Speck
Bright insect
inching across the firmament.
First the shock front.
Then the blast wind.
Bodies fall like rags
into an airless sea.
Pixilation
Tiny squares unite to divide.
We see an ashen heap,
but the seal is not complete.
Here, a pair of legs alone. There
a shoulder with its arm,
and then the hand, fingers spread.
Apron
A flap of the plane’s skin
hangs in the forest’s canopy
like titanic picnic litter.
Another sheet, insignia unfurled,
stands ready to sail
across a sea of rippling wheat.
Seats bask in the fields
in clusters of two or three.
Some on their sides,
others facing back up to the sky.
Each chunk of wreckage
with its apron of personal effects.
A suitcase, open-mouthed, allows
a deep pink cardigan to escape.
Turbine
Your blades once sat
snug as gills inside their toadstool cap.
Now skewed and compressed
the blades look like the cutaway
of a chambered nautilus
nestled far from its element.
A shell bound by its ratio,
its beauty chained yet infinite.
Poem
MH17
Amy Crutchfield