*Not* my LJ Idol entry...

[alexpgp]

The subjects for this week's LJ Idol essay are "Getting Involved" and "Flying."

It's a crazy world, but I can come up with entries for both that are... a little out of the ordinary.

Still, I got to thinking about the latter, and that got me thinking about something I've wanted to do for a long time, and that's write a response to one of my favorite poems, by John Gillespie Magee, Jr., High Flight. I wanted to write something from the perspective of someone who has flown at the controls of an airplane, although not in the way that Magee did, or in an aircraft comparable to his.

And I knew I could not go to sleep until I had written something.

      Response to High Flight

To you, who slipped the surly bonds of earth
And passed too soon from life into God's care,
Know this: emboldened amateurs of worth
Maneuver yoke and rudder through the air
In craft that cannot stomach fancy flights,
Yet which - when all is said and done - do fly.
They ply above the plains, and lakes, and heights
And let us straining mortals kiss the sky.
We've learned the rudiments of trim and flaps,
Of slips and stalls and carburetor heat,
And plotted out new courses on our maps.
And in the end, we've gained a state so rare:
We've chased the wind and felt the world complete,
And know we've shared your footless halls of air!

Consider it a first draft.

Cheers...

UPDATE: I could not get this out of my mind, so I continued to tweak the poem and did made it a part of my week 5.21 essay in the LJ Idol competition.

Comments

[spydielives.livejournal.com]

I like it.

[daphnis.livejournal.com]

Works for me, too!! Pometry, the appreciation thereof, has always been an enjoyable pastime for me, but I'm too imprecise by nature to flog my brain over subtleties, nuances and barely discernible flavour alterations.

Love your flair for words!