Poem: Flying Angels
By: Adreyo Sen
A good flight attendant
is the sanctity of service
guided by sadness –
she is the grey dove transforming
into a silent line
amidst our feckless ways.
Ask a flight attendant
the meaning of sadness
and she’ll answer with a nun’s smile.
She is in the employment of heartbreak.
The children capture
her nurtured naivete,
she wonders gently
at the dour businessmen
pecking at their smartphones.
She longs to be in their arms.
Airports are places of metamorphosis.
They emerge from gates
with all the delighting beauty
of a mother’s smile
and return home
to be the gentle silk worms
spinning their families close
with all the majesty
of their unseen industry.