May 21, 2025
Memorial Day
As we prepare for the different ways we will celebrate Memorial Day this coming weekend, some of us venturing for the first time together to Shrine Mont, some of us remaining at Oak Hill, others traveling elsewhere, be sure to make time to set aside time to remember those who have died in service to our country.
Originally, Memorial Day was called Decoration Day, from the early tradition of decorating graves with flowers, wreaths, and flags. This day was first widely observed on May 30, 1868, to commemorate the sacrifices of Civil War soldiers.
The End and the Beginning
A poem by Wisława Szymborska; Translated By Joanna Trzeciak
After every war
someone has to clean up.
Things won’t
straighten themselves up, after all.
Someone has to push the rubble
to the side of the road,
so the corpse-filled wagons
can pass.
Someone has to get mired
in scum and ashes,
sofa springs,
splintered glass,
and bloody rags.
Someone has to drag in a girder
to prop up a wall.
Someone has to glaze a window,
rehang a door.
Photogenic it’s not,
and takes years.
All the cameras have left
for another war.
We’ll need the bridges back,
and new railway stations.
Sleeves will go ragged
from rolling them up.
Someone, broom in hand,
still recalls the way it was.
Someone else listens
and nods with unsevered head.
But already there are those nearby
starting to mill about
who will find it dull.
From out of the bushes
sometimes someone still unearths
rusted-out arguments
and carries them to the garbage pile.
Those who knew
what was going on here
must make way for
those who know little.
And less than little.
And finally as little as nothing.
In the grass that has overgrown
causes and effects,
someone must be stretched out
blade of grass in his mouth
gazing at the clouds.
