Under the Kármán Line
I wonder how an astronaut feels, down here.
Walking through city streets, heels hitting sidewalk, the occasional jostle of crossed paths, a mumbled apology. Fork scraping plate. Flopping into the driver’s seat, a moment listening to the key’s-in-door’s-open dinging, the rumble as the key turns. Television voices, radio voices, a thousand overheard conversations from lovemaking to argument. Every window always full.
Then, the moment right after jumping into a pool — everything suspended, and the blood remembers —
And then there’s the surface, and air.
I wonder if they look at someone over the table and think about what they look like floating.
I wonder if they want to tell them — I’ve been somewhere so different. I want to take you there. I want you to know it, too, and to also feel these sandpaper feelings at this all-around-us-world, so that I may be less alone.
I wonder if it’s at all like this.
