FROM BALLOONS TO 'CHOPPERS'

If air balloons are natural,

Then the earliest planes, open to the air,

Were moderately antinatural,

With double wings on either side.

Then came the single-wing closed cockpit planes,

Suggestive of a radical antinaturalism,

Which were followed, in due course, by

The more radically anti-natural jet planes,

With shorter wings set aslant the body,

As if drawn back in horror of relativity.

But even they seem moderate

Compared with the extreme antinaturalism

Of those jets, often smaller, whose wings

Are so close to the body as to appear a part of it,

An extension of the body rather than an independent wing,

Near absolute in expansive tail, more fish than bird.

Similar to them but capable of vertical take-off

Are the anti-supernatural jets, with fold-up wings,

And reminiscent of balloons but powered by engine ...

Are the supernatural 'choppers',

Their blades revolving atop the body

Or, rather, head - a vertical take-off

Confirming a transcendental essence.