{"id":66393,"date":"2020-06-27T14:32:45","date_gmt":"2020-06-27T18:32:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/?p=66393"},"modified":"2020-06-28T07:58:47","modified_gmt":"2020-06-28T11:58:47","slug":"to-be-present-in-the-morning-hour-6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/2020\/06\/to-be-present-in-the-morning-hour-6\/","title":{"rendered":"To Be Present in the Morning (Hour 6)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The silent, dark, untouched stillness of the country house.<br \/>\nChildren sleeping safely in wooden framed bunk beds,<br \/>\ntheir bedroom door closed softly against the sound of percolating coffee.<\/p>\n<p>Cool, summer mornings before dawn.<br \/>\nWet earth and cut grass,<br \/>\na warm ceramic mug in hand bringing<br \/>\nrich, hot syrup to lips, to mouth, swallow.<br \/>\nCalibrating caffeination<br \/>\nlike a sunrise of the mind.<\/p>\n<p>Clench of shoelaces pulled tight, securing the foot,<br \/>\nmaximizing strength and performance<br \/>\nin the snug and pillowed embrace of running shoes.<br \/>\nThe gentle toss of gravel underneath pacing strides,<br \/>\nrising heartbeat, and the warm circuitry of pumping blood.<br \/>\nHeavy breath, deep and alone, drawing sound amidst awakening nature.<\/p>\n<p>Cows turn their heads, chewing cud, and slightly startled,<br \/>\nThe redtail hawk gives lift, rising from the fence post<br \/>\nto glide upon growing solar winds.<br \/>\nTrickles of water, gliding over stones, falling short distances,<br \/>\nsplashing and cascading as the runner crosses the creek,<br \/>\nthe morning cold still hid in the lowest recesses of the earth<br \/>\nkisses his skin as he passes over the bridge.<\/p>\n<p>Brownsnakes slither aside,<br \/>\nspeckled Great Plains toads hop out of the way,<br \/>\nlarge grass spiders scamper from the path.<br \/>\nThe sun\u2019s first sliver breaks over the oak trees on the horizon<br \/>\nlike a swelling lip of fire painting the purple morning<br \/>\nwith a beauty that burns the eyes if you stare at it for too long.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The silent, dark, untouched stillness of the country house. Children sleeping safely in wooden framed bunk beds, their bedroom door closed softly against the sound of percolating coffee. Cool, summer mornings before dawn. Wet earth and cut grass, a warm ceramic mug in hand bringing&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":965,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-66393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marathon-poem"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66393","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\/965"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66393"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66393\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":76290,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66393\/revisions\/76290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}