LIA DEWEY MORGAN


Flight TR25 SIN - MEL / Poet
I entered isolation from the point which the government mandated it ten days after I arrived home, and have maintained isolation since.

Lia Dewey Morgan is at home eating sunflower seeds on the porch listening to Billie Holiday.



𓅔


I am on a plane. The turbulence is catastrophic. Several people die. Shell shocked and battered, the plane lands. After departing, Bernie Sanders — a fellow passenger — delivers a press conference addressing the connections between climate change and the inconsistencies of weather affecting the safety of air travel.

I am dreaming. I wake uncomfortably splayed, body wedged against the backs of the row of seats, face buried in my camouflage jacket with my cap balanced to block the light. Rearranging myself into vertical, for $5 Singaporean I request a Scooty (a name budget airlines Scoot call their cabin personnel) to make me cup-of-noodles and a 3-in-1 coffee. I have been in transit for 32 hours, dressed in man drag: a covert lace red brassierre beneath the plainest black pants and crisp white shirt I can muster.


Hanging moon
shimmers off the jet engine —
cabin lights switch on



(3/4/2020)




© Neptune and Manisha Anjali

© Neptune and Manisha Anjali