Amelia Earhart

AMELIA EARHART
James C. Henderson

News has reached me late, like a message in a bottle
washed over the waves of generations
that you were not lost at sea as thought
but marooned on the tiny island of Nikumaroro
a pinpoint in the blue map of the Pacific Ocean.

That was in 1937 on your flight around the world.
And what have I been doing all this time?
Nothing really—chasing a route that has led me
to this desolate dot on the Minnesota prairie.
Only now turning to you over a sea of snow
to see that you were looking toward me all this while.

O, Amelia, had I known that you were missing
I would have looked for you as the others did
searching, searching until their eyes and hearts ached
not knowing you were waiting
something they could not have known
something I cannot forget.

Even now I want to search for you—
you who are no longer lost in place but time.
I want to join the researchers who walk
where you last walked, who found a sextant box
compact, the sole of a shoe, a jar of freckle cream
who sleep were you last slept, who eat where you last ate
who stand where you last stood looking up
at a mountain range of clouds; the only place
your Electra took you that you were ever safe.

O, Amelia, had I heard the newsflash that you were missing
I would have looked where G.P. could have never looked
and I would have never stopped
cruising around and around your palm-filled island
until I saw you standing on the white beach
tanned, hair bleached by the sun, waving
calling, “I’m here, I’m here.”
You rushing into the water
me jumping into the surf, wading closer and closer
to you until, finally, in your teary embrace
I would know what it is like to be found.