There are three main components to the narrative of "Suspended for Now": the rocket ship, suspended “for now”; the rope that leads up to a pole with various metal and wooden arrows hammered to it; and three men emerging from a pile of boxes.
The rocket has left behind smoke in the form of an uprooted tree, representing the people forced to leave their homes in times of war and destruction. Wherever the rocket goes, uprooting will follow. It is suspended from the sky in a symbolic act, making the connection between a rocket’s place in the sky or the “heavens.” How could a weapon of war come from the heavens, from God?
The rope that guides us from the rocket to the arrows is the second part of the uprooting process. The rocket tethered to all of these different arrows also implies a lack of direction, and the shorter knot of rope hanging from the rope implies that perhaps there is a key component missing, a clue to direction that has since left.
The arrows are also a reference to the arrows along roads in Europe that were flipped by Allied forces to confuse the Nazis. The arrows are therefore useless, we cannot trust the directions they offer. The grouping of men represents a moored people. Two men reside within the boxes, tearing up branches and opening up flaps of cardboard. They are making this space their “home” in spite of the limited resources they have. The third man, dressed in an expensive looking coat and hat, stands on the edge of this budding community. He rests one hand leisurely on the box, but looks elsewhere. It is clear there is no place for him in this community, or at least no role in it that he would wish to occupy. His gaze follows the direction of the rocket and of the arrows, searching for a place that no longer exists.
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