Flight 171

Without you...

There is something so collectively gut-punching when you hear of a mass tragedy. Today’s India airline Flight 171, with 242 souls aboard, unable to complete it’s lift-off, crashed into a nearby medical college killing everyone on board, with the exception of one man. A miracle in the flames. Ground casualties as well.

In an instant. They were all gone.

Endless wars are fought and collectively the casualties are tremendous.

“The eyes gaze. The legs walk. The lungs breathe.”

We don’t see the big numbers flashing in flames on the news.

In every city, neighborhood and hospital, around the world, there is someone about to meet their fate and someone tending to them. Or not. There are natural and man-made explosive events, death tolls, burned out buildings, rising waters, carnage, weeping on camera. And off.

But collectively, when we stare at an entire plane crashing on our socials, stunned — we move knowing in that moment — until we move onto the next thing — how deeply fragile life can be. More than 1, 6, 20, 53. 241 this morning. An entire flight. Climbed to 290 this afternoon. We wake up to it, go to bed with it — due to instantaneous media. There are already “goodbye videos,” sent from passengers about to board the fatal flight — from India’s Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel International Airport, to loved ones and friends waiting in England to greet them or hear that they are safely landed — on their way.

These are their loved one’s last memories of them speaking. Frozen in time. I still have voice recordings on my phone from dad. I cannot lose my phone.

Accidents, disasters, crime, illnesses — a world-wide pandemic still wrecking havoc. Death tolls are more than we could ever fathom.

Ashes by the bedside, pictures, cards, jewelry, notes, stuffies, their favorite beanie, jacket, headstones, gravesites scattered in oceans, rivers, streams, by mountains and trees — faded plaques. Our memories, recordings, stories, songs, mementos, flags and crosses, memorials spread across the universe collectively in the billions.

When I heard this song playing on one of my Spotify “radio” stations — I had just arrived home to settle back after dad passed away (five years ago). Before that, (many years prior) thoughts of staring at my best friend, lying motionless, gone too soon to cancer. In the quiet of my home there was a deafening silence — and almost immediately I had to say goodbye to a dog I rescued and loved. She represented the cruelty of humans. Holding her, I wept myself silly.

This morning while sipping coffee, I shut down the news and began to pray. All I could think of was the family and friends left behind. Holding them near my heart.

That’s what we do. We remember the sting of losing.

I turned on a radio station for the artist Brandon Lake (where various artists, like him, play). Normally, I wouldn’t hear a Broadway song and here it was again. As if to say, this is how life works. It goes on. We are flesh and blood. Here, rooted, planted for a purpose, that reaches far beyond division and drama.

We can be love. Near and far. Thinking before speaking. Giving before taking. Working things out with each other, with ourselves, in return for the gift of our lives.

What could be the last thing we ever say to each other?

Can we stop for five minutes, a whole day? and think of them — “as flowers bloom, children play, stars gleam, poets dream...”

May we follow Light over darkness while we have a chance.

RIP to all who perished.

And to those who are left

without you.

---

Without you, the ground thaws

The rain falls

The grass grows

Without you, the seeds root

The flowers bloom

The children play

The stars gleam

The poets dream

The eagles fly

Without you

The Earth turns

The sun burns

But I'd die, without you

Without you, the breeze warms

The girl smiles

The cloud moves

Without you, the tides change

The boys run

The oceans crash

The crowds roar

The days soar

The babies cry

Without you

The moon glows

The river flows

But I die without you

The world revives

Colors renew

But I know blue

Only blue

Lonely blue

Without you

Without you, the hand gropes

The ear hears

The pulse beats

Without you, the eyes gaze

The legs walk

The lungs breathe

The mind churns

The heart yearns

The tears dry without you

Life goes on

But I'm gone

'cause I die

Without you

Without you

Without you...

— Without You | for the Broadway musical Rent - written by Jonathan Larson, who tragically passed away at the age of 35 from an aortic aneurysm the day before the show's first off-Broadway performance. Rent would go on to receive Tony Awards and a Pulitzer Prize.