FEATURES
The Spitfi re type he would have fl own.
Two
Immortal Lines…
By KenPike, Projects Officer,RAF HQ Air Public Relations & Media Projects
Oh! Ihave slipped the surly bonds of earth, And danced the skies on laughter- silvered wings;
These two immortal lines are the start of ‘High Flight’, apoem penned 75 years ago by Canadian pilot John Gillespie Magee Junior,which has since become the unofficial poem of several air forces around the world, including the RAF,and afavourite of aviators and astronauts.
In August 2016 the poem was celebrated with aspecial service nearMODSt Athan at the old RAF Llandow site in Wales where Magee was posted during the war as part of his attachment to No. 53 Operational Training Unit (OTU) before moving on to 412 (Fighter) Squadron, RCAF at RAF
Digby.The Poem was recited simultaneously between America, the United Kingdom, China andNewZealand with attendees including dignitaries and families fromMODSt Athan.
Magee served in the Canadian Air Force, but died within two months of writing the poem inamid-air collision over Lincolnshire in 1941, and his grave at Scopwick
raf-ff.org.uk Magee's grave at Scopwick Cemetery,Lincolnshire.
Cemetery bears the first and last words of High Flight.
Magee started writing the poem on 18 August 1941, just afew months before his death, whilst he was based at No. 53 OTU. In his seventh flight in aSpitfire Mk I, he had flown up to 33,000 feet. As he climbed upward, he was struck by words he had read in another poem, “Totouch the face of God.” He completed his verse soon after landing.
Since then it has been read out by film stars like Cary Grant, President Ronald Regan after the Challenger disaster,Orson Welles and many more. It is recited from memory by Cadets at the USAF Academy and appears on several headstones at the Arlington National
Cemetery.Ithas even been broadcasted by astronauts orbiting the Earth.
Dr Jeroen Pinto, the event organiser and founder of the Gramophone Memorial Tour,said:
“A special poem that means alot to people all over the world, especially the places whereWW2airmen were born, were educated, and were serving and now resting. In my native Holland we recite the poem at grave sites and it is widely loved. This is our chance to return the love to the poem, and when Ifound out that Magee wrote the poem while he was in Wales Ithought it would be nice to commemorate it here.”
Magee getting his wings. High Flight
Oh! Ihave 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 Youhave 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.
Autumn 2016 17
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