As has become a bit of a tradition on here with Stormbirds.blog, I always like to mark today, November 11, as a day of Remembrance.

Marking the end of hostilities at the end of World War I, on the 11th day of the 11th month, many countries mark the day to remember and honour armed forces members who sacrificed everything in the line of duty.

Though we face many challenges over 100-years after the day was first marked, it is still valuable and worth remembering what happened before. And as we tend to say here… Lest we forget.

And because Stormbirds has always been about flight simming and the love of aviation, I leave you with a sonnet written in 1941 by poet John Gillespie Magee Jr. The piece was inspired by his experiences as a fighter pilot of the Royal Canadian Air Force in World War II and in particular by a flight he undertook in a Spitfire Mark I with No. 53 Operational Training Unit where he reached 33,000 feet.

“Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of – wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air….

Up, up the long, delirious, burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace.
Where never lark, or even eagle flew —
And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
– Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.”

“High Flight” by John Gillespie Magee Jr.