Ten months

Died,

such a small word,

but oh the weight

it drags behind it.

It has been ten months and

the FAA finally released your personal effects.

Your mother needed to sift through where

zippers whispered confessions,

smudged finger prints

gave testimony you were alive.

It seemed an invasion of your privacy and

I refuse to let grief catalog

you into evidence bags or

let owners translate your skyfall

to fit their narrative and

protect their investment.

I will not visit the site

where your parachute failed you.

I refuse to stand and count

your absence like broken ribs.

Jasmine, I will always remember you

flying in the sky…alive and smiling.

Sunlight caught in your teeth,

your laughter stitched in blue,

gravity an unspoken rumor.

I refuse to accept the airport’s version.

The living protecting their investment and

blaming the dead who cannot speak.

I will keep you rising up

where the sky remembers your name

and rich owners have not begun

their cover up and

blamed you for dying too young.

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