Memorial Day 5/30/16 Frank and Janet Lamb Sister Cities Bridge, Pedestrian bridge at Genesee Crossroads Park, Bragdon Place.
On Memorial Day, about 60 people gathered to read the names of people killed in current wars and — if they chose — to drop roses into the Genesee River.
Time Warner Cable and Channel 8 News covered the ceremony.
Remembrance and Hope: A Memorial Day service of remembrance of the victims of the current wars. 9 a.m. May 30. Frank and Janet Lamb Sister Cities Bridge, Pedestrian bridge at Genesee Crossroads Park, Bragdon Place.
from The long vigil for peace on the corner of East and Goodman
The event is organized by members of the every Sunday peace vigil on the corner of East and Goodman.
The dropping of the roses. Pedestrian bridge at Genesee Crossroads Park. Memorial Day, 2016
Alex White. see Green Party candidate Alex White offers plans to reduce violence
People come for different reasons, but especially because they find the mostly silent ceremony a fitting way to reflect, collectively and individually, on peace and war.
Alex White — who you’ve met before — would later walk with the Veterans for Peace at the downtown Parade. Lilita Lassen-Ward said she did not personally have a connection with veterans, but for her this was a better way than parades and marching soldiers to honor and remember those killed in war.
Thomas Moore
Like Lilita, I’ve never experienced war. I did live in Kosovo about ten years after the 1999 war. The painful memories still fresh, the subject was taboo for most people; in the countryside we still had to watch out for signs saying, Unexploded Ordinance. When I saw the roses floating on the Genesee, I thought of the flowers on the Martyr’s Wall in Pristina.
Memorial Wall dedicated to the Martrys of the 1999 war, Nene Tereze Boulevard, Pristina, Kosovo, 2008: “Don’t step on our blood. . . don’t let us disappear” from: Tiranna with Love. And a dash of Pristina
The ceremony was first held Memorial Day, 2003, a few months after the Invasion of Iraq, about the same time the peace vigil on the corner of East and Goodman began.
Julie Everitt (left) and Carol Kramer, Washington, D.C. 2003 from The long vigil for peace on the corner of East and Goodman
As explained by one of the organizers, Thomas Moore, the ceremony honors all those killed in current wars, but he also wants us to remember the killing has hardly ended in Iraq. Last year 16 or 17,000 people died by violence, including many children. Thomas cites a reference made by Pope John Paul II on how an invasion of Iraq could open “the gates of hell.” Pope John Paul II did not live to know just how prophetic he would be.
Thomas emphasizes that Iraq — like current wars — was another televised spectacle of a war that seemingly directly affected few in the American public. I was in Providence, RI in a sports bar when the news of the invasion broke. Viewing the first footage — as the other TV’s showed their games — one man said he was going home to watch, “Shock and Awe.”
The roses floating up river.
Thomas thinks of Shock and Awe differently. Thankfully, he has never experienced anything like Shock and Awe, and can’t fully imagine what it’s like. But when Thomas hears and sees fireworks — pointing around to the many places you can see fireworks from Crossroads Park — he wonders what those who have lived though war feel when they see and hear the exploding sky lit up and the staccato white bursts of noise.
with Denise Williams [Photo: Ms. Rogers] Memorial Day Parade, 2016 see On Memorial Day and The Army of the Republic of Viet Nam
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On the Memorial Day Parade and The Army of the Republic of Viet Nam
