By Satina Tolman
For many, Memorial Day now marks the start of summer days,
Of crowded camps and barbecue smoke drifting through the haze.
Storefront windows flash their signs in bold and blinding red,
“Mattress Sale!” the banners shout in letters brightly spread.
The highways fill with travelers, the lakes with laughing sound,
While rows of silent marble stones stand watch across the ground.
And somewhere there’s a mother with trembling hands and glistening eyes
Who kneels beside a weathered grave and quietly breaks inside.
For some, this day means little more than one more day to rest,
A long weekend of sunshine, shopping, and food enjoyed with friends.
But others walk through cemeteries in the early morning rain,
Still carrying the weight of war, and always living with its pain.
Next to the graves of the fallen, they place flags and wreaths with care
For the brothers who once stood beside them who are no longer there.
Memorial Day belongs not only to the brave who paid freedom’s cost,
But to every heart still grieving for the precious ones they lost.
The widows bring carnations and tears freely shed.
The fathers bring a token and silently bow their heads.
The children, they only know their loved ones
Through stories told to daughters and sons.
The soldiers who made it home alive do not rejoice this day.
They carry ghosts no time can heal and memories that ever stay.
One veteran once told me, with a voice both worn and thin,
“At least they died for somethin’. I will die of somethin’.”
And somehow in those few small words a thousand sorrows lived,
The burden of surviving when your friends no longer did.
And every flower placed beside a grave is watered down with tears
By hearts that are still breaking after all these passing years.
Memorial Day was never meant for sales or crowded shores.
It’s meant to make us stop and remember what this freedom cost before.
It was bought with folded flags placed in shaking hands to hold.
And with soldiers buried too soon, never allowed to grow old.
So before you strike the match beneath another backyard flame,
Before the camping trip begins, remember why this day is named.
For every flag that waves beneath the wide and open sky
Represents a hero who went to war and did not make it home alive.