{"id":3568,"date":"2013-12-19T16:18:26","date_gmt":"2013-12-19T14:18:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/?p=3568"},"modified":"2013-12-19T16:18:26","modified_gmt":"2013-12-19T14:18:26","slug":"i-ask-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/?p=3568","title":{"rendered":"I Ask You"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a title=\"06paikcandle\" href=\"http:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/06paikcandle.jpg\" rel=\"prettyPhoto-img\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-3569 alignleft\" alt=\"06paikcandle\" src=\"http:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/06paikcandle.jpg\" width=\"250\" height=\"197\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong><blockquote class=\"sc-blockquote\">I Ask You<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>What scene would I want to be enveloped in<br \/>more than this one,<br \/>an ordinary night at the kitchen table,<br \/>floral wallpaper pressing in,<br \/>white cabinets full of glass,<br \/>the telephone silent,<br \/>a pen tilted back in my hand?<\/p>\n<p>It gives me time to think<br \/>about all that is going on outside&#8211;<br \/>leaves gathering in corners,<br \/>lichen greening the high grey rocks,<br \/>while over the dunes the world sails on,<br \/>huge, ocean-going, history bubbling in its wake.<\/p>\n<p>But beyond this table<br \/>there is nothing that I need,<br \/>not even a job that would allow me to row to work,<br \/>or a coffee-colored Aston Martin DB4<br \/>with cracked green leather seats.<\/p>\n<p>No, it&#8217;s all here,<br \/>the clear ovals of a glass of water,<br \/>a small crate of oranges, a book on Stalin,<br \/>not to mention the odd snarling fish<br \/>in a frame on the wall,<br \/>and the way these three candles&#8211;<br \/>each a different height&#8211;<br \/>are singing in perfect harmony.<\/p>\n<p>So forgive me<br \/>if I lower my head now and listen<br \/>to the short bass candle as he takes a solo<br \/>while my heart<br \/>thrums under my shirt&#8211;<br \/>frog at the edge of a pond&#8211;<br \/>and my thoughts fly off to a province<br \/>made of one enormous sky<br \/>and about a million empty branches.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\">\n<p><em>Billy Collins<\/blockquote><\/em><\/p>\n<pre><span style=\"font-size: medium;\">\u00a0<\/span><\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3568","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-contemporary-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3568","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3568"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3568\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3571,"href":"https:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3568\/revisions\/3571"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3568"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3568"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.magdalenabiela.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3568"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}