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Home  »  Poetry: A Magazine of Verse  »  Wanda Petrunkevitch

Harriet Monroe, ed. (1860–1936). The New Poetry: An Anthology. 1917.

Death and the Aviator

Wanda Petrunkevitch

JOYOUSLY he dips and flies,

Floats at ease in the windy skies

Where the changing cloud hosts run;

Fragile winged between earth and sun,

Strong in youth and seeming free:

And he rides, O Death, with thee!

Piteous and a broken thing,

Solemn, slow, the mourners bring.

Crushed the torch and quenched the fire

Of his prophet’s keen desire;

Where—oh, where the living flame?-

Spirit thou alone could’st tame?