Lou Suarez

The Fan

Overhead a ceiling fan turns,
each blade chasing the next
hour after hour.

The night is warm;
the fan cools the room,
and its music helps the man

sleep. All night
he has dreamed he is flying
a small airplane, afraid

because he knows how to fly
the plane but not
how to land. Too soon

the engine will stall,
and the plane will crash into a field,
a forest, a lake—whatever

is beneath him when his fuel
is gone. And his only hope now
is that onlookers on earth

will look and point skyward
at his soundless fall and mark
the spot of his death,

so he may go there if ever
he wakes, may tell the world
how sorely he will be missed.