Memorial Day
By Bruce R. Partain
Memorial Day is celebrated by many Americans as the start of summer, a three-day weekend to gather family and friends over barbecue, golf or leisurely bike rides. It might include an extended road trip or a music festival.
Others will visit the cemetery to place decorations – flowers and flags, and call up the memory of a loved one who truly gave all for a cause.
It is an almost-sacred holiday to those Americans, not a celebration, but a recollection of sacrifice.
Ninety-nine years ago, in the Great War, a U.S. Army infantry sergeant was engaged in dangerous duty, leading his men on reconnaissance of German forces.
His unit could see him positioned on a small hill, apparently scanning the landscape for their target - an enemy machine gun location. He did not answer their calls, and they found him dead – struck by a sniper’s bullet.
Sgt. Alfred Joyce Kilmer, age 31, was already a celebrated poet, best known for his simple homage, “Trees.” He had volunteered with the New York National Guard, and after a relatively safe assignment as a statistician, he requested transfer to frontline military intelligence.
A few months before his death, he wrote about other comrades falling during battle.
As Memorial Day enters our collective experience once again, here is Joyce Kilmer's commemoration of his brothers in arms. The poem was published in Stars and Stripes, and read at Kilmer's own burial in France.
Rouge Bouquet
By Joyce Kilmer
In a wood they call the Rouge Bouquet
There is a new-made grave to-day,
Built by never a spade nor pick
Yet covered with earth ten metres thick.
There lie many fighting men,
Dead in their youthful prime,
Never to laugh nor love again
Nor taste the Summertime.
For Death came flying through the air
And stopped his flight at the dugout stair,
Touched his prey and left them there,
Clay to clay.
He hid their bodies stealthily
In the soil of the land they fought to free
And fled away.
Now over the grave abrupt and clear
Three volleys ring;
And perhaps their brave young spirits hear
The bugle sing:
“Go to sleep!
Go to sleep!
Slumber well where the shell screamed and fell.
Let your rifles rest on the muddy floor,
You will not need them any more.
Danger’s past;
Now at last,
Go to sleep!”
There is on earth no worthier grave
To hold the bodies of the brave
Than this place of pain and pride
Where they nobly fought and nobly died.
Never fear but in the skies
Saints and angels stand
Smiling with their holy eyes
On this new-come band.
St. Michael’s sword darts through the air
And touches the aureole on his hair
As he sees them stand saluting there,
His stalwart sons;
And Patrick, Brigid, Columkill
Rejoice that in veins of warriors still
The Gael’s blood runs.
And up to Heaven’s doorway floats,
From the wood called Rouge Bouquet
A delicate cloud of bugle notes
That softly say:
“Farewell!
Farewell!
Comrades true, born anew, peace to you!
Your souls shall be where the heroes are
And your memory shine like the morning-star.
Brave and dear,
Shield us here.
Farewell!”