{"id":357,"date":"2026-08-23T12:58:51","date_gmt":"2026-08-23T12:58:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/?p=357"},"modified":"2026-08-23T12:58:51","modified_gmt":"2026-08-23T12:58:51","slug":"the-illusionist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/the-illusionist\/","title":{"rendered":"The Illusionist"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"drop_cap\"><span class=\"lead_in\">We toss around our emotions like an illusionist springs his cards.<\/span><br \/>\nBack and forth,<br \/>\nhand to hand,<br \/>\nseemingly without a care.<br \/>\nWhen, in reality, the illusionist knows the exact placement of every single card.<br \/>\nWe have love in our hearts, but if we let it out, it might hurt.<br \/>\nBest to keep it right where it&#39;s at.<br \/>\nAnd the cards spring to the next hand.<br \/>\nAnxiety, depression, any divergence from the norm.<br \/>\nBest not to let them see. They might think we&#39;re crazy, expose us.<br \/>\nWhat would people think?<br \/>\nAnd the cards spring again.<br \/>\nIf we&#39;re too happy, we&#39;re manic,<br \/>\ntoo sad, we&#39;re depressed.<br \/>\nEnjoy reading a good book?<br \/>\nWhat&#39;s wrong with you?<br \/>\nYou&#39;re boring!<br \/>\nYou have no life!<br \/>\nGo out a lot?<br \/>\nGood God, son, you&#39;re a lush!<br \/>\nA whore!<br \/>\nA&#8230; Republican?<br \/>\nAnd the cards spring again.<br \/>\nWe tuck our emotions, our issues, and our pleasures away, putting them all back into the deck.<br \/>\nNothing up my sleeve.<br \/>\nIt&#39;s another misdirection,<br \/>\nnothing to see here at all.<\/p>\n<div class=\"pld-like-dislike-wrap pld-template-1\">\r\n    <div class=\"pld-like-wrap  pld-common-wrap\">\r\n    <a href=\"javascript:void(0)\" class=\"pld-like-trigger pld-like-dislike-trigger  \" title=\"\" data-post-id=\"357\" data-trigger-type=\"like\" data-restriction=\"ip\" data-already-liked=\"0\">\r\n                        <i class=\"fas fa-thumbs-up\"><\/i>\r\n                <\/a>\r\n    <span class=\"pld-like-count-wrap pld-count-wrap\">1    <\/span>\r\n<\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We toss around our emotions like an illusionist springs his cards. Back and forth, hand to hand, seemingly without a care. When, in reality, the illusionist knows the exact placement of every single card. We have love in our hearts, but if we let it out, it might hurt. Best to keep it right where [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_ppma_block_editor_authors":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[38],"class_list":["post-357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry"],"authors":[{"term_id":38,"user_id":0,"is_guest":1,"slug":"ginny-drake","display_name":"Ginny Drake","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&r=g","author_category":"1","first_name":"","last_name":"","user_url":"","job_title":"","description":"https:\/\/ginnydrakewrites.com\/"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=357"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":358,"href":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357\/revisions\/358"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=357"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.interrobanglit.com\/laidtorest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}