Keith Montesano
In November, 2009, three college softball players were found dead after their sport utility vehicle went into a pond on a North Dakota farm during a stargazing trip.
We’re all accustomed to the stars: their luminescence too far
above our heads, and yet few know the names, or care, because
we’re jealous of their lives and deaths, always becoming
something else, rebirthed in the uncharted spaces we gaze at
under cloudless skies, over counties and cities we’ll never see
before our own lives expire for good. And yet I wonder
if those who drown turn into angels, those taken by accident
instead of murder, those who cared about their future lives
amidst the black pond’s invisible circumference,
almost taunting, some long bony forefinger reaching out to take
what it wants forever. And how do we find out about LifeHammers
and ResQMe Keychains if it isn’t through tragedy? Practical
are de-icers for locks, a Maglite’s thin beam gleaming toward what’s missing.
But water enters the cabin like a flood, first in drips and slow
percolation, before it bursts the cracks like black holes,
the gush and fill too quick to stop. And how do we practice
before it happens? Relax. Conserve your energy and your air.
As serious as children’s games: Would you rather be burned alive
or freeze to death? What happens fastest? If you sit and fight
the whole way, you drown. Perseids. Quadrans Muralis. Beautiful names
meaning nothing in the end. Stay as calm as possible. They were speaking
of things we’ll never know. Keep your seatbelt on. The sheriff
wanted to say they had trespassed. Don’t wait for the pressure
to equalize. Who was driving? Roll down or break the window.
The collie couldn’t imagine what was happening, its fur swaying
like seaweed. Escape through a door. There were signals from a tower
nearby: words of panic, static, before the cell phones
floated away from their hands. Look for bubbles and follow
the direction they’re going. In cars we’re always afraid of collision.
There were Crash Test Dummies toys: clicked-in plastic test center,
car with two front-seat figures, multiple crash zones. We got further
from the walls each time, measured how far their bodies would fly,
broke pieces that weren’t meant to break. Everyone asks
who’s to blame. Were there headlights? And does it matter?
Was there a drop-off they didn’t see—the pond’s dark becoming
every edge around it? But all we’re left with is the last: Swim to safety.