Memorial Day 2006

I live near cemeteries.

Headstone

Ghosts walk my street, always behind us, just around the corner, with cries we cannot hear, wounds we cannot bind, restless hungry ghosts. It’s too late for them, their time is past, we have covered them with the earth and made up stories about their lives, how they were loved and honored, and we shed real tears not for them but for our memories of them, our twisted memories, how they would have wanted it, yes, they would have wanted it just this way, vengeance for their deaths, proof for their lives. They faced the enemy, they saved the world, their flesh was torn, the glory and the horror burned their eyes, and yes, they would have wanted it this way. We will follow them down, our holy dead, and we will kill for them, and we will be killed, and in this way we will honor them.

Oh, my sad, foolish father, my sweet, innocent mother, I won’t go to that boneyard, but I’ll dream of you today, your songs of hate and love, and I will weep that you have learned the last lesson, and you can no longer teach me.

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Click here to read my 2005 Memorial Day post.

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