Pulling a rare and textbook perfect
canted rolling scissors.
The opportunity to come
directly out of the sun long gone. Blown.
Smiles keep running ear to ear
behind your oxygen mask.
The gees are getting to you, I hope,
the way they are getting to me.
The joy is in the maneuver. The knowing
"I'm doing it! I'm doing it."
But the ground is coming. Fast. I know
you know
which way you're going to break and
I do not.
Thumb on the hat switch, it is hard not to watch
the horizon rise and fall
the sun wheel and dive behind cloud banks,
Earth rise, fall, and sky blind again.
Hydraulic boosters are crying.
The air is tearing.
The real nerve is found headfirst supersonic
toward the ground.
I don't want to blink, watching your helmet glitter
glancing straight up at me
through your canopy. Judging distance and guts and glory.
You are beautiful,
but I will roll as deep and when you throttle out
I will be ready to light you up
and send you home in flames and titanium confetti,
nothing more than a tea cup for a casket.
