A Sky Full of Holes on Remembrance Day

Today is Veterans Day-we once called it Armistice Day because that's what the day on which World War I ended was called, back before we had to put a roman numeral after World War (we are the smartest species on the planet, the crown of creation, but we still had to have two worldwide conflagrations to realize how horrible they were).

"Elizabeth, that thundercloud is creeping up the Empire Hill. There's shadows on the overpass and puddles in the old dirt path. Peoria lay silent still in the belly of the overgrown; all quiet on the open plain. Footprints to the family plot where evermore will restless sorrow sleep in a broken heap."

Many nations across the globe, to include our neighbor to the north, call today Remembrance Day and I like that title. We have a day to recall those in uniform who gave their lives for our country, Memorial Day, and I have always appreciated the idea of a separate day set aside to honor everyone's service.

"Elizabeth, our fathers came and settled where the ground was flat; drew water from the Indian wells, cut timber from the rolling fells. Grandaddy-o, bled hearth and home for oiling the company gears. No rest for the errant ones. Godspeed their reckless sons who evermore play their forefathers' hands On the foreign sands."

We had people serving in the military before we even had a country. After all, this is where the American Revolution started with farmers and shopkeepers grabbing muskets and forcing the world's most powerful nation at that time, the British Crown, after a profuse flow of blood, to concede to the inevitable and allow all those up and down the Eastern Seaboard to become the United States of America (not that we've always been or even are to this day).

"Cemetery Guns go bang, bang, bang, shooting all the sky full of holes."

And while it's hard sometimes to see the line from the Battle of Lexington to Lexington Avenue and from low rent districts everywhere to the streets of the District of Columbia, it's all a part of what every veteran made possible by her and his service. The best way to say 'thank you' is to safeguard and use wisely the freedoms that service and sacrifice made possible and make them a part of your legacy for those who will follow you.
-bill kenny