Det kanoniske stewardessedigt

er åbenbart amerikanske James L. Dickeys "Falling", en moderne Ikaros-rutine, der særdeles ekapansivt fabulerer over en virkelig hændelse, her er begyndelsen (følg link for fortsættelsen):

Falling

By James L. Dickey

"A 29-year-old stewardess fell ... to her
death tonight when she was swept
through an emergency door that sud-
denly sprang open ... The body ...
was found ... three hours after the
accident.                                             
                              —New York Times

The states when they black out and lie there rolling    when they turn

To something transcontinental    move by    drawing moonlight out of the great

One-sided stone hung off the starboard wingtip    some sleeper next to

An engine is groaning for coffee    and there is faintly coming in

Somewhere the vast beast-whistle of space. In the galley with its racks

Of trays    she rummages for a blanket    and moves in her slim tailored

Uniform to pin it over the cry at the top of the door. As though she blew

The door down with a silent blast from her lungs    frozen    she is black

Out finding herself    with the plane nowhere and her body taken by the throat

The undying cry of the void    falling    living    beginning to be something

That no one has ever been and lived through    screaming without enough air

Still neat    lipsticked    stockinged    girdled by regulation    her hat

Still on    her arms and legs in no world    and yet spaced also strangely

With utter placid rightness on thin air    taking her time    she holds it

In many places    and now, still thousands of feet from her death she seems

To slow    she develops interest    she turns in her maneuverable body

To watch it. She is hung high up in the overwhelming middle of things in her

Self    in low body-whistling wrapped intensely    in all her dark dance-weight

Coming down from a marvellous leap    with the delaying, dumfounding ease

Of a dream of being drawn    like endless moonlight to the harvest soil

Of a central state of one’s country    with a great gradual warmth coming

Over her    floating    finding more and more breath in what she has been using

For breath    as the levels become more human    seeing clouds placed honestly

Below her left and right    riding slowly toward them    she clasps it all

To her and can hang her hands and feet in it in peculiar ways    and

Her eyes opened wide by wind, can open her mouth as wide    wider and suck

All the heat from the cornfields    can go down on her back with a feeling

Of stupendous pillows stacked under her    and can turn    turn as to someone

In bed    smile, understood in darkness    can go away    slant    slide

Off tumbling    into the emblem of a bird with its wings half-spread

Or whirl madly on herself    in endless gymnastics in the growing warmth

Of wheatfields rising toward the harvest moon.
(...)"