There are scars on the sky
There are stories in those scars
Going home, leaving home
Vacation, deployment
There are tears and there is excitement
There is chatter and annoyance,
Loss and beginnings.

A new grandmother, anxiously trying to learn to knit before the child is too old to wear her handiwork.
A woman still shaking from the pat down, because it was just like the game her older brother used to make her play.
A salesman almost completely focused on his PowerPoint, trying to shut out the thoughts that, if he doesn’t make his quarter, she will actually leave.
A college student, heading off to his first study abroad, with eight extra sets of batteries for his camera, and a map from his older brother that shows the best places to get high.
An ex boyfriend, going home from the funeral, where he wasn’t welcome, still wonders if he could have changed it.
An almost child, going to a place he can’t pronounce, to wear sand camo and an assault rifle, to meet new people to fear.
An elderly woman, on her third cocktail, fights back a tear as she remembers her daughter’s parting words.
A young woman excitedly shows her engagement ring to the gentleman next to her, who just received divorce papers.
A bride and groom on a honeymoon paid for by his parents, because he doesn’t want her to realize he’s lost his job, until after the trip.
An AVP who blames the airline for not automatically upgrading him to first class, but fears it’s because his expense account was cut off.
The copilot, who has once again decided this is his last time he will fly with intoxicated.

There are scars on the sky,
Lit by the morning sun,
and in a day, they will have faded
and been replaced a dozen times.
Each one contains a hundred scars.
Those may never fade.