The Problem of Heart Failure

Murphy's Law is wrong - what can go wrong usually goes right. But
then one day a few of the bad little choices come together ..."
—William Langewiesche

A cardiac concern in living colour on the laptop of a man
across the aisle, two rows up. I assume he's a doctor
though who isn't interested in the cranking
of that muscle? My own flimsy pump chugs on a slick
of Xanax, Jack chaser, a beer to smooth the pockets:
Our superior fermentation technology now adds
more pleasure to your life. Amen. Brothers, sisters,
what does it mean to prepare for cross-check? I'm iffy
and this the least of my worries 35,000 feet above
the Okanagan crater, tubed in steel propelled
by the most flammable substance on earth.
It's inconceivable, at 600 miles per hour, that people
will take off their shoes.

It's a kind of science, System Accident Thinking.
Mislabelled baggage. Wrench monkeys lurching through
mid-morning tequila flashbacks. The captain's
had a bitch of a day and the airstrip borders
a waterfowl preserve. Such inconsequentials converge
and a perfectly good aircraft nose dives
into Louisiana swampland, limbs scattered like receipts.
One whisky, one scotch, one beer. This is the problem
of heart failure: the initiation and progression
of desire. Pardon me. I've misread. That last word is
disease. Bad luck, bad habits. The unforeseen.
The doctor's screen shows a triangulation
of possibilities, the sanguine humour of geometry.