The empty runway underneath;
above, the waiting sky.
This is the transfiguration.
The music dies, the conversation drops
as thunder presses on our backs.
Behind flawed glass the landscape
slips and slides.
Wrapped, coccooned in speed – still
the sky has not received us.
Between heaven and earth
we’re hurled across the concrete.
It happens.
Ahead of the shrieking jets
at the still point
the turning.
The nose lifts to heaven.
The plane leans back on duckling wings.
The sky receives it.
Behind and below us
the queue shifts beneath a veiled sun.
The runway clears, exposed to pale light
and for the next supplicant
the sky crouches again.