"We will shortly be arriving at Lockerbie."
By alexwritings
Wed, 08 May 2013
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3 comments
Streaked and grey
with speed and rain;
cut up by pylon cables
which tense and wane
through bone-seeping dampness,
neck-craning tallness,
a blandness that recycles
again and again
like poor vocabulary.
Lockerbie's signal makes us wait.
Makes our ahead-of-schedule train contemplate
the eyelash-atop-a-finger
that is humans flying. But mostly
the ghoulishness of that moment,
where they must've realised
something had gone unsolvably wrong,
in their pinned balloon
which wrinkled headlong downwards.
Time enough to find
a crucifix, time enough
to find a hand.
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Comments
Poignant, well-written
Permalink Submitted by The Walrus on
Poignant, well-written piece, Galeforce 7 - my wife lost a close friend in the Lockerbie calamity.
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I found this incredibly
I found this incredibly painful and a highly accomplished piece of work. The time perspective is unbearable because you communicate those last few seconds before death exquisitely.
The last two lines:
Time enough to find
a crucifix, time enough
to find a hand.
Those last two lines will stay with me.Nice one.
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I love this. Especially the
I love this. Especially the 'eyelash a-top a finger' comparison to flying. Brilliant.
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