Dreams of Flight

From the first dream of flight
Sent to Daedalus
The spastic fall of his first born
That seems to inspire
All those bird flapping imitations
Was an invisible Pledeian hand
in Leonardo’s ornithopter
And with all those failed Wrighters
That took us to the brink
Of Guerre de plume
(Dog-fight over the Frog Skies)
Through little Hurricanes
And Spitfires
Diving Stukas in the tub


Through the manless flights of the V1 and V2
That terrorise my Granny
In the London East End

Bring on the Jet Age
The Age of the Rocket
And the failed compact over Concorde
Monsieur Heath and Monsieur D’Estaing
The Sputniks and the spaceniks
Those Apollonian dreams
Are now scrap on our Moon

What is left to us of pretty flight
But the double edge sword
Of in flight info-(at)tainment
And the hijacker on board