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.