42600"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42600\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42606,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42600\/revisions\/42606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42600"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42600"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42600"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}