Archive for graves

Memorial Day: Elephants in the Cemetery

On Memorial Day, an elephant and her calf are shaded by trees as ducks and geese waddle by the pond at Milton Cemetery.  The life-size topiaries are covered in ivy, and the symbolism of their deep family bonds and long memories are the reasons for their art installation in this place of remembrance.  Elephants never […]

Healing the unsaid with the dead

[Photo taken in 1973 of Suzette and her father, Steve Martinez, who passed away in 1982.] Lately memories of loved ones, now gone, are tinged with “I wish I told them [fill in the blank].”  Recently, I had the chance. A meditative exercise is designed to heal the unsaid with direct conversation. I tried it […]

Memorial Day: Tender Attention Needed

  The dead have badges and I stop to read them: 1941 World War 1945, Women’s Relief Corps.147, The American Legion and more.  Small American flags flutter next to soldiers’ graves at the Milton (Mass.) Cemetery in preparation for Memorial Day. At a glance souls, long gone, wave across the acres, “Over here!” “I served!” […]