Like Old Faithful, which I have never visited,
\nI get notifications of new sites to explore via Atlas Obscura, a wondrous travel page
\nfor eccentric treasures and places over the world,
\neach one tantalizingly more far away and remote,
\nsuggesting a reality outside the realm of quarantine and paper towel counts.<\/p>\n
Currently awaiting my rueful inattention in my clogged in-box:
\nVisiting the Brooklyn Trail Mining Ruins of Fayetteville, WV;
\nA Vietnam Culinary trip;
\nthe Hobbit Houses of Culver City, CA;
\na Gargoyle and Grotesque tour in Newcastle, England;
\nand a cemetery tour of Doodletown, NY, a town with no living residents but three cemeteries.<\/p>\n
Flush in time as I am at the moment, and willing and able to go to anyplace in the world,
\nI find it ironic we’re suddenly grounded for the sins of the overgrown child
\nwho resides in the Oval Office.
\nCould the ineptitude have been part of a larger plan? Is that even possible?
\nFirst, prohibit visa applications, then bungle our response to a pandemic to the extent that
\nno European countries will accept us, and probably Asia and Africa don’t want to smile at us
\nif we were to walk through their airports, either.<\/p>\n
Where’s left? What’s remains to compare to the hidden nooks and crannies shown me
\nby Atlas Obscura?
\nMy own state? In my mental state, do I want to cross into other counties, and be perforce
\nto how they do or do not respond to a changed world?<\/p>\n
I wish it were possible to go so far in that we were on the outside again.
\nIf we woke up and pretended we were in a different place – a prison –
\nwould we be more willing to comply with the simplest of precautions?<\/p>\n
Maybe I should just pick up any number of the books waiting for me to turn off the news. The unfairness of faith being the cause of its own demise is a tough lesson to share, Like Old Faithful, which I have never visited, I get notifications of new sites to explore via Atlas Obscura, a wondrous travel page for eccentric treasures and places over the world, each one tantalizingly more far away and remote, suggesting a reality outside the realm…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,441],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marathon-poem","category-poetry-prompt-responses"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70121","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\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70121"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70121\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70681,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70121\/revisions\/70681"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nThere’s a lot of travel in Jude, the Obscure<\/em>, the hapless family leaving behind addresses
\nas soon as their matrimonial secret is revealed, all leading to the tragic death of Father Time. <\/p>\n
\nbut maybe the unsilent minority needs to listen to what they’re actually being told.
\nThere’s not just a whiff of sulfur at the rallies they attend…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"