Flight

All my life I've had a fascination with things that fly; whether it be insects, birds, paper airplanes or any of the machines that man has made, from the earliest aeroplanes to stealth aircraft to the space shuttle. At one time I'd considered becoming a pilot and was encouraged to follow that dream by my father but that plan didn't come together. As I was nearing 30 I did hang around a jump zone for a summer and made one ill-fated parachute jump. That was probably the most exciting 10 minutes of my life - I loved it right up until I landed. But that's another story.

This was brought to mind as I was going through a journal last night and happened across a poem that I'd cut from a local paper a couple of years ago. The poem was written in 1941 by a Canadian pilot named John Magee Jr. I hope you enjoy it.

'High Flight'

Oh! I have slipped

the surly bonds of earth

And danced the skies

on laughter-silvered wings;

Sunward I've climbed,

and joined the tumbling mirth

Of sun-split clouds-

and done a hundred things

You have not dreamed of-

wheeled and soared and swung

High in the sunlit silence.

Hov'ring 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 wind-swept

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 out my hand and

touched the face of God.