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For Kirstin and Andee.

Another burial

It's hard not to think of all the people I have buried since arriving at Trinity... fifteen last year, two this year thus far, eight to ten the year before. A generation of The Episcopal Church is dying literally before my eyes. Of these funerals, I have actually known the deceased in four or five cases. The rest are phone calls the office gets from one of the three funeral parlors in town. In these cases, the deceased are members of the communion of saints and what I call the alumni/alumnae society — those folks who twenty-thirty years ago had a connection with the church but since then have fallen away. No matter how much I entreat the survivors to come back and check up on them, they don't. I am beginning to wonder if I should hang out in the graveyard?

In any event, today's interment was in a beautiful graveyard on a beautiful day in May before the black flies have emerged (and they will be FIERCE this year for all the rain). The cemetery is on Rte 103 in Cuttingsville; it looks across the road to Hateful Mountain (dunno why it's called that). The maple tree leaves are just about to open fully so they are wonderfully effervescent. [These photos are pulled off the web because the winter 'house' that curators put over the statue and door to the mausoleum are still up.]

What distinguishes this graveyard from others is the mausoleum at its entrance. Local tanning magnate John Porter Bowman's daughter died in 1879, the following year his wife died and two years after that he built this mausoleum complete with his statue, a grieving husband and father bringing flowers to his daughter and wife. He then built his house (now a B&B) across the road so he would not have to go far. It is reminiscent of Victor Hugo's poem, Demain dès l'aube....

Demain, dès l'aube, à l'heure où blanchit la campagne,
Je partirai. Vois-tu, je sais que tu m'attends.
J'irai par la forêt, j'irai par la montagne.
Je ne puis demeurer loin de toi plus longtemps.

Je marcherai les yeux fixés sur mes pensées,
Sans rien voir au dehors, sans entendre aucun bruit,
Seul, inconnu, le dos courbé, les mains croisées,
Triste, et le jour pour moi sera comme la nuit.

Je ne regarderai ni l'or du soir qui tombe,
Ni les voiles au loin descendant vers Harfleur,
Et quand j'arriverai, je mettrai sur ta tombe
Un bouquet de houx vert et de bruyère en fleur.

Tomorrow, at dawn, in the hour when the countryside becomes white,
I will leave. You see, I know that you are waiting for me.
I will go by the forest, I will go by the mountain.
I cannot stay far from you any longer.

I will walk the eyes fixed on my thoughts,
Without seeing anything outside, nor hearing any noise,
Alone, unknown, the back curved, the hands crossed,
Sad, and the day for me will be like the night.

I will not look at the gold of the evening which falls,
Nor the faraway sails descending towards Harfleur.
And when I arrive, I will put on your tomb
A green bouquet of holly and flowering heather.

An empty word

The news pundits keep talking about how Osama bin Laden's death will 'bring closure' to those who lost family members on 11 September 2001 or in the war fronts following that fateful day.

The word, 'closure,' should be banned when put in terms of mourning someone's death. We so want as a society to wrap things up neatly and put them away, especially when it comes to someone's dying.

The overuse of this word in the reports and the scenes of people jumping around wrapped up in US flags and chanting USA is indicative of our culture methinks.

Meanwhile, I still try to understand it all. And I won't. So I light candles instead.