I don’t go in.
just noticed it in passing, pacing loops
on a layover

I am an hour’s flight and three hours
of waiting from you
I’m not one to imagine my own
future, don’t build a life
of what ifs, if this then
that’s. But a chapel

in an airport makes me stop
Are there people inside sending
prayers to their pilots
Are they asking for safe
passage, for no crying

children, for the drinks to come
fast and be cold
I don’t pray, my belief comes most
in letting someone

close, but once I did ask
a bird to live
I was a child and it had flown
into our window

I asked it because I thought
the trick was in the asking
like if I ask you what you’re
feeling as if I might
find you

in the answer. In the chapel,
at the airport, I wonder if
anyone has ever gotten

married there. Placed
their lives
together and then

set flight.

Chloe N. Clark is a teacher, writer, and editor. She is the author of The Science of Unvanishing Objects, Your Strange Fortune, and the forthcoming, Under my Tongue. She is co-EIC of Cotton Xenomorph and can be found on Twitter @PintsNCupcakes.