“Mission controllers lost contact with the spacecraft within 8
1/2 minutes of its flight before determining that it was
destroyed in what the company called a ‘rapid unscheduled
disassembly.’”
A Starship exploded today—I can empathize.
It scattered sparkler streaks across the sky
for those awake, outside, and looking up,
and in one of many ‘right spots’. Sometimes
it feels like everywhere is the wrong spot.
Sometimes time extends from week to week
so the ‘ends’ are winnowed into slivers
straining to hold back the torrent of Monday.
Dams bulging, stretched transparent
until every weekend hour is spent staring
at the imminent disaster wondering when?
rather than if. They caught the booster,
chopsticked it back to safety like a token
of normalcy, of progress toward the future.
No humans aboard, no sweet Laika doomed
from the jump, this flight was still a test
but I feel for the mostly-empty vessel. I feel
like a mostly-empty vessel, more often
than I feel like weighing if it’s half-full or
the other. The malaise comes from afar
with its seed crystal of meh. The good news?
We can launch anew. We can recycle,
try again, see tomorrow as another day,
an untarnished snowy field boxed in
only by its boundless possibilities—
and I’m told, in the infinite multiverses
whitecoats keep yammering on about,
at least one of them will see the Starship
spontaneously reassemble, will see
a tomorrow on my calendar that doesn’t feel
like an opportunity to burst into fiery pieces
without warning or even an obvious cause.