Eighty-five years ago... Think about that for a second. Eighty-five years!
This beautiful aircraft carried a young air mail pilot into the clouds of Olympus. That young air mail pilot has been gone for 38 years, but the Spirit is still with us. Is not that the way of life? Our stuff stays long after we are gone.
Yep, in my view, the most important aviation artifact ever. I have stood underneath the Spirit numerous times and am always astonished by the essence of glory that still radiates from the airframe. It is simply amazing.
Lindbergh's Grave
Palapalo Ho'omau Church Cemetery, Kipahulu, Southeast Maui
That long green swell that sears my eyesAs I lie in this bed of black stone,Is it the Irish coast rising in the dawnBeyond the brushed silver of my blind cowlingWhere, throughout the night, I trusted Not in some desert God's directions,But in the calibrated compasses of man?
That rushing sound, is it the hordes at Orly,Swarming past the barriers and lightsTo scavenge my Spirit, and lift me upInto the air that only heroes breath?Or is it the age-old sigh of sea on stones,Known to those who pace the shingleAnd the swirled black sands that seepUp from the sea's loom to wrapImpossible islands in a shawl of waves?
That painting daubed on the chapel's window-Not the roselined mandala at ChartresWhere flame in glass misprisoned sings- But a cruder Savior, bearded, browned and popular,An icon obtainable to plain sight, a trim God Flat upon the glass in dull gesso limned,
And, when light moves behind it, looking down....Is this the sign in which, at last, we conquer?
Conquer? I'd laugh the laugh of stonesHad I but eyes to see and lips to breathe.No, I am content here where man and apesTogether waltzing lie, having done at lastWith all horizons, having done at last with sky.
If you would see me now pass byThe small green church where ancientBanyans looming shade and guardThe tower and the bell which youMay toll for me, or you, or all thoseNot yet delivered to the stars and sea.
And then, retreating, heed the treesWhose tendrilled branches hold but air,And shadow both the church and stones Beneath which wait both apes and men,Who, foolish with their hunger for the air,Swung branch to branch up all the yearsUntil, letting go at last, they learnedThrough me, at last, to rise.
Sea, stone, tree, ape and Savior.These now my boon companions are.
Better here, I think, in this dank greenCartoon of Paradise, this slight-of-hand Eden;
Better here beneath the pumiced stonesWhere strangers drop a wreathe from time to time;
Better here than there, hovering over waves,Alone between the new world and the old,
Trusting in a man-mad compass To take me home along The sharp cold blade of air.
Better, much better, hereWhere the sound of the waves enfoldsThat fire they could never snare.
Gerard Vanderleun American DigestLife on the Line continues...
(Originally posted May 2009)
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