Long Afternoon Track

They lifted into morning
without ceremony—
a routine climb
into the open grammar of sky.

Autopilot held the line
like a steady hand,
while something unseen
quietly stole the room—
no alarm loud enough,
no voice returning.

Below, the continent unrolled—
cities, rivers,
fields turning under sun—
while above,
the cabin kept its silence.

Fighters rose to meet them,
drawing near enough
to witness the stillness:
no movement in the glass,
no answer in the wave of wings—
only the terrible calm
of a path unbroken.

Hours passed in daylight,
a journey continuing
without the living—
a ghost of intention
crossing state lines,
holding altitude
as if nothing had changed.

Until the sky released them.

Over South Dakota,
the line ended—
not with warning,
but with gravity’s claim,
and the sudden return
to earth and consequence.

What remains
is not only loss,
but that long, impossible stretch
of afternoon sky—
where motion endured
after meaning had gone.