Letter to the Editor: Memorial Day is not just a three-day weekend

To the Editor:

I thank Lowell L. Engle of Harpers Ferry for his letter to the editor May 10, 2017. The Lincoln Gettysburg Address was part of the founding Memorial Day services. The Address does not parse well in English, rather to be heard with the heart.

Memorial Day is not a “three-day weekend celebration” as so many know now. Do you know when Memorial Day really is?

Memorial Day is a single day for the task “... that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain,” as is stated in the Gettysburg Address. It is a time to honor those, wherever they are buried, who fought for our nation in the Civil War, Spanish-American War, World Wars I and II, Korean War and all others since.

In my hometown in Kansas, May 30 (yes, the real Memorial Day) we did such not for the convenience of the day. Was it convenient for those brave men the day they fell in battle?

My dad, a veteran of World War II, spent many days every year before the Memorial Day service stumbling through a poem to recite. Besides his other duties as a veteran for the day, he had managed his tears with his head held low and a crack in his voice.

Below, I will give you the little poem to contemplate. The life of John McCrae, the author, and Flanders Field are a story in their own right.

In Flanders Field
by John McCrae

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.

How many “break faith” because they know not the history or meaning of Memorial Day or why there is a Poppy Day. Lowell is right, “it is a pity.”

Memorizing poems and reciting historical addresses is not a pass time. It is an effort of the heart for those who write them, and those who recite them on the real Memorial Day. The heart takes time to think. The heart takes time to listen. Perhaps time is the really misunderstood.

Sue Fry Vonderohe
New Albin