A flock of names whispers lift: Autoplane, Tampier, Longobardi.
Flying cars hover above slow trucks—
they wing past stucco houses, commercial strips,
miniature golf, and the pale sand of the public beach. Like poets,
the designers test pitch and yaw. They practice gliding,
learn to wrap the extraordinary vertical in the everyday horizontal.
A flying car ascends, amazes, but like a figure of speech,
a roadable airplane must descend, drive on.
So, sell me a car to spring from the street, soar over traffic,
fold its wings, wheel home. Order me a fast, float-footed plane,
a flying boat to lift from a lake, cruise, splash down.
Build me a skyburb, each house with a hangar.
Light great circles, skyfaring routes. Swivel runways
into the wind, speed arrivals and departures.
Streamline everything in the U.S.A. Imagine 2020:
fifty thousand flights could take off every day.