Amelia Redux 1937-2012:
A Pilot's Log
  
Koepang, Dutch Timor

Lombok Strait's a toll booth,
Errant Pacific swells
Fast-track through rocky pinch,
Join Indian Sea
We cut across Savu's coral moat:
Brittle stars and feather stars
Out-clock channel swimmer,
Or did they fall
From Orion's spangled bands,
--Daystarnes, double-dippin'?--
My twin-fin buzzes Dutch Timor,
Once fabled sandlewood stand
Koepang's olivine bay shifts
Beneath airport precipice
We descend to barren plateau
Northwest winds
Flatten spear grasses
Into rhythmic plaited moor
Red pigs rummage
Behind landing's rock-walls
--Await boarding calls--
Barefoot boys pull wood carts
Stocked with water jugs
They offer sweet sips
Marito hawks fresh fish,
Arrayed on oil-drum shelves,
Electric-blue ikat drapes
His waist; indigo-yardage
--Coiled into cap--
Summits his head 
I wrap Lockheed's engines
With weatherproof Grenfell cloth
Villagers pivot plane into wind,
Strap fuselage down for night
Strolling musicians pluck sesandos
Of frond and bamboo,
Brass strings yield cithern-strains,
Melody-of-spheres
Evaporates to moon 

I know much of leave-taking,
Departures are small deaths

Spirit accelerates,
Overrides earthly timetables

Bones and finger bones--body detritus--
Marrowy channels for vapory soul

Pt. Darwin, Australia

Long wavelengths of light
Stain horizon
Electra propels through
Rouge tincture,
Australia bound
Timor Sea's an asteroid's
End zone:
Buoys algae meadows
Of cuttlefish, purple sponge
An sea pen
Magnetic striae
--Polarity betwixt--
Follow dinosaur tracks across
Continental shelf
I unfurl my antenna
Above oyster luggers
Anchored off Darwin,
Hear diesel-compressors
Pump-air through hoses
To workers foraging seafloor
--Bronze helmets, canvas suits,
Lead-boots, chest weights--
Replaced naked-dive
Aborigine pearlers:
Female swimmers
Breath-held for minutes,
Owned fathom-depths,
Collected Mother-of-Pearl,
And precious shell-berries,
From south-winter coast

Pt. Darwin Australia

Star-mangal canopy,
--Mistletoe wove--
Thresholds top-end bay,
Mangroves nourish honey-sippers,
Host flying-fox hang-overs,
Apres sweet-satiate
Parap Airdrome's an oxide swath
Amid ambrosial rickrack
Electra orbits field,
Touches down more nimbly
Than a bat,
Parks beside Quatas hangar,
Next to scarlet Comet Racer
And Gypsy Moth Biplane
A black dog--dingo derived--
Sniffs NR16020's tail,
Then pan-cakes in shade
Under fuselage. Ignores
Ford flat-bed delivering
Chrome-yellow barrels
Of gas and oil
My tarnished Sylph's
A petrol-thermos:
Her starboard wing tanks
Carry 100 octane fuel,
--Elixir--
For dicey take-offs
And sorties-covert
87 ethyl sequesters
In port-side wing;
Brims ten tanks
Behind bulkhead
My fingers tap raised rivets
Along barge's anodized flanks,
Thump dark crescents of tires,
Slap flaps, ailerons, trim-tabs,
Probe shock absorber struts
Lores Bonney, Gypsy Moth pilot,
First woman to solo 
Brisbane/London groove,
Rushes to welcome me,
She wears white coveralls,
Her head coroneted 
With flying cap and goggles 
Lores places a gold and pearl ring
In my hand,
Tells me, "An orb on its rounds
Is never lost",
Then sprints to her deep blue plane

Laura Stickney

photo from mcmahanphoto