A Promise & a Friend<\/b><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
When death owes you a kindness,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n he will do it without blinking.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n He will look into your eyes and\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n thank you with genuine earnest<\/span><\/p>\n for the pleasure.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Death asks only\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n that you pay it forward<\/span><\/p>\n and hopes you wear your incisors\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n a little more proudly.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n That is how death befriended me.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Not by asking me to smile,\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n but by making sure I had a reason to.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Death told me jokes about the universe<\/span><\/p>\n and made me a playlist of all the songs<\/span><\/p>\n I had never heard before.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Death bid me farewell with a kiss<\/span><\/p>\n so softly on my cheek that my eyes swelled<\/span><\/p>\n and Death did not ask me not to cry,<\/span><\/p>\n simply wiped my cheek with soft black cloth<\/span><\/p>\n swathed over bony fingers.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n I lend every book I read to death<\/span><\/p>\n and he always gives them back.<\/span><\/p>\n Says to try again.<\/span><\/p>\n Read a little slower.<\/span><\/p>\n Drink in the words with a more luxurious tongue.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n These memories<\/span><\/p>\n he says<\/span><\/p>\n are not only yours but the author\u2019s.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n That ones even in my care.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Take care of their words for them,<\/span><\/p>\n for no one else will.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A Promise & a Friend When death owes you a kindness,\u00a0 he will do it without blinking.\u00a0 He will look into your eyes and\u00a0 thank you with genuine earnest for the pleasure.\u00a0 Death asks only\u00a0 that you pay it forward and hopes you wear…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3778,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,441],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-98510","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\/98510","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\/3778"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=98510"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98510\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":98515,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98510\/revisions\/98515"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thepoetrymarathon.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}