Tomorrow, I fervently hope that there will be someone out in front of my favorite grocery store with containers of "Buddy Poppies". Going into town to get my poppy with my Dad, who was in WWII was a big deal. I am pretty sure I didn't grasp their meaning, but I knew they were special and were in honor of soldiers. When I see one I think of him, he was a disabled Vet.
My collection of poppies secured to the visors of my car grows year by year. And so does my interest in the history of Memorial day. In 1918, after reading In Flanders Fields by John McCrae, written in 1915, Moine Micheals began advocating that the Poppy should become the national emblem of Remembrance. In August of 1920 American Legion designated the that a memorial poppy be worn by its members in remembrance, a month later the American Legion met again and officially adopted the Flanders Field Poppy as official emblem.
I find the following image so powerful, Within walking distance of my home is a small cemetery where rest the mortal remains of soldiers who served from the Revolutionary war forward.
~~~~~~Joyce Kilmer
"Dulce et decorum est"
The bugle echoes shrill and sweet,
But not of war it sings to-day.
The road is rhythmic with the feet
Of men-at-arms who come to pray.
The roses blossom white and red
On tombs where weary soldiers lie;
Flags wave above the honored dead
And martial music cleaves the sky.
Above their wreath-strewn graves we kneel,
They kept the faith and fought the fight.
Through flying lead and crimson steel
They plunged for Freedom and the Right.
May we, their grateful children, learn
Their strength, who lie beneath this sod,
Who went through fire and death to earn
At last the accolade of God.
In shining rank on rank arrayed
They march, the legions of the Lord;
He is their Captain unafraid,
The Prince of Peace . . . Who brought a sword.
