I inspect my bedroom’s walls for new specks
after changing dead bulbs in the low sky
of this house I’ve lived in for three years.

Airplanes have always sounded the same,
haven’t they? I’ve slept close to airports
and railroads my entire life, hear engines

coming on like symptoms no need to pay attention
to, low hum in your throat mourning out
of the night. By now you’ve watched friends soar

into the horizon to break the illusion
of life’s infinite line, seen the cord dangling
down from the clouds and sometimes

                                                                                   you reach for it

(originally published in Umbrella Factory, Fall 2018)