High Flight

this poem has always touched me,
so much so i know it of by heart.

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,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 blue
I`ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never Lark nor 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.

John Gilespie Magee
Royal Air Force
killed December 1941 in a mid-air collision
three months after writing it.