America, Give Me a New Fighter Jet
The US military is searching for a missing F-35B in South Carolina
after the pilot ejected yesterday and the jet kept flying. If you have seen an
F-35 in the woods, please contact the US Marines [at 843-963-3600].
—@flightradar24
America, give me a new fighter jet.
Give me every green head in the air.
I’ll be the swarm. Give me time
in the afterlife to reinvent chaos.
Give me an afterlife, a swan theory,
a dried duck. Let me bite at the water for scent.
Give me a woman in the back kitchen
pulling silver skin from a rack of ribs
with her hands. Give me the ribs
cooked and cut. I’ll shake them
like bells. Give me a child’s thrill
as she rides her bike up and down
suburbia’s beveled curb. Show me
how far can she get on foot
after riding over a thick shard of glass
and popping a tire.
She stands in front of the tv later,
blood drying scab-tight over her knees
and the cut opens again as she sits.
America, give me an exit hatch,
top gun dreaming, the sky overhead,
the trees like knives, the parachute,
the silk, the how-wait-no-
not-now, the broken radio, the cabin pressure,
the eject button blinking wildly,
the seat springing up
like a cartoon, the pilot hanging in open air
until he realizes the metal plane under him is gone.
NORA SULLIVAN is a poet from Massachusetts. Her work has been supported by Fulbright and the Vermont Studio Center. She is an MFA candidate at the University of Michigan, Helen Zell Writers' Program.