Row 6

[TranquillityBase]

Row 6

[Edit]

Our third plane trip together,
my daughter bends across her seat,
fascinated by fields below,
a stained-glass terrain
of browns, greens and yellows.

I’m more aware of the man in row 6
with black hair and grey streaks like thin cloud.
He’s been watching us with eyes
that seem, to me, glazed in some sad thought.
He could be dreaming of sitting here,    Is he dreaming.......?
his own daughter by his side.

I imagine he remembers
a love that saw its end in talk
of children and their absence,
of wanting and not wanting, being stuck between.
I want to tell him, Don’t regret
that you’ll never suffer dark moods
from mangled sleep, nights blent
into mornings and watercolour weeks.

As if on cue,
my daughter whips up a storm of whining
over a broken pencil.
The food trolley approaches,
and I pay for a pleasant reprieve,
closing my eyes to savour it.

When they open, he’s still there,
casting a glance as she kisses me,
plucking her spoils from a bag of Maltesers.
Be happy with who you are, I tell him,
imagining myself in his seat:
row 6, by the window,
without anyone to attend to.

Trevor,

Nice edit.  Much improvement.  No big complaints.  Couple of tiny suggestions.

TqB