MH370 pilot Zaharie Shah was a Religious Skeptic

The disappearance of flight MH370 has captured the attention of the entire world. Though not entirely without precedent, the circumstances surrounding it's disappearance are compelling a multitude of theories from both reputable and disreputable sources alike in a common effort to better understand the motivation behind the event.

One of the many problems with that is that extrapolating theories from such little evidence carries with it the ancillary danger of it being wildly incorrect, especially in an era saturated by the  media-manufactured paranoia surrounding terrorism. Such is the case with the reporting by news outlets throughout the world that the pilot of that flight, Captain Zaharie Shah, is or was a devout muslim.

Now on the surface, this assertion inspires at least a moderate level of plausibility based simply upon the geographic location of Captain Shah's residence. Since the majority of people living in Malaysia happen to be devout muslims, it isn't a stretch to assume that he is as well. It has also been stated that he attended weekly religious service, and some of his friends described him as a "faithful" person. It is therefore curious that there could be compelling evidence to the contrary of that superficial observation that is not being shared among the many stories being written analyzing the background of both individuals who were in the cockpit of that plane.

Allow me to explain.

I am a youtuber. Though I can more accurately be described as a "youtube atheist" who makes regular video content that provides commentary on global issues directly related to atheism, anti-theism, and secularism. My channel name on youtube is meridianfrost.

https://www.youtube.com/user/meridianfrost

You may ask what any of this has to do with flight MH370, and not without reason. The relevant portion, is that Captain Zaharie Shah was also a youtuber. He made do-it-yourself videos that were technical in nature, and regularly engaged the community when other users posted comments in response to his video productions.

On every youtube channel page, there is an option to share your youtube activity so other people can visit your channel to watch related videos, see which videos you have liked and other youtube channels you subscribe to, send private messages to you, and generally engage in discussion specifically related to their particular interests. The compelling evidence I have found is that Captain Zaharie Shah recently subscribed to my video feed, and liked one of my videos regarding the Pope and the Catholic church. It does not stop there. If you look at his channel page

http://www.youtube.com/user/catalinapby1

You will see a subscription and "like" history of the videos of very high profile personalities within the global anti-theist community. For instance, he recently subscribed to Richard Dawkins (his latest youtube activity) who is considered by many to be the most prominent atheist on the planet. He is also subscribed to Tim Minchin, Eddie Izzard, Sarah Silverman, TED, and others. It is quite clear from this evidence that Captain Shah was at the very least a skeptic regarding religion, and at most an anti-theist atheist. It does not mean that he was anti-religious, as he could have indeed still held to a core Islamic belief, but it does show that the likelihood of him being devoutly religious is slim to none.

The co-pilot of the plane however, was a devout muslim, as evidenced by the testimony given by his family, friends, and officials at the mosque he attended for prayer.

So, dear reader, I invite you to extrapolate the possible implications from that actual evidence, a scenario that is more plausible than "Pilot Suicide"

Malaysia is known for its particularly barbaric treatment of atheists. "Atheism" is in fact a criminal "offense" in Malaysia that is punishable by death. Considering that the lion's share of Zaharie Shah's youtube activity that was directly related to atheism occurred within the last month, coupled with the culturally collective hatred of atheists that is rampant in Malaysia, wouldn't it be more reasonable to assume that the co-pilot is the likely suspect in an "intervention" scenerio? Muslim extremists (and every other demographic of organized religion for that matter) are significantly more violent than atheists because religious people reason and justify their violent actions with scripture. Zaharie Shah, it appears, was not a member of that extremist demographic.

Could the co-pilot have discovered Captain Shah's atheism, resulting in an argument and physical confrontation in the cockpit? Or is it more likely that the pilot, dejected and enraged over the wrongful imprisonment of a political figure he supported, decide to become a mass-murderer in protest of the Malaysian government? You can decide which appears to be a more likely cause of the event. That is again not to say that it is likely that either of the two scenarios even took place to cause this flight to go missing. When looking at hypothetical situations, we must still use competent faculties of reason when examining the evidence.

I hope we soon discover the truth. For now however, perhaps we should at least attempt to include reliable evidence when considering the possibilities.

Update: Here is an example of a great article written by a pilot that bypasses all the possible scenerios related to some type of intervention

http://www.wired.com/autopia/2014/03/mh370-electrical-fire/

An open letter to pastor Rick Henderson

Hello Mr. Henderson. I recently read your post “Why There Is No Such Thing as a Good Atheist”, and thought that I would offer a response on the woefully inept manner in which it was so clumsily composed. You offer a challenge to atheists in your post as well, to which I will rise with relative ease.

But first!

Let’s delve into your ridiculously petty construct, and kick out some of the warped 2 x 4s upon which it is teetering, so that you may approach it again with a clearer understanding of what you are referring to. I’ll reference the passages verbatim for you as I respond to them. I understand that your theological perspective allows several hundred interpretations of the same event, so to avoid that, I’ll make sure to address what you said. Not what I think you could or should say. So here goes.

 You begin your post with this statement: “You clicked on this post for one of two reasons. Either you're hoping that I'm right or you know that I'm wrong. For those of you who are eager to pierce me with your wit and crush my pre-modern mind, allow me to issue a challenge. I contend that any response you make will only prove my case. Like encountering a hustler on the streets of Vegas, the deck is stacked, and the odds are not in your favor.”

Now, aside from your conclusion of what my motivation was for clicking on your story being subjectively incorrect (I clicked because I am always curious to witness the depths of theistic stupidity), it is inherently troubling to think that people “hoping” you are "right" about “No Good Atheist” as a motivation to click on the miniature dumpster you posted, assumes that there are people incompetent enough to believe that absurd proposition. Then again, you are around, amongst, and a member OF individuals on a daily basis who subscribe to the idea of a personal, all knowing, all seeing, intervening, and ever-present creator of the universe, so again, it isn't surprising that you'd pander to people believing in absurdities like your notion of “god”. I suppose doing so ensures that you have a paycheck every month, another fact of which I am certain that you are keenly aware.

 You also posed what you have decided to be a “challenge” to Atheists, but I fear that your knowledge of what a challenge is comprised of needs immediate improvement. Although I extrapolated what you believe to be a challenge, it isn't at all clear that what you are proposing meets the criteria of that term. As such, I’d say that your communication skills are in an identical state of dysfunction. 

Let me begin with that old, time honored secular effort of explaining things as they actually are, rather than what crackpot snake oil salesmen say they are.

 According to the Oxford Dictionary, the definition of challenge is: verb – To invite someone to join in a contest. While your PROPOSITION is that any response to this soppy paper will only further prove your case, you failed to engage individuals in a tangible contest with an objectively observable outcome that favored either yourself (the CHALLENGER!) or the respondent. Since the terms of your “challenge” have no meaningful structure or discernable outcome, it must therefore be intellectually and academically identified as theological bantha poo doo.

It also doesn’t surprise me that you are familiar with “stacking the deck” so to speak, being an adherent to an ideology that teaches children to hate, but in the future you may want to actually have CARDS to accomplish that feat. It is good to finally see a religious leader correctly identifying their character by comparing themselves and what they say to a hooligan in a back alley who's only interest is liberating a person from their cash. Well done, sir.

Onward!

Next you take a moment to define a term. “Before our love fest continues, allow me to define an important term, "worldview." A worldview is your view of everything inside (and possibly outside) the universe: truth, religion, beauty, war, morality, Nickleback -- everything. Everybody has one.”

Now, aside from that one word you’ve apparently invented actually being known to the rest of the academic world as two distinct words, i.e. “world”, and “view”, your definition adds complexity where none exists. Once again, according to the Oxford English dictionary, “world view” is defined as a particular philosophy of life or conception of the world.

Let’s continue: “While it is true that there is no definitive atheistic worldview, all atheists share the same fundamental beliefs as core to their personal worldviews. While some want to state that atheism is simply a disbelief in the existence of a god, there really is more to it. Every expression of atheism necessitates at least three additional affirmations:
1. The universe is purely material. It is strictly natural, and there is no such thing as the supernatural (e.g., gods or spiritual forces).
2. The universe is scientific. It is observable, knowable and governed strictly by the laws of physics.
3. The universe is impersonal. It does not a have [sic] consciousness or a will, nor is it guided by a consciousness or a will.”

Let’s deal with number two first. You make a statement here that no responsible atheist can agree to. Allow me to compose a more accurate revision of your number two statement.

“So far, the universe appears to operate within the boundaries of known scientific principles. It is observable, knowable, and governed by the known laws of physics.”

Now, this would be a much more agreeable statement. I understand why your perception of the existence of all things is hopelessly enclosed within the pages of your employee manual (the bible), but if you are going to assume an epistemic position of people who are not bound by those confines, you must endeavor to divorce yourself of your personal biases, and actually effort a clear understanding.

In your first statement, you say that a non-negotiable affirmation of atheism is dependent upon the precept that there is no such thing as the supernatural, which is quite true. We would however, in the context of your statement that follows disagree. It is true that atheists believe that there is no realm that is apart from spatiotemporal existence that would qualify for what you define as “supernatural”. However, you then state that “gods” and “supernatural forces” would be included in that designation. You reveal a critical weakness in your own theology in that in order for something like “god” to exist, it must be supernatural, or non-spatiotemporal. Atheists are open to the discovery of a natural being or consciousness that is responsible for the creation of the universe. Unfortunately for your ideology, as well as that hypothesis, there is exactly zero evidence…so far… that it exists. There is however evidence that the universe operates without the assumption that it was “created”.

 Your third statement is generally accepted as true.

“Denial of any one of those three affirmations will strike a mortal blow to atheism. Anything and everything that happens in such a universe is meaningless. A tree falls. A young girl is rescued from sexual slavery. A dog barks. A man is killed for not espousing the national religion. These are all actions that can be known and explained but never given any meaning or value.”

As I’ve shown, two of the three assertions that you have made are lazily dismissed with a bit of good ole’ fashioned cognition. Additionally, they have the misfortune of not being the mortal blow you said they’d be. Your assertion that everything that happens in such a universe is “meaningless” is categorically false. Without your existence, and the ability to reason your existence (albeit clumsily, for you anyway) you would simply be unable to perceive anything to what you now assign the highest meaning. This is a result of your learning from the observation of your environment, as well as the subjective interpretation of your experiences. Without your understanding of language, you cannot understand the scripture you so ardently adhere to, etc. You are bound to even your most basic editorial decisions and trivial practices being dependent upon a learned set of instructions. Think of how your priorities would change with only slight modifications to the variables of your life experiences. It isn’t difficult to see how “meaning” changes depending upon our environment. Each event that you listed has a subjective meaning for the individual experiencing it, which is the only “meaning” anyone ever derives, from anything. What you are attempting (again, clumsily) is to assert that “meaning” without a centralized authority to tell us what that is, is trivial. It’s one of the most comical propositions that theological quackery has to offer. Any entity that you must choose as a governing authority of morality and by extension – meaning – WITHOUT EVIDENCE is entirely subjective. Unless you can illuminate special information that provides evidence for your inept hypothesis of all things (Christianity), you will continue to enjoy a comfy collective seat on the short bus.

Your next declaration takes the taco in your broken little sad box of theology.

Here it is: “A good atheist -- that is, a consistent atheist -- recognizes this dilemma. His only reasonable conclusion is to reject objective meaning and morality. Thus, calling him "good" in the moral sense is nonsensical. There is no morally good atheist, because there really is no objective morality. At best, morality is the mass delusion shared by humanity, protecting us from the cold sting of despair.”

While this drivel inspired a bit of haughty laughter, it was useful for little else. First, you assert that the only good atheist is a consistent one, and then go on to state that calling an atheist “good” is nonsensical, because there is no objective morality. The lecture circuit is full of idiotic statements like these, however more responsibly delivered, but that isn’t really what concerns me. I believe that morality is subjective, and that it pre-dates Christian (or any other religion’s) scriptural example. There are inherently held precepts that seem to guide our morality from a young age, but our intelligence has more to offer our sensibilities regarding our relation to other human beings than any “objective” standard could. We’ve found throughout our recorded history of civilization that murder, theft, perjury and rape are as close to absolute as they can possibly be. Close, but hopefully you’ve already reasoned exceptions to them. Since most of them are promoted and indeed often required by the pious or God himself in scripture, I will have to assume that the morality espoused by Christian theology, is inferior to my own subjectively deduced version. It is that inherent morality that is biologically evolved in each person that makes your god seem like a pimp in some dark alley. Should we even touch on vicarious redemption? The act of jesus washing away the sin of the offending human race to gain their loyalty and obedience? It is one of the most irrevocably unethical aspects of the Christian “way” there is to observe.

Your final comment about morality is sophomoric. The cold sting of despair? Morality is quite simply the subjective arrangement of governing principles that people use to define right and wrong. You, in your closed, inept dogma system may need a standard to adhere to when considering morality, most of the rest of us derive that from the empirical data collected during our analysis of empathy. When held in comparison to Christian morality, it does a much better job of instructing us.

 Since I am not a religious, goldbricking lay about, the above will have to suffice as a response to your hopelessly ridiculous interpretation of the mechanisms of morality as they relate to the atheist. Unlike you, I don’t enjoy endless paid hours of postulation on how to keep the veiled eyes of the pious veiled, so we will skip on to your conclusion.

Here it is: “Conclusion: Intelligent people ask serious questions. Serious questions deserve serious answers. There are few questions more serious than the one I'm asking. How do we explain objective meaning and morality that we know are true? If a worldview can't answer this question, it doesn't deserve you. One sign that your worldview may be a crutch is that it has to appeal to an answer outside itself -- becoming self-contradictory, unable to reasonably account for the question. Any atheist who recognizes objective meaning and morality defies the atheism that he contends is true. If your worldview can't makes sense of the things that make most sense to you (like objective morality), then it's not worth your allegiance. This new reality may launch you onto a journey of reluctant discovery. Whoever you are. Wherever you are. Whatever you believe. You deserve a foundation that is strong enough to carry the values that carry you.” “Intelligent people ask serious questions.”

Really? Perhaps questions like “Should I believe in an all-powerful creator entity without any evidence of its existence?” somehow elude your inquiring and ironic mind. Since atheists do not have the opinion that there is an “objective morality”, your assertion that “objective morality” requires an explanation is nonsensical. Here’s a tip: if the “objective” portion of your morality system is dependent upon cultural norms, or can be rendered invalid with exceptions, IT ISNT OBJECTIVE. This is one of the reasons that honest people call the religious hypocritical. It isn’t your “worm” status as a “Christian” that makes you a hypocrite, and in need of a savior. It’s that your savior is the hypocrite. “World Views” don’t answer questions. They inform them. I am constantly surprised and saddened by people who are so willing to surrender their individuality. Your shallow understanding of morality is not the basis by which every other human must understand morality. It is not difficult to not only understand your moral position as a Christian, but to demolish its flaccid attempt at creating a standard of behavior.

So, without getting into the meat of morality, I have dismantled your platform, and shown your “objective standard” to be inherently unethical and immoral. A CRUTCH, so to speak that you use to inform your apparent decision to absolve yourself of the more difficult moral task of deciding whether or not to make an attempt at understanding your existence, and what you should do with it while it is “yours”. Since you believe in all the fantasies of doctrine, you have no accountability whatever to the evolution of society, or its changing moral and ethical landscape. We believe in ourselves, and each other. We learn from our interactions and continue to seek answers to questions that are illusive and important. Our world view is broad, and our convictions are attended to with deliberation and conscientiousness. That is a strong foundation. Strong enough, in fact, to carry and reason through the manufactured ghost stories of man that people like you scalp to the desperate as true. Think about THAT as you’re cashing your next paycheck provided to you by people who can’t afford to give the money they put in the collection platter at your church.

Your pal in humanity,

-meridianfrost

 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/pastor-rick-henderson/why-there-is-no-such-thing-as-a-good-atheist_b_4442287.html

@pastorrickhenderson @huffingtonpost

Memories...

I’d forgotten…
And it for a time it was bliss
Kissing air in your place
Faced impossibly blind
By waiting lines never clearer

Five feet ahead.
42 triangular planes of angled glass
Force that man past the edges, and ever nearer
To the beveled bind
Of my vanishing mirror

I never meet anyone there
And words I conjure Impair the
Tops of poems like these
For the wood, the forest, or the Fare
Is almost never in trees

And so, beyond a brief passing
After all that curious alas-ing
Pretending those words in the wood
Made a good bird’s better wings flare
Falls like ash where the boy once stood

The weight of the man, however slight
Is further fractioned by the flight.

lies

all lies.

Blind Eyes Blaze Like Meteors

And with a subtle wisp of chain, she quietly clanked into that dark corner of my history. Unburdened by loss, dangling a paper world of jagged scrawls and scribbles....onward to the next transparent heart. I'll just drift to the glow. She's got red hair, and an idle pen. More to shape the globe of us with touch, and not that.....artificial neon of the subterranean phantom. Not an amalgamation of fiction, not stained of the mouth, not vanished by the tiniest drops of reality. Not kept merely by the interval between a flicker of an eyelid, but by a promise. Locked in a sharp yank of blazing hair, and five compressed digits on a windpipe. In quiet moments, too, behind dirty glass blocking folded swells of lakewater. My pelican on the degas dock is fat with pride, and scowls into the cold wind with marble eyes, silently daring all to test this fire. I'll scoop them with all manner of food, and crush their rubber bones till the powder of their core layers the scene on our ocean, glowing opalesque in the current sun for a brief moment before becoming saturated by the brine of blue you love so well. Lost in the catalog of lies.

And with a decimal, he goes.

Minarets

Enter dawn, when our frozen sky
Streaks fire and burns into being
Where our only darkness comes to die
And light gives birth to seeing

Oh how the sands swell in the sound!
Would that it were not softly so
Yet a stellate glass of diamond ground
That led us to the glow

There, upon that uncertain dust
Inflexible eyes fixed on the gold
Her wings twitch, tied closed in the trust
Her heart would not unfold

But it was never so in dreams
Where her brightest tertails are free
Stretched wide in the filtered sunbeams
Reflected on the sea

She softened her stance in the thought
As her graceful hands traced through flight
Those distant clouds at last were caught
And married to the night

And just as that fragile dream came
So too its pallid foe made haste
Like a crackling shriek wrought from shame
It laid her wish to waste

Adhan echoed in the new air
And tightly bound her wings for threat
She may once fly, and dream, and dare
To destroy the Minaret

Enter Dusk, where our saddened sky
Burns, and fades to violet blue
Where "darkness" is the sun’s reply
When begged for lasting hue.





Our Landscape

I woke up in dewy grass, underneath a lavender sky. The palate was sprinkled with twinkling diamond stars suspended in particulate mist. I felt at peace. Slow waking movements. Blinking a lazy shutter with smiling eyes and opium bliss. I could finally draw a deep, satisfying breath.

“What wants he but to catch earth’s heedless sons and daughters.” I thought as I rose to my elbows. Yet just as the vision had clipped it’s instantaneously conjured memory, the grass turned to frosted Ice, and the pastel magnificence of that unknown beauty………vanished…. with a whisper. Barely known.

A low frequency boomed into life, and rattled through my chest. Like the growing bass that preceded some disastrous event. The lone tree in sight bled silver from its uppermost limbs, and shook all leaves. They fell as if cast away, and blasted to ashes before they were to ever reach the ground. The lavender mist swirled like a closing curtain, spiraling its glittering orbs toward a central point. Their speed increased, and once drawn toward the center were gathered to a single point of light amidst the absolute black, and obliterated in an unheard sphere of destruction. The blast wave multiplied as is rippled across the nothing, trailing bits of that happy sight as is disappeared into the vast void of incomprehensible distance.

I was alone. Yet, accompanied by my tree, I did not despair. For from their frozen enclosure, the roots of this lingering biological column pulsed faintly with the tiniest traces of ultraviolet hope.

I tilted my head just slightly askew, and wondered if I had imagined it. And then, as if forced into reality from my thoughts, streaks of black light traveled from its base, and along its ancient contours with a crackling electric sound.
I managed a smile, and seated myself on a patch of dead Ice. I leaned on my last little bit of hope, and fell asleep. Dreaming of that place, and that tree, and how everything had changed. Everything.

Digital Me

I played last night. Played until my fingers bled. Sang every song, every sorrow I've ever known, and washed this place of its horrible past, striking a new chord into a new path, with a new song, and a new beginning.

meridianfrost - text inquiry on the meaning of my youtube username.

"Meridianfrost means there is a danger in being indecisive. That when you grow old, all of your middle decisions will pile up with a kind of chilling, and regretful hindsight. Dare to take a side, and that reflection will be a series of momentary life experiences where we have failed, and succeeded. Or more appropriately, where we have learned and triumphed, instead of populating our thoughts with what we wished we had done. Seize YOUR day. Seize your life."


~meridianfrost

Walker's Question

Walker - "I just realized that i don't know if i hate all races or love all races. By that i mean there are no races. My grandmother's father came from Switzerland, but was really Italian, but most Italian where either immigrants or slaves from the roman empire, and wherever they are from before that is probably the same thing......immigrants or slaves...one can't identify as any race because we aren't anything...or are we everything? How long does it take to become a race? i just needed to tell someone, and you're the only one who would be intelligent enough to appreciate it, if there is anything to appreciate in this. anyways, thanks."

ME - "Well, one of the very first things I learned in Anthropology, was that there was no significant variation between different ethnicities. I'll never forget it actually. My professor sat on the front edge of her desk and said. "There's something that you should know about me. I'm racist." and the crowd had this kind of, collective tension that soon turned to confusion when she went on by saying "...and so are you." She continued by saying that there are no biological differences between races, and that the lowest common denominator of human is the one who discriminates because of a person's ethnic or cultural background.

You'd be astonished to discover the genetically molecular similarities of some of the people on this blue dot of ours. It's just our ridiculous ability to discriminate against social and cultural groups that have been carried over from one generation to the next. Cultural identity (especially in America) is fuzzy at best, so when we do find colorful expressions of humanity, we point and laugh, or fucking HATE because of a lack of understanding of cultural diversity, OR our subconscious desire to find a sort of comradeship in a culture that is so obviously lacking in it, especially if you are a fucking white dude in America. Ha.

Get the idea of "race" out of your mind permanently. It's a foolish concept not grounded in any sort of science. Replace the word with "Ethnicity" and you will begin to see the fear, and anger, and jealousy associated with the negative or pejorative application of that word in society. It'll cause you to look inward, and face your fear, or whatever unease you might feel about particular ethnic groups, and just generally raise your awareness that culture is a thing to be admired and shared.

Embrace humanity, and live a fucking happy life. Thanks for the comment. Take care."

Black Dust.

I'm nocturnal. I fucking hate the night. All I see is neon, and hookers, and lavender light, fucking underfed and malnourished strippers sucking cock for 20's and greasy floors dripped with the semen of troglodytes. Oh how I long for this fucking ambient glow to flicker and die, so I might see the stars as something in... the black, rather than the hum of cock cancer.

Java Prayer

Every time I fly, I pray for a crash. Sitting there at number 3 or 5 or 1 in line for takeoff, the captain’s apathetic voice crackles through the intercom like a fucking five dollar walkie-talkie, barely audible over the idling jets on the wings. I can just make out -

“Flight attendants please take your seats.”

- and they emerge from the rear of the plane, with their bullshit smiles, having just joined in mocking the fat guy in the front of the plane who has already asked if he can have something to eat. One of them looks at him and suppresses a laugh with a reasonably disguised cough. I notice a stain on my tie, and I’m suddenly propelled back to my hotel room, and the violent fucking of the night before. She sounded like an animal who'd carelessly ambled into the street and was hit by a speeding car. Left hand ripping the hair from the back of her head while the right choked her neck coaxing a panicky gurgle of bliss. I pressed the back of her head into my cock while she stared into my eyes. It penetrated her throat with that familiar, tiny pop, and her eyes rolled into stare at her own cerebrum. I saw her mouth filling with my cum again in that darkness. Saw the smile of satisfaction as those opalescent streams of milky soul streaked across her alabaster cheeks, glowing in the dark. I kiss her after. Taste the soft warmth of the only thing I have ever had worth offering. I move a clumsy hand to the night table in search of a cigarette, knocking over one of the ten cups of cold coffee in the room, and pause. She's breathing in short gasps. Shuddering on her back as though the entire world was comprised of that view of the ceiling.

The coffee courses in a slow stream toward the end of the table, and escapes the edge, dripping onto the hunter green olefin. At first a steady flow, but bound for a dwindling drip, smacking the floor in that patting noise of liquid falling onto short polyester fibers. I touch her face. Her lips are still slick. I gently trace the pad of my thumb over them. “I love you so much.” She says. And the air conditioner clicks on and roars to life.

The jets of the plane throttle up. I’m pushed backward into my seat by the unusual force of acceleration. I look to the front of the plane now. The flight attendants seats look safer than mine, but I don’t care. After all, I’m about to die.

The engines cavitate with exploding jet fuel, and the view outside begins to blur in an absurd streak of bad impressionism as the ground falls from beneath me. Another thrust. Downward this time, and then the sensation of being lifted into the sky.

I close my eyes, and imagine a faulty fuel line. I course it’s path to the break, where a spark is waiting to ignite the wing tank. I see hydraulic fluid leaking from a gasket in some imaginary machine, causing a catastrophic failure in flight control. I see a microburst flipping the aircraft at 500 feet, and it’s maddeningly short tumble to earth, blazing an exploding fireball trail through some suburban neighborhood. I pray to nothing.

“Please.” I say. “Let it happen now.”

The aircraft banks sharply to the right. “Let the flaps lock, and send this fucking plane into a glittering streak toward the earth’s core. Let it end now.”

I speak to those I love, and remember their faces. I tell them that I am not afraid. I calmly, and very quietly tell my secrets to the high pitched and steady drone of the muffled fuselage, and prepare to meet my end among the screams of my fellow passengers without a sound. I rip the oxygen mask from the compartment above me and cast it away. I feel the velocity increase. I hear the steadily growing squeal of the turbines as they swallow the forced air. I see a rotating gimble, spinning in all directions.

And just as the plane’s cockpit is crushed into the ground, I open my eyes, four miles above the earth. The beverage trolley is next to my seat. I tilt my head as the goldbricking flight attendant asks me if I would like something to drink.

An eyebrow drifts toward my scalp, and I give her a little smile.

“Coffee, please.”


The Guillotine

So… here I am. Damp wood at my neck. Staring into the rusty brown basket that my head will wobble in once the blade has severed it. To my left, a lined box into which my decapitated body will soon be unceremoniously flipped after all those words fall. I can hear them on the blade, muttering incoherent bits of fabrications and false anger. They’re priming their conjured ire for the drop and the chop. Steady eyes at the space just below the base of my skull. Waiting for the elevation to courage that’s necessary to slice that innocent love from the course of its realization.

It’s 9am.

A trickle of water bleeds from a leaky spigot on the wall to my right. It courses through street mortar and bulges toward me.

The voices grow louder.

The soldiering streak catches a glimmer of sunlight, and speeds through the puzzle in the road.

I glance as far as I can toward the tetragon shear. The words are moving faster there. Concentrating on the edge as they prepare for the click and the drop. A figure to my left extends a hand from the folds of her midnight cloak. I notice her glittering lavender nail polish is chipped along each unattended ridge. I catch a hint of jasmine on the breeze. Just beneath the brim of her hood, a crooked smirk curling up the left side of her face. She glances at the blade, clutching the lever with uncharacteristic strength and purpose. I thought of those hands touching me in dire moments. How they looked curious, and clumsily graceful. Strange to see them like this now. Disjointed, and lacking any semblance of affection.

On my right, the water rages toward me now. Bursting from the mortar and onto the surface of the blackened cobblestones, flooding the edges like great waves crashing on cliffs.

I watch the fingers on the hand flex, and the twitch of an arm. A shink, and words are sent plummeting toward my love. They ride the rail, bent on one final disconnection. Screaming down that fake wave of promises and sentiments.

The torrent of water lurches up into a massive blanket of transparent cloth, catching every beam of light unhindered by the protruding guillotine and its operator. A gasp. A pause. A thought.

I’m not confused, though I would like to have seen the sky one last time.

Speed

She is everything I have ever wanted.

Everything.

I am headlong in a dive.

The world is screaming past me in a blur,

and all I can focus watering eyes on is her.