Andy Keech - Skies Call

Rick Nelson (rec.skydiving 2000-1-19) wrote:
> Whatever happened to Andy Keech?

  I don't know but in the category of it's a small world type tales
  I was coming back from Australia in 1976 and ran into him in the
  Sydney airport. Turns out we were sitting next to each other on
  the same flight.

  I also remember him writing me in the 80's when I was busy trying
  to turn into Ben Daniels, asking me if I was "on the lam" :-)

  Australian tales bubbling up ... Did you know that when the Australian
  10 man team was flying to New Zealand in 1970 for the first world
  RW meet that they drank the plane dry? Of course it was only one
  plane and we're talking Australian skydivers here so I guess that's
  not such an amazing fact after all :-) :-)

I ran into Andy many times around the world.

I remember when Skies Call came out reading it with great interest,
and being slammed when I got to the last page and read this poem.
I was not yet at the height of my involvement and it filled me with
such a sense of poignance and grief and foreboding.




             From Skies Call Vol 1 by Andy Keech
             -----------------------------------


                This is his last good season,
                I wonder what we'd find
                   If we could see the reason,
                   and what is on his mind
                He started in the Fifties,
                   what memories of those years
        Of youth and high adventure and experimental fears.

                He jumped at small town fairs
                after long nights in a train
                   Slept with lonely aircraft
                   in hangars when it rained
                Countless half forgotten faces
                   of strangers on the way
        A sinking sense of loss when cloud blew low all day

                The friendships formed a decade back,
                most precious in his mind
                   A special type, the selfless few,
                   his pioneering kind
                He gladly helped his sport mature,
                   while every year it's grown
        His ranks are sadly thinning, he's practically alone.

                What weight is on his shoulders now,
                a business, wife or son?
                   He'd felt youth was eternal,
                   life, everlasting fun
                He lived the highest aspirations
                   that ever crossed your mind
        The meets you hope to jump in, he's already left behind.

                His gear still carries dust
                from drop zones round the world
                   He stood with national team
                   and saw his flag unfurled
                So if our ranks he now must leave,
                   no reason should be sought
        Respect his silent privacy, the turmoil of his thought.