Happy Memorial Day
May 26, 2008
Hopefully, you are enjoying the day off somewhere. But we still want to highlight folks in our community who are sharing about the importance of this holiday for Americans. (I know not every member of the network is American. So if you have a similar holiday in your country, this might be a good time to tell us about it.)
Robert Hruzek of Middle Zone Musings writes about the Washington, D.C. Vietnam Memorial in “Memorial Day, 2008.” He includes that iconic picture of the wall. And Robert is such a good conversational writer:
Today we in the United States recognize our debt of gratitude to those who have given their lives for the cause of freedom while in the military service of our country. Read more…
J. C. Schaap of Stuff in the Basement writes a moving essay about how Memorial Day changes when the names read on the list are soldiers who have died recently. In “A Year of Morning Thanks: Memorial Day 2008,” Schaap says:
Okay, this from an old anti-war protester. The annual Memorial Day celebration in town where I live had long ago become wooden. The same man reads the names of the dead while surrounded by a profusion of flags… But then, just two years ago, things changed dramatically… a name was added to the list of fallen. Read more…
As for me, Marcus Goodyear, the guy browsing through blog posts to feature this morning on HighCallingBlogs.com, I found myself remembering one of my favorite American poets, Yusef Komunyakaa, and his elegy for the Vietnam War, “Facing It.” It’s a fitting poem for Memorial Day:
I turn
this way–the stone lets me go.
I turn that way–I’m inside
the Vietnam Veterans Memorial
again, depending on the light
to make a difference.
…I touch the name Andrew Johnson;
I see the booby trap’s white flash.
Read the full poem at Poets.org…
