War, remembrance and summer

Two months after marching through Boston,

half the regiment was dead;

at the dedication,

William James could almost hear the bronze Negroes breathe.

-- From Robert Lowell’s “For the Union Dead.’’ It refers to  the Robert Gould Shaw and Massachusetts 54th Regiment Memorial,  above, across Beacon Street from the Massachusetts State House.

Ah, Memorial Day: In somber remembrance of the dead of our wars and in celebration, especially in America’s cooler climes, of the coming of summer.  A paradoxical holiday.

My strongest memories of the day are of the Memorial Day Parade in my little hometown. In the maximum lushness of the season, with the fragrance of cut, wet grass and gasoline from the lawn mowers on the common, the men (and a few women) marched, accompanied, I recall, with patriotic music by the high school band. They marched under the elm trees, of which there  were still many, although Dutch elm disease was taking a heavy toll.

Most of them were men in their thirties who had fought in World War II, although there were still plenty of World War Ivets around, too. I remember that my father, who had been a Navy lieutenant in the war, and most of his fellow veteran friends, disliked being asked to march in the parade. They had no desire to put on their uniforms again.

Of course, we kids were still in school, which didn't end for another three weeks, but we saw the broad sunlit uplands of summer stretching ahead to the horizon that day. Time seemed to move so slowly then.

-- Robert Whitcomb