by Lori Desrosiers
(June 11) - In an unfortunate twist a fate, a woman who missed the Air France flight that crashed into the Atlantic last week has been killed in a car accident. Johanna Ganthaler was vacationing in Brazil with her husband, Kurt, last month and was scheduled to fly into Paris May 31 on Air France Flight 447. The Italian couple missed boarding the flight after arriving late to the Rio de Janeiro airport, according to the Times Online.
So, when your time is up, it’s up:
the male or female deity takes
his or her scepter and that’s that,
you will die even if you miss
the first chance to die, even
if it’s not your fault and both
times may involve a serious amount
of accident insurance money,
your symphony is over, your
song is now sung, finis, kaput.
Or is it just a strange coincidence,
these folks who bumbled through
their lives, missing flights,
forgetting where they put their keys,
dropping pens, spending too much
time with friends, maybe lingering
too long in a conversation,
enjoying the music a bit too much,
like my dad used to when he drove,
conducting Beethoven in thin air,
while my mother yelled at him
to keep his hands on the wheel?
Lori Desrosiers' chapbook Three Vanities is being published by Pudding House Press. Her poems have appeared in Common Ground Review, Big City Lit, The Equinox, Ballard Street Poetry Journal, November 3rd Club, Blue Fifth Review, Gold Wake Press' mini-chapbook series and others. She is the managing editor/publisher of Naugatuck River Review, a journal of narrative poetry. She lives in Westfield, Massachusetts.
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