and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings
sunwards I've climbed and joined the tumbling mirth
of sunsplit clouds and done a hundred things
you have not dreamed of ....
wheeled and soared and swung
high in the sunlit silence hovering there
I've chased the shouting wind along and flung
my eager craft through footless halls of air
Up, up the long delirious burning blue
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
where never lark or even eagle flew
and while ........
with silent lifting mind I've trod
the high, untrespassed sanctity of space
put our my hand and touched the face ... of God
2 comments:
Bernie, what a great piece of poetry you've found. Have you known of it for a long time, or did you happen upon it in one of those flying magazines. Strangely enough, I've had dreams similar to this, and it re-awakened that experience. It can also be interpreted as a mystical/religious experience. I love the way it ends with that thought...like you want it to be.
This poem, which I first read in an office at Archerfield Airport in 1996 (I was doing a report for the government on how we could attract young people into the aerospace industry as maintenance engineers), thoroughly captivated me.
The last two lines was incorporated in the eulogy by Ronald Reagan for the deceased astronauts when the Challenger blew up in 1986. He had a very sharp speech-writer (a woman who's name escapes me at the moment) who crafted a very poignant speech in honour of the astronauts.
I've been inspired since then about flight, particulary the closeness of the big blue which is so beautifully expressed in the poem. It's abysmally different to being in an airliner with a hundred or more people let me tell you.
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