Flight

Today is simple. We leave early,

hurtling to the airport, the cloudless sky

pronounced above my tiny black car,

no one on the road, nobody to see

inside the dusty windows, my mother

dabbing her eyes with tissues.

Our faces cover a whole future of missing,

long days spun in front of us in rooms

full of pictures, old furniture we both touched.

On the banks of the highway, the wheat grass

sways, leans forward, offering us its hands.

In plain terms, I cannot stand her leaving,

the curbside goodbye, her back to me

to pass through the wide glass doors, her

heavy luggage trailing. It’s all I can do

to watch her go. The roads home merge

into total humid loss. Back home, I

look for her behind me, in the doorway,

her scent cut straight into my skin.

Samantha Bell is currently a graduate student at the University of Kansas in creative writing, where she writes both essays and poetry. Her most recent publications have been in Fourth River, Under the Sun, and Paradigm.