November 14, 2021
What if a person lived a short life and his main legacy to the world was a poem?
John Gillespie Magee was born in Shanghai on June 9, 1922 to an American missionary family, and was educated at Rugby School in England. In 1940, wanting to help with the war in Europe, he gave up a place at Yale University to enlist in the Royal Canadian Air Force.
Stationed in England, he kept in touch with his parents – now in America- by letter. On the back of one, he included this poem he wrote, inspired by his training sessions in the air as a fighter pilot.
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 trop
The high, untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.
