August 11 Aloft

For a reason I don’t quite understand

I threw old terrors to the sky, 

I read about all the sciences

I read about the fears and phobias

I read about once again

The places I do not wish to miss, and 

I decided to fly. 

For more than a decade, nearly two,

To fly meant someone dying, and in

An early memorable event, 

I melted down on

A flight that turned around to put me 

Back on terra firma. 

And then the long years,

Missing family, missing beloved friends, 

Missing, and all the while I was growing 

Into a newer woman, with some 

Fulsome years who does

Not believe that life, loving 

Should be lost to terrors, insecurities, or 

Unexpected vicissitudes, finally 

Clear-eyed about what I want to do

With my allotted time:

Welcome the uncertainties that 
Accompany the unknown, the glorious 

And vast.  

Outside the aircraft’s windows 

At 30,000 feet, the cumulus clouds

Are the architectures of gods and

Visionaries, and I begin to 

Become composed

The physical demons of unrealistic fears

Are quieter now, 

And time and again I remember what my 

Destination brother tells me:

Let what seeks you find you. 

I brought Wendell Berry’s Wheel, his 
Meditations on life and death of life

Reborning into new, in mystery,

I know mother earth survives, and 

I know that we do not, nor our progeny.

Along every way, terror, 

Threatening science,

Political despair, cruelty, 

Those things’ lives are limited, 

As are ours.

Up here, nothing from those days 

Is any different, except

My newly-birthed mandate to

Myself to live high, hard, true, brave

There is no static in the sky;

For awhile I viewed the Finger Lakes 

And Lake Ontario from on high; 

Soon I’ll be watching the Great Plains 

If I can even see them from so high aloft

Giving way to the Rockies, and I’m 

Promising myself I’m 

Going to move, and love, with what time I’ve left, purposeful, intentional, 

And stubbornly less afraid.