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Air Force Poetry
During 2024 we will be sharing Poems written by men who served in the Air Forces.
A new Poem will be posted each month by sharing an excerpt via our Newsletter & Social Media Channels.
If you want to be alerted to these then you can follow our channels via the links above or by subscribing to our newsletter
List of Poems
Point of View
Reported Missing by John Bayliss
Parachute Descent by David Bourne
The Pilots' Paradise by O.C. Chave
Untitled Poem by Jackie Poulton
Reported Missing by John Bayliss
With broken wing they limped across the sky
caught in late sunlight, with their gunner dead,
one engine gone - the type was out-of-date -
blood on the fuselage turning brown from red:
knew it was finished, looking at the sea
which shone back patterns in kaleidoscope,
knew that their shadow would meet them by the way,
close and catch at them, drown their single hope:
sat in this tattered scarecrow of the sky
hearing it cough, the great plane catching
now the first dark clouds upon her wing-base
patching the great tear, in evening mockery;
so two men waited, saw the third dead face,
and wondered when the wind would let them die.
John Bayliss (1919-2008) was a British Poet & Literary Editor who served with the RAF during World War 2. Born in Gloucestershire he was an undergraduate of St Catherines College in Cambridge.
The Pilots' Paradise by O.C. Chave
High above Betelgeuse, they say,
Beyond Orion’s questing eyes,
Ten million star-strewn years away,
There hangs a pilots’ paradise.
Thither when airmen’s bodies fall
Their spirits climb on eager wing
To greet old comrades and recall
Old days of earthward sojourning.
They talk of flak, intruders, beams,
Of dummy runs and how to weave,
Sorties and Strikes, and tales like dreams
Which none but airmen would believe.
From aerodromes like cloth of green
Mid cloudless skies for ever blue
They sport themselves; and each machine
Is every morning bright and new.
And every pilot when he lands
Three-pointed sweeps the glossy lawn;
With young keen eye and strong young hands
He climbs to meet each glowing dawn.
What dawns are those, what noonday sun
From which no enemies descend,
What flights when duty here is done
To enter at your log-book’s end!
Flight Lieutenant Owen Cecil Chave (1912-1943) was the Son of Sir Benjamin Chave, K.B.E., and Lady Chave (m.s. Morgan), of Highfield, Southampton, he was married to Joan Sanders. Serving as a Pilot with 15 Squadron his Stirling Aircraft (BF448) was shot down by a night-fighter on the 14th Feb 1943 whilst taking part in an operation to Cologne. All seven of the crew lost their lives & are buried at Heverlee War Cemetery in Belgium.
Untitled Poem by Jackie Poulton, 1945
'The WAAF was started, I believe,
Six years ago today.
They couldn't do without us now
Despite what airmen say.
I can't think what the airmen did
Before the women came
To cheer them up and mend their socks
And join in work and game.
When all the WAAF are WAAF no more
And airmen work alone,
They'll think with sighs of girls who made
The service home from home
They'll wish that we were back again,
And talk of "Good Old Days",
Instead of laughing at our trials
And lack of service ways...
The NAAFI and the Sally Ann
Will look a trifle bare,
With only airmen handing round,
No WAAF to meet them there.
We know that you will miss us girls
Whatever you may say,
Because we've shared your service life
In every kind of way.
But when we all go home once more
And are no longer WAAF,
I'm sure we shall look back with pride
On serving with the RAF.'
Not much is known about WAAF Jackie Poulton other than the fact that she was a General Duties Clerk who trained at RAF Kirkham in July 1944. She wrote this Untitled Poem in 1945.
The Bomber by J.C.M. Gibb
The patient one, ungainly blackened brute,
Waiting for night to fall,
With wings and breast unfeathered,
Milkless and destructive all.
Like Damocles - his sword above -
It hangs aloft a while,
To keep a vow made to our dead
In air, in sea, on isle.
With nerves of steel and eyes
That pierce the darkness, velvet-deep,
It shears its way from shore to shore
While men are fast asleep;
And youth, our youth so fine,
So loved by all who know,
Go out alone at night with youth
To overcome the foe.
James Clifford McEwen Gibb A.F.C., was born in 1903 in Kingston, Jamaica. Post WW1 he joined the Royal Navy during which time he served on the HMS Ganges before being invalided out. He went on to join the RAF where he initially trained as a pilot before rising through the ranks to Wing Commander. He died in 1982 in Suffolk.
Point of View (Heard in a Butchers Shop, Bolton, Lancashire
Trigger Warning!! The content in this poem may upset, reader discretion advised!
'It's slaughter-nothing more nor less-
The bombing in this war...
A dreadful thing...you'd never guess
The shocking sights we saw
In London, when the Blitz was on...
A leg hung from a tree;
A body with the top half gone
And nowt below the knee;
A hand with wedding ring and all;
Two feet in socks and boots;
A baby's head stuck to a shawl;
An arm torn by the roots;
While here and there was flesh in lumps
They shovelled into sacks.
It proper left us in the dumps...
Sent shivers down our backs.'
'It's slaughter, sir. I've seen a bit
Of what those swine can do.'
His chopper fell and fiercely split
A sheep's head clean in two.
'It's downright murder to attack
Defenceless folk who can't fight back!'
....And swinging dumbly on a hook,
A dead pig gave him such a look.
Parachute Descent by David Bourne
Snap back the canopy,
Pull out the oxygen tube,
Flick the harness pin
And slap out into the air,
Clear of the machine.
Did you ever dream when you were young
Of floating through the air, hung
Between the clouds and the gay
Be-blossomed land?
Did you ever stand and say,
'To sit and think and be alone
In the middle of the sky
Is my one most perfect wish'?
That was a fore-knowing;
You knew that some day
To satiate an inward crave
You must play with the wave
Of a cloud. And shout aloud
In the clean air,
The untouched-by-worldly-things-and-mean air,
With exhilirating living.
You knew that you must float
From the sun above the clouds
To the gloom beneath, from a world
Of rarefied splendour to one
Of cheapened dirt, close-knit
In its effort to encompass man
In death.
Pilot Officer David Bourne was born in Meopham, Kent in 1921.
He was educated at Cranbrook before joining the RAF in July 1940.
He Joined 43 Squadron at RAF Drem, East Lothian in July 1941 & was under training as a Section Leader.
On the 5th September 1941 he took off at 0845hrs in his Hawker Hurricaine from Drem as leader of Black Section with Pilot Officer Mehta as his No 2. Whilst flying over low cloud on the north side of the Firth of Forth at about 1000 feet he made a sharp turn onto a vector which forced his No 2 to enter the cloud which at that time was 10/10ths cloud from 1000 feet to ground level. Pilot Officer Mehta came above the cloud but could see nothing of Bourne. He subsequently learned that Bourne had crashed into a wood on the side of a hill. It seems that he must have lost control of his aircraft as soon as he entered the cloud & was not able to get out of a spin until it was too late.
He was buried the following Wednesday in the RAF Cemetery, Drem (Direleton) with Service Honours.
It is believed that Bourne left approx 140 Poems.
P/O David Bournes Grave at Drem. Image © AAFR
If you think there is a poinant Air Force themed Poem that we should include please get in touch via the contact button below