Trip of a Lifetime

Before the wake of incinerated wreckage
blazed a black slick of surface –
just alit and just afire –
we were
all
aboard
in the early evening departure
reserved only for overseas flights
excitement budding in baggage barely checked
and almost left behind
– Look at all you poor bastards
we’re leaving
Aren’t you so jealous?
we were smug in our coach seats
– Maybe next year
we snorted
a stifled nod to that crazy Orthodox kid who couldn’t sell enough candy,
smelled like warm body odor in an early fall sukkah –
poor schmuck left to day camp.
The amazing luck of such good fortune glided with us,
how we ascended.
You can only imagine how good it felt to explode
midair midthought midsentence
to vaporize in midrelevance.
I look to the sky and burst into tears
– Maybe next year
the Orthodox kid is not jealous,
but relieved.