Red-eye flight

A small delight on a red-eye flight from Tokyo to Vancouver - whoever knows that a paper cup of ice cream can teach you life lessons?


There are many reasons that people can't sleep on a flight:

One, the mere reason that we are floating in the middle of nowhere
inside a gigantic metallic vestibule thrusting everywhere
clinging onto nothing.

Two, the overloading of the senses:
the whizzes and hums from the engines
the flickering on and off of the halo reading light from that insomniac passenger
the intermittent cracking of the pilot's voice over the intercom
the air prickling under your skin
the arid bitter clump in your throat
the potpourri of stale bread, clothes, and perfume
all churning into a thick blanket suffocating you to the very core.

Three, you toss and turn in your juice-stained hoodie, hoping to have a nanosecond of rest
but all was in vain
and you think how draining it is 
to be packed more than in a sardine can, up ten thousand feet 
while down the gentle ground,
people are succumbing to their velvety bed sheets on a rainy night,
sipping steaming lattes while watching the morning sun glowing,
or lulling by the iridescent poolside on a scorching noon.

But don't you get to do all of that at once, right now
watching the sun rise and set 
on the vast stretch of the peach-tinted atmosphere 
over the pristine canvas of cumulous clouds,
under which hope, joy, and sadness flow.
You glide through all of them, leaving behind not a trace of an afterthought
high in the skies, living just a fragment of the past.
Just as the wheels hit the runway
you wake up, elevated and returned.




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