They flew in the cold,
in the
pitch-blackness of an evil sky,
riddled with bullets.
No radios.
No parachutes.
2 bombs.
Engines cut
on the Polikarpov
U-2,
to creep
up on sleeping
monsters,
to visit their dreams
with light,
and bring the Reich
and Reign
closer to hell.
Started them up
in mission, resolute,
crawling out on the
wings,
on a limb,
for the rest of us.
Copyright 2012
Jennifer Wagner
Did you know women flew airplanes in combat in WWII? I didn’t until I visited the Flying Heritage Museum recently. The 588th Night Bomber Regiment
was made entirely of women who flew the PO-2.
They would sneak up on the enemy by cutting their engines, drop bombs,
and then restart their engines to get away; even crawling out on the wings,
mid-flight when necessary, to get the props going. And then go and do it all over again
throughout the freezing night. Truly heroic. The Nazis began to refer to them as Night Witches because of the terror this tactic inflicted. Seemed like the right time of year to write
about them.
The photos: (top) a few of these
amazing aviators. And (right) the PO-2, the tail
number honors the 23 who earned "Hero of the Soviet
Union" citations. And (left) the lettering on the fuselage translates
into "Revenge for Dusya," a tribute to the first Night Witch to be killed in combat. 30 of them were lost
in all. If you click any of the links here I recommend the "Revenge for Dusya"...really some fascinating reading from the book A Dance with Death.
Linking up to OpenLinkNight at dVerse, an amazing site for poetry.