Marching

Here the sound only of renovation, growth and change, to mark this day. And children are giving chocolates as though st valintine were watching over the thousands who stand, bound looking out on their twenty four minutes of silence.

To seems always to be filled with a strange sort of confusion, if i look behind me i can see it spanning the years. The confusion of the silence, of the tears, of the colours and sounds. The gentle tap of the drum. The long breaths through pipes.

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.


We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.


Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

— John McCrae