There is an awful, delightful old tradition that women have “permission” to ask men for their hand in marriage on Leap Day, with the added impetus that if he refuses, he must give her the gift of a silk dress and a kiss to soften the blow. So, with the best of intentions, I asked one of my dearest friends to marry me today. (He is pretty great.) This is the glorious, achingly beautiful poem I received in reply, proving, I believe, that it was a win-win situation either way:<\/p>\n
Handy Guide<\/b>
\n By Dean Young<\/i><\/p>\n
Avoid adjectives of scale.
\nDandelion broth instead of duck soup.
\nDon\u2019t even think you\u2019ve seen a meadow, ever.
\nThe minor adjustments in our equations
\nstill indicate the universe is insane,
\nwhen it laughs a silk dress comes out its mouth
\nbut we never put it on. Put it on.
\nCry often and while asleep.
\nIf it\u2019s raw, forge it in fire.
\nThat\u2019s not a mountain, that\u2019s crumble.
\nIf it\u2019s fire, swallow.
\nThe heart of a scarecrow isn\u2019t geometrical.
\nThat\u2019s not a diamond, it\u2019s salt.
\nThat\u2019s not the sky but it\u2019s not your fault.
\nMy dragon may be your neurotoxin.
\nYour electrocardiogram may be my fortune cookie.
\nOnce an angel has made an annunciation,
\nit\u2019s impossible to tell him he has the wrong address.
\nMoonlight has its own befuddlements.
\nThe rest of us can wear the wolf mask if we want
\nor look like reflections wandered off.
\nEventually armor, eventually sunk.
\nYou wanted love and expected what?
\nA parachute? Morphine? A gold sticker star?
\nThe moment you were born\u2014
\nyou have to trust others because you weren\u2019t there.
\nDitto death.
\nThe strongest gift I was ever given
\nwas made of twigs.
\nIt didn\u2019t matter which way it broke.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
There is an awful, delightful old tradition that women have “permission” to ask men for their hand in marriage on Leap Day, with the added impetus that if he refuses, he must give her the gift of a silk dress and a kiss to soften the blow. So, with the best of intentions, I asked … Continue reading “I’m a size ten”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1722,128,1580],"class_list":["post-3780","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-poem","tag-poetry","tag-verses"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/foxtongue.com\/dreampepper\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3780","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/foxtongue.com\/dreampepper\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/foxtongue.com\/dreampepper\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foxtongue.com\/dreampepper\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foxtongue.com\/dreampepper\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3780"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/foxtongue.com\/dreampepper\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3780\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/foxtongue.com\/dreampepper\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3780"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foxtongue.com\/dreampepper\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3780"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/foxtongue.com\/dreampepper\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3780"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}