It floats in the dishwater
\nlike the eyeball of some<\/p>\n
great beast, watching me
\nthrough grease & soap suds. <\/p>\n
my grandmother is saying
\nsomething about the rain, <\/p>\n
worrying about the nearby
\nfarmers & the price of corn<\/p>\n
in the coming months,
\nbut all I can think about <\/p>\n
is the children living behind
\nchickenwire, sleeping on <\/p>\n
concrete floors. When I used
\nto stay the night, my grandmother<\/p>\n
would bring in extra pillows
\n& lay down beside me until<\/p>\n
I fell asleep, though my mother
\nwas only thirty miles away, <\/p>\n
though I had never gone
\na night without a goodnight <\/p>\n
kiss, my favorite stuffed
\nanimal. What would she say <\/p>\n
to a Syrian child crying for
\ntheir mother? Could she look<\/p>\n
that child in the eye and call them
\nvermin, say that it doesn\u2019t matter <\/p>\n
if their home is in the belly
\nof a bombshell, that they
\nwill find no safety here?
\nOr would she hold that crying <\/p>\n
child & hum until they fell
\nasleep, put them to bed <\/p>\n
in the guest room, line
\nthe mattress with pillows <\/p>\n
to protect them even as
\nthey slept? the mug turns <\/p>\n
in the grimy water & I wonder
\nhow many grandparents had mugs <\/p>\n
with swastikas that spun
\nquietly in the sink while they<\/p>\n
talked about the price of corn
\n& if it looked like rain again, <\/p>\n
never about what makes one child
\nmore human than another. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It floats in the dishwater like the eyeball of some great beast, watching me through grease & soap suds. my grandmother is saying something about the rain, worrying about the nearby farmers & the price of corn in the coming months, but all I can…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1091,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-52875","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\/52875","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=52875"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52875\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":52889,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52875\/revisions\/52889"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}