The poem is originally by John Gillespie Magee Jr (see http://www.davidpbrown.co.uk/poetry/john-magee.html for the entire poem). See also this google search for more stuff.

Quite a famous passage. Used by Reagan while speaking of the Challenger crew after that shuttle disaster...

As found at http://www.qunl.com/rees0008.html...
Oh I Have Slipped The Surly Bonds of Earth... Put Out My Hand And Touched the Face of God
How did these lines become so famous? Because they are a classic case of a speechwriter having the appropriate quotation to hand at the right moment. On 28 January 1986, in his TV broadcast to the nation on the day of the space shuttle Challenger disaster, President Reagan concluded: `We will never forget them this morning as they prepared for their journey and waved goodbye and slipped the surly bonds of earth to touch the face of God.'
It happened while I was in late grade school, and the disaster and Reagan's speech made quite an impression on my young mind.
Update: More references

--MidLifeXis

In reply to Re: The Surly Bonds of Earth by MidLifeXis
in thread The Surly Bonds of Earth by ack

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