Writing in the stratosphere

I’ve been desperate to archive my accumulation of fading meditations before I can no longer make them out. But restoration demands a sanctuary of solitude that’s been illusory for months.

Without waking a soul, I escape with five tools — journal, pen, blanket, soundtrack and coffee — and settle into the inviting nothingness outside. Smug in this suburban universe, I queue the playlist and analyze my secret domain.

A ballet of steam swirls up, up, up…
dispersing into sweeping cirrus clouds,
stretched across the same altitude as
my wispy transparent thoughts.

Millions of green feathers rustle and flap,
plucking golden plumes that flutter to the dusty earth.
“TINK! Tink, ttttk… ttp”
One by one they twirl into a mosaic.

A capricious chirp breaks the rhythm. The sparrow’s flirtation guilts me back to my fruitless pursuit. For a moment.

Dawn glows into daybreak, and the
ambient shadows of the trellis overhead
sharpen into a geometric array
just beyond my swaddled feet.

I whiff diesel exhaust as the first bus of the morning rumbles away with a commuter.

Work.

Serenade is replaced with clattering, and I’m kicked out of the sanctuary with yet another blank page.