Heather Lang, a poet, editor and literary critic, serves as an adjunct professor at Nevada State College. More of her writing can be found here. Click here to hear an interview and reading from KNPR's "State of Nevada."
This airplane: like hollow bone,
laced with unwanted water,
& still. The body changes angles,
& its underbelly touches yet will
never reach for the sky. But fins
& wings, aren’t they the same
thing, really? In college,
I met a girl who I loved,
but she said that she already
had her friends & I wonder
if we had been together on this flight,
from New York to Las Vegas,
would that have been enough
time for me to change her
mind? This plane with windows,
holes spread as if for careful
fingers or, perhaps, too many eyes
that can only look away. The body
of this airplane, a white seed-
shaped vessel, one that cannot
take root, no matter how we climb.
I wait with white knuckles wondering
if water or air can clump like the dirt
on my shoes, & I think about how
today I love a man named David, but
I still think about that girl.
