America, Give Me a New Fighter Jet by Nora Sullivan

"The trees like knives, the parachute, the silk."

NORA SULLIVAN
America, Give Me a New Fighter Jet 

The US military is searching for a missing F-35 in South Carolina after the pilot ejected yesterday and the jet kept flying. If you have seen an F-35 in the woods, please contact the US Marines [at 843-963-3600].
                 --@flightradar24

America, give me a new fighter jet.
Give me every green head in the air. 
I’ll be the swarm. Give me time
in the afterlife to reinvent chaos. 
Give me an afterlife, a swan theory,
a dried duck. Let me bite at the water for scent.
Give me a woman in the back kitchen
pulling silver skin from a rack of ribs
with her hands. Give me the ribs 
cooked and cut. I’ll shake them 
like bells. Give me a child’s thrill
as she rides her bike up and down
suburbia’s beveled curb. Show me 
how far can she get on foot 
after riding over a thick shard of glass 
and popping a tire. 
She stands in front of the tv later,
blood drying scab-tight over her knees
and the cut opens again as she sits.
America, give me an exit hatch,
top gun dreaming, the sky overhead,
the trees like knives, the parachute,
the silk, the how-wait-no-
not-now, the broken radio, the cabin pressure,
the eject button blinking wildly,
the seat springing up
like a cartoon, the pilot hanging in open air
until he realizes the metal plane under him is gone.

First published in The Southeast Review, Volume 31.1.