Here’s our pitch: Come on up, fly
with the angels! We take you
high or low, fast or slow.
Pilots fake it in films, we carry
thousands who soar sitting next
to our sheepskin shoulders
and watch us loop,
spin, whipstall, wing-over,
wing walk. Every weekend
we add a wedding in the air,
a cross between a stunt
and a prayer:
I load a bride in tulle,
a groom in tails,
a minister to splice them:
breezy rites at cloud altitudes beat
marching down the nave in town
to an organ wheezing Mendelssohn.
The groom holds his hat, the couple
pays for a long, long ride, people
ogle vows sworn on the sky side
of the dollar. After the show, the boys and I
head for the juke joint on Airport Road,
Anywhere, U.S.A. (They name the road
before they build the airport.)
We do some ground flying.
You bet I stay single.