Memorial Day
a day originally
set aside
to recall
and remember
World War I
inspired by a poem
a place of the battle dead
Flanders Field.
Red Poppies
Veterans
Cemeteries
Loved Ones gone
And now, too
Parents
Grandparents and Great-Grandparents
Uncles and Aunts
a Brother
Sister
a Spouse
and friends
To memorize, like a favorite Bible verse, and hold dear tender moments with our cherished beloved no longer here.
To honor them and their story;
and stories of ancestors we never knew except those handed down from one family member to another. Each a part of the fabric of life, adding to who we are. I think of my great-great uncle, Andrew Gavin Norton who died of influenza in France in WWI. I picture him close in age to my hero, my Grandpa Cooney, who also fought in France during WWI. I wonder if they knew each other. If they were on the same ship going overseas. If they were in the same camp. While my Mother never knew her uncle, she always referred to him as Uncle Andy and would tell my brother and me stories about him , and of his sad demise in the First World War, and how his younger siblings looked up to him; our Uncle Joe and Uncle Lee and Aunt Nor and Grandma Blanche, and how his Mother, our great great Grandmother, Mary Gavin Norton - who passed away when I was 9, received a check for six dollars from the U.S. government every year until her passing because her oldest son died in France during the Great war. My Mother would tell how she, with her family would drive 91 miles from Council Bluffs to Odebolt every Memorial Day - their car loaded with freshly picked Peonies from their yard to lay at gravesites at St. Martin’s cemetery there. Including Uncle Andy’s. Mother would always smile telling of this special time and how they would sing, and eat a sack lunch on the way, and visit all day with Aunt Mag, and other extended family listening to tales of far away Ireland.
In a recent text from my cousin, Shauna she mused , even though Memorial Day is tearful and bittersweet, those who know great loss continue to lovingly celebrate those who have gone ahead. And I do mean “ahead”, K- Minnie. Remember when we were little and veterans dressed in their uniform would hand out little red artificial poppies? At the time, and having no real reference to their meaning, I just thought it was so sweet that they loved red flowers and wanted to share them. Every Memorial weekend from probably age 4 to 12, I would wait at the kitchen window and watch for Grandma and Grandpa Packard (Shauna’s maternal grandparents) to pull in the driveway . I sat in the backseat of their red Lincoln, a little space saved just for me next to the side window, and the rest of the backseat and floor was filled with buckets of water exploding with peonies and roses from their garden. The trek began. No freeways! So we meandered through SLC, Provo, Springville, Spanish Fork stopping at all the cemeteries. My grandma had 11 siblings. So there were uncles and aunts and great this and that. They would bring folding chairs, picnic baskets and visit all day; talking, greeting. Tears, laughter, hugs, homegrown flowers, memories. A slower time and pace. They knew what helped mend broken hearts. They had experienced a lot of it. All of it cathartic, to help those who hadn’t yet gone.
I appreciate all my cousin shared; her sweet reminiscing about loving grandparents, and Memorial Day past.
About this day, and what it really represents; the remembrance of others no longer on this earth. Of those who have died defending our country, his or her great sacrifice to a cause beyond themselves.
May 30, 2010 brought another kind of Memorial Day remembrance to me, and to our family. The sudden, unexpected death of my younger brother, Walt. He was 55, and suffered from a massive heart attack. No goodbyes, no last hugs, or gentle words. He was gone in a matter of seconds. My baby brother, whom I adored from the moment Mama brought him home from the hospital. And our Mother and Dad, so heartbroken and sad.
In giving the eulogy at my brother’s funeral 12 years ago, I read one of e.e. cummings most poignant poems. Since then my precious Mother and darling husband have passed away. So today, Memorial Day 2022 I once again share this poem by e.e. Cummings. For Walt, our Mother and Gary. I remember them with clarity and deep love. Longing for their presence, to make me whole again. Until then I trust somehow they’ll know,
i carry your heart with me (i carry it in my heart)
i am never without it (anywhere I go my dear,
and whatever is done
by only me is your doing, my darling)
i fear no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want
no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you
here is the deepest secret nobody knows
here is the root of the root and bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide
and this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)
