Safe

I
In anonymous airplane space
we are all muted and blank

Safe, but not safe, as
time slows down

Changes, becomes artificially
ventilated

As we move across the map of this world
and navigate the stupid crowded cabin

Or stare out the window, watching God play
with the fluff of our lives

The weather outside sparking
suddenly, like a child with matches.

But we are also children inside
this regulated and controlled environment

Fearing adult things
like losing jobs, unavoidable

Death and taxes
as the ice cubes melt in my plastic glass

While tears run down my face
in heavy, messy gashes.

II
Memories visit me, like vivid
photographs floating across private
space - my pristinely new sorrow

Or a movie playing me
the time he listened so patiently
to my five-year-old grievances

Just after the horrible tantrum
as he was putting me to bed
so kind and wise and gentle

While the work waited
on his desk and just behind
his furrowed brow, the worries

The problems, of never enough
money, never enough time, to do
the other things he wanted

The dreams deferred or
completely abandoned for the
inescapable demands of children.

III
Rocking in the beautiful and turbulent
night air, high above the clouds

I remember the details of my father's
complicated love, feeling anger, awe and fear.

Never Safe again like I was when
I was there, in his warm attention

Past the hiccupping tears and nodding into a sweet
sleep where I was all that mattered to one person.

Waiting for it to be Otherwise

Waiting for it to be Otherwise
~ by Michele Hirning
Waiting for the call
that tells me he is dead.
Waiting for the fall
for the failure
the loss
I'm sure is coming.
Expecting it all.
For me, unfortunately
it is always
already, somehow
Otherwise.

Otherwise
by Jane Kenyon
I got out of bed
on two strong legs.
It might have been
otherwise. I ate
cereal, sweet
milk, ripe, flawless
peach. It might
have been otherwise.
I took the dog uphill
to the birchwood.
All morning I did
the work I love.
At noon I lay down
with my mate. It might
have been otherwise.
We ate dinner together
at a table with silver
candlesticks. It might
have been otherwise.
I slept in a bed
in a room with paintings
on the walls, and
planned another day
just like this day.
But one day, I know,
it will be otherwise.