[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 60 (Thursday, April 29, 1999)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E822-E823]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        ``KITTY HAWK REVISITED''

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. TAMMY BALDWIN

                              of wisconsin

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, April 29, 1999

  Ms. BALDWIN. Mr. Speaker, today I would like to submit a poem 
entitled ``Kitty Hawk Revisited'' into the Record. This poem was 
written by Ms. Marion Brimm Rewey of Verona, Wisconsin, and I believe 
she captures the adventurous spirit of the Wright brothers first flight 
with her words.

                          Kitty Hawk Revisited

                        (By Marion Brimm Rewey)

     I wish I had seen them, the quiet men who built bicycles and 
           odd machines, pushing and dragging their da Vinci dream 
           over sea grass and sand.
     It might have been a good day to change the world, full of 
           cumulus clouds, strings of pelicans flying ragged 
           formations, a sandpiper or two and curlew calls . . . 
           and the wind of December purling off the Atlantic, 
           plucked wires and struts, hummed such music as had not 
           been heard since sirens lured Ulysses to forbidden 
           shores.
     So, while running seas rearranged the sand and every man 
           stood with feet planted firmly on solid ground, here, 
           under untried skies, on Kill Devil Hill, a hand-made 
           skeleton, like a prehistoric bird, teetered on the 
           ledge of the last frontier.
     In the broken silence of birds, wind, tide, Orville belly-
           flopped on the waiting wing.
     Then came a universe splitting roar-propellers spun, sand 
           exploded and ballooned,

[[Page E823]]

           chains rattled and slapped through metal guides, the 
           engine's pitch climbed to a scream.
     The plane shuddered, rocked like a cradle, lumbered over the 
           dunes, rose, hung between ocean and space, floundered, 
           twisted sideways, steadied, caught the wind and flew!
     to touch the moon.

     

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