Sport 2: Autumn 1989
Boeing
Boeing
We are only just safe here in the thin air
weak blue above flying at 897 kmph
Borneo 11,880 metres below or
if you prefer it we are perched
on top of the clouds flying at 558 mph
39,000 feet above the green ruckus of Borneo
knuckly white clouds clenched and rising towards us
like serene contortions of virtue
and the
empty blue
is it the real true blue world
around us the purest unearthliness
we'll ever know? and the corrugated
white greying sky
is it the stain
of what's not new gathering around us
as we descend into that other world
that's other always always other?
We're told it's Borneo forested
mountainous infested and I believe
most of what the First Officer tells us
so confidently assuringly
but
across the aisle a white woman
crosses herself when the 'Fasten Seatbelts' sign
lights up and smarts and as we begin to renew
our intimate acquaintance
with clouds something that looks like down
is combed across the wings
and breaks away