GODS-EYE VIEW
By Don Blanding
An air map for the earth-bound. You get a gods-eye view of things . . . up there,
A different world . . . a world, vast, clean and fair.
No, not a different world; a different view
And all accustomed things seemed changed and new.
You see a jewel-lake, a river's source,
And trace the vagrant windings of its course
Through fields and cities, mountains, towns and plains,
The streams that feed its flow in silver veins,
And arteries that make a living mesh
Of life-blood drained from earth's dark fertile flesh.You see the mountain ranges, rocks and stones,
Like vertebrae of super-mammoths' bones
With forests in great tatters, dark and dun,
Old fur that clothed the mighty skeleton.
The fields are varicolored patch-work quilts
Stitched with the thread of fences. Soil and silt
Are dark soft velvet; grass in varied green
Shimmers like squares of satin and sateen;
Red earth and brown, and yellow of ripe wheat
Make patterns and designs, precise and neat;
The contour plowings on the slopes of hills
Are rumpled corduroy. Soft lacy frills
Of trees trace casual lines of brooks and streams,
And roads bind all together with prim seams.
Between the planted acres, plots and towns
Are open spaces, jigsaw greens and browns,
The uncut cloth of forests, through the years
Awaiting man's tape-measure and his shears.You get a gods-eye view of things . . . up there,
Soaring serenely through the world of air;
You see lush lowlands thinning into plains,
And deserts praying for the truant rains.
You see the flat-topped mesas loom ahead
Like islands in an ancient ocean's bed,
Then peaks, snow-helmeted with clouds for plumes,
Dark canyons yawning like deep open tombs,
High cliffs that show in geologic screed
Earth's history for the knowing eye to read
The petty things are less than grains of dust,
While wars are only transient stains of rust
That tarnish the great shield. The cleansing years
Will wash away the "blood and sweat and tears."The world below is mimicked by the clouds
Without the noise and clamor of the crowds;
Here, too, are mountain peaks of virgin-white
And valleys, purple-shadowed. Shining bright
With new sun-gold are temples, spires and domes
Like far celestial cities . . . angels' homes.
You see the violet draperies of the rain
Shaken by thunder, and like blades of pain
The lightning rips the blue silk of the sky.
You see the new day born, the old day die
In splendored glory, and against the night
Familiar constellations, traced in light,
Spill star-dust on your hushed receptive heart.
It is good to see our world, detached, apart
From discord and confusion which is man's,
To see the mighty blue-print of God's plans
Where centuries are measured as the hours
Of human days. Up there, you sense the powers
That sway the seas in ceaseless rhythmic tides;
You hear the voice of silence that abides
In inter-stellar space. Up there, you know
That nations rise and fall, men come and go
As leaves that answer spring's awakening call
And in the autumn wither, fade and fall
To clear the way for next year's newborn leaves;
You know that grains of life are in the sheaves
That stand so stark and lonely in the fields;
You know that this day's leaden sorrow yields
The next day's gold. Up there, above the clouds
That pall the earth with gray and heavy shrouds
You see the patient sun that waits . . . up there . . .
And hear God say, "Tomorrow will be fair."
This poem appears on pages 17-19 of Don Blanding's book, Pilot Bails Out, published by Dodd, Mead & Company in 1943. On the facing page, an untitled full-page illustration shows the silhouette of an airplane caught in the sun's rays above billowing clouds.
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