Poppy

 

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie,
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

-John McCrae, May 3, 1915, written on the battlefront in Belgium

Yesterday was my dad's birthday, today is Veteran's Day. Such it has always been. I think of my dad, my beat-all-odds, handsome, silly, steady dad, and then I think of him again in uniform. Year after year two dad days stick together.

Because I am a daddy's girl, because I am proud to be an American, and because I have a unique religious perspective in how I view the land which is my land from California to the New York island, I well up during patriotic songs and blink away the blur caused from "In Flanders Fields".

"In Flanders Fields" turned 100 this year and remains one of the most celebrated war poems in history, but fathers have been fighting and dying for their children since time began. They fought for the future, they fought in hope, they died standing for something.

My America the Beautiful, founded on God in whom we trust and fertilized by so many lives over the centuries, has become a raucous battlefield botched by individual indulgence. Nobleness once stood on the shoulders of forefather giants, its biceps bulged from holding the torch of liberty high. Are the newer generations too lazy to lift? Many sputter and spit fire at anything blocking their cruise-controlled route to Easy Street.

Who will hallow the soil our founding fathers rest in? Who will catch and carry the torches flung from Flanders? Who will bravely sing like a lark above the deafening buzz of current contention? Someone has to, or America will soon awaken from her glorious American dream.

Photo of my 23-year old dad in Vietnam, 1967. I'm proud that my daughter calls him every year to thank him for his service. One other written piece I love, especially today: 

I've just been told that over 3,000 of our American boys died in the first eleven days of the invasion of France.

Who died? I'll tell you who died.

Not so many years ago, there was a little boy sleeping in his crib. In the night, it thundered and lightninged. He woke and cried out in fear. His mother came and fixed his blankets better and said, "Don't cry. Nothing will ever hurt you."

He died...

There was another kid with a new bicycle. When he came past your house he rode no-hands while he folded the evening paper in a block and threw it against your door. You used to jump when you heard the bang. You said, "Some day, I'm going to give that kid a good talking-to." He died.  

Then there were two kids. One said to the other, "I'll do all the talking. I just want you to come along to give me nerve." They came to your door. The one who had promised to do all the talking said, "Would you like your lawn mowed, Mister?"

They died together. They gave each other nerve...

They all died.

And I don't know how any one of us here at home can sleep peacefully tonight unless we are sure in our hearts that we have done our part all the way along the line.

From the essay "Who Died?" by Betty Smith, who also authored of one of my top five novels, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.