What Things Are Made Of

Day Before Memorial Day

73 Day Before Memorial Day Let the usual mockingbirds, like gold-chained rappers perched on your satellite dish, holler down their boasts and jeers. Let sun slide toward your window one inch at a time, a rising light-tide that lifts you toward another forgettable day. No need yet for gentlemen to start their engines. Tomorrow will be time to see how fast people can drive to honor those who died with bowels bayoneted, limbs blown off, skulls pulverized, or more slowly of typhus, gangrene, septicemia so that you, snoozing in your king-sized bed, can feel martyred when your cat plucks the door-screen, yowling to come in. As you rolled grounders to your son last night, that cat pranced by, a squealing rat dangling like a Fu Manchu. She dropped it behind the hedge to torture more, the way you tossed still-hooked bluegills back into White Oak Bayou to force out more fight. As you scrape rat guts off your porch, try not to think of wars your ancestors survived, passing their murderous DNA to you, which must be why you ache to gun your way through traffic jams, and garrote authorities who set serial killers free, but won’t let you shoot BBs in your own backyard. It must be why, watching The Last Samurai, your five-year-old grabs his plastic sword, hacks the air, and screams so loud your wife threatens to slap him if he doesn’t “simmer down,” and let her enjoy the on-screen butchery. While terrorists build atom bombs, and Operation Break-a-Camel’s-Back drags on and on, you can relax with the sports page full of projectiles and clubs, 74 hits and kills and sudden death. It’s all in fun. Have some, for the love of Christ (who also died for you, and not comfortably). Save for tomorrow your reflections on the custard-brains who think they can scold Hitlers out of their Dachaus. Give up your shame at having killed no enemies. You can slip by Memorial Day the way you snuck past Vietnam. (What joy to hear, “unfit to serve.” For once, the government was right!) You’ll swim today at your father-in-law’s club, its yearly dues more than your father’s salary. Savor the pool’s tanzanite blue. Plunge into familial love, and come up sputtering. Sip Irish Cream after coaching your son’s tee-ball team to a rare victory. Toss pinecone grenades at a yapping wiener dog. Count yourself blessed that your country holds a place called Dickeyville Grotto, and any time you like, you can go there. ...