HIGH FLIGHT

(The poem I wish I had written. My heart fairly soars as I read these beautiful, insightful words.)

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 windswept heights with easy grace
where never lark, or ever eagle flew--
and, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
the high untresspassed sanctity of space,
put out my hand and touched the face of God.

(Written by Pilot Officer John Gillespie Magee. He died a few months after writing this beautiful poem on a scrap of paper and sent it to his parents. He wrote the entire poem on flight as his heart with filled with inspiration. He died at the age of 19. It makes me appreciate even more the magesty of creation. He was truly inspired.)