Disastronautics

Tightroping your own flatline,
you plot the course
for a space shuttle’s falling orbit,
where Christians thank God
for blasphemy in surround-sound
around the airlock, tie bladders
like plastic bags over their heads,
though more like floating
without helmets through payload doors,
wrist-watches wearing each moment’s
ear-tick, snipping speaker wire,
clutching metal detectors—even
if they find a bomb disarmed,
they’d never hear it go off.

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