{"id":42924,"date":"2017-08-06T08:13:36","date_gmt":"2017-08-06T12:13:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/?p=42924"},"modified":"2017-08-06T08:13:36","modified_gmt":"2017-08-06T12:13:36","slug":"the-apple-tree","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/2017\/08\/the-apple-tree\/","title":{"rendered":"The apple tree"},"content":{"rendered":"

the bench beneath the apple tree<\/span><\/p>\n

has collapsed like my<\/span><\/p>\n

grandmother\u2019s lungs <\/span><\/p>\n

but the tree still gives fruit and she<\/span><\/p>\n

still makes dinner folds<\/span><\/p>\n

clothes <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

see when a tree dies it does <\/span><\/p>\n

so slowly piece by piece until<\/span><\/p>\n

the dead weight is too much it<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

starts <\/span><\/p>\n

from the inside <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

my grandmother doesn\u2019t smoke<\/span><\/p>\n

three packs a day<\/span><\/p>\n

anymore but her breath<\/span><\/p>\n

sounds like the rustle of<\/span><\/p>\n

dead leaves her cough<\/span><\/p>\n

like branches snapping <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

a limb from the apple tree<\/span><\/p>\n

has collapsed like my <\/span><\/p>\n

grandfather\u2019s legs <\/span><\/p>\n

but the tree still gives fruit the<\/span><\/p>\n

light in his barn is always on <\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

he is auctioning off the last<\/span><\/p>\n

of the cars he built buying<\/span><\/p>\n

a handicap van he<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

sits down next to me on<\/span><\/p>\n

the new bench <\/span><\/p>\n

and as my grandmother <\/span><\/p>\n

makes her way toward us<\/span><\/p>\n

and the the limbs hang heavy <\/span><\/p>\n

above us he smiles and says<\/span><\/p>\n

I did good, kid. \u00a0I did good. \u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

the bench beneath the apple tree has collapsed like my grandmother\u2019s lungs but the tree still gives fruit and she still makes dinner folds clothes   see when a tree dies it does so slowly piece by piece until the dead weight is too much…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1091,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,2114],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42924","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marathon-poem","category-official-marathon-announcement"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42924","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\/1091"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42924"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42924\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42934,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42924\/revisions\/42934"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42924"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42924"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42924"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}