Elegy of the Airplane

Here I am and there you are.

You can’t see me and neither can that guy,

that stranger sat near to you, pressed

to your shoulder, torturously

beside [read: robber of my intimacy].

The eight year old behind you, striving

against cabin pressure, tossing

herself to regain a blip of comfort

[read: me] she can't see a flicker

of my existence.

Here I am watching you,

you, [feel: without me]

as you plummet through a glowing mountain.

- 

Here I am and there you are.

While you can see more

[read: more],

you can’t see me.

Your gaze falls farther

than my heart has stretched before

Wider than my spirit

can hug your smile

Higher even than my tears,

oh, my tears,

can clear that figure of you in the sky  [read: beyond].

Your eyes don’t fall on me,

and the misted sky is solid to you

and to me, you’re fading away

past, above, and through a jagged, stoic cliff.

-

I am here, and over there   you are.

You’re zooming past me

at unfathomable speed and I,

I am at the mercy of planetary spin

[read: unfathomable speed] [feel:

nothing].

Singularly together—

in frame, a moment, till life presses play

and you’re gone, jetting into,

rocketing through, falling past

a blue iced summit in the penumbra of my eye.