To a Warplane

As you wait in your hidden hangar,

being of such sleek beauty

now bending even the faint moonlight

gleaming along your body

into the nightstreak of rockets,

hundred-million dollar angel,

nuclear deliverer,

swept-wing, black-silver metrical

veined and blooded with secret

electronic and hydraulic systems,

fierce and lovely essence, American

numina of soft cockpit leather, guardian

of the deadly flame and of the power,

thee, for my recitative, thee.