“Do you see these flowers?” said Mary.
He nodded. “Of course.”
“They were left here, by one of the living, for one of the dead. Somebody whose name is on this panel.” She pointed at the section of polished granite in front of her.
Mary bent low. The flowers—red roses—still had long stems, and were bundled together by string. A small card was attached to the bundle with a ribbon. “‘For Willie,’” said Mary, evidently reading from the card, “‘from his loving sister.’”
“Ah,” said Ponter, having no better response at hand.
Mary walked farther. She came to a fawn-colored sheet of paper leaning against the wall, and picked it up. “‘Dear Carl,’” she read. She paused, and searched the panel in front of her. “This must be him,” she said, reaching forward and lightly touching a name. “Carl Bowen.” She continued to look at the incised name. “This one is for you, Carl,” she said—apparently her own words, since she wasn’t looking down at the sheet. She then lowered her eyes and read aloud, starting over at the beginning:
Dear Carl—
I know I should have come here earlier. I wanted to. Honest, I did. But I didn’t know how you would take the news. I know I was your first love, and you were mine, and no summer has been as wonderful for me as that summer of ’66. I thought of you every day you were gone, and when word came that you had died, I cried and cried, and I’m crying again now as I write these words.
I don’t want you to think I ever stopped mourning you, because I didn’t. But I did go on with life. I married Bucky Samuels. Remember him? From Eastside? We’ve got two kids, both older now than you were when you died.
You wouldn’t recognize me, I don’t think. My hair has got some gray in it, which I try to hide, and I lost all my freckles long ago, but I still think of you. I love Buck very much, but I love you, too…and I know someday, we’ll see each other again.
Love forever,
Jane
“‘See each other again?’” repeated Ponter. “But he is dead.”
Mary nodded. “She means, she’ll see him when she dies, too.”
Ponter frowned. Mary walked a few steps farther along. Another letter was leaning against the wall, this one laminated in clear plastic. She picked it up. “‘Dear Frankie,’” she began. She scanned the wall in front of her. “Here he is,” she said. “Franklin T. Mullens, III.” She read the letter aloud:
Dear Frankie,
They say a parent shouldn’t outlive a child, but who expects a child to be taken when he’s only 19? I miss you every day, and so does your pa. You know him—he tries to be strong in front of me, but I hear him crying softly to this day when he thinks I’m asleep.
A mother’s job is to look after her son, and I did the best I could. But now God Himself is looking after you, and I know you are safe in his loving arms.
We will be together again, my darling son.
Love,
Ma
Ponter didn’t know what to say. The sentiments were so obviously sincere, but…but they were irrational. Couldn’t Mary see that? Couldn’t the people who wrote these letters see that?
Mary continued to read to him from letters and cards and plaques and scrolls that had been left leaning against the wall. Phrases stuck in Ponter’s mind.
“We know God is taking care of you…”
“I long for that day when we will all be together again…”
“So much forgotten / So much unsaid / But I promise to tell you all / When we meet among the dead.”
“Sleep now, beloved…”
“I look forward to when we are reunited…”
“…on that wonderful day when the Lord will reunite us in Heaven…”
“Goodbye—God be with ye!—until we meet again…”
“Take care, bro. I’ll visit you again next time I’m in D.C….”
“Rest in peace, my friend, rest in peace…”
Mary had to pause several times to wipe away tears. Ponter felt sad, too, and his eyes were likewise moist, but not, he suspected, for the same reason. “It is always hard to have a loved one die,” said Ponter.
Mary nodded slightly.
“But…” he continued, then fell silent.
“Yes?” Mary prodded.
“This memorial,” said Ponter, sweeping his arm, taking in its two great walls. “What is its purpose?”
Mary’s eyebrows climbed again. “To honor the dead.”
“Not all the dead,” said Ponter, softly. “These are only the Americans…”
“Well, yes,” said Mary. “It’s a monument to the sacrifice made by American soldiers, a way for the people of the United States to show that they appreciate them.”
“Appreciated,” said Ponter.
Mary looked confused.
“Is my translator malfunctioning?” asked Ponter. “You can appreciate—present tense—what still exists; you can only have appreciated—past tense—that which is no more.”
Mary sighed, clearly not wishing to debate the point.
“But you have not answered my question,” said Ponter, gently. “What is this memorial for? ”
“I told you. To honor the dead.”
“No, no,” said Ponter. “That may be an incidental effect, I grant you. But surely the purpose of the designer—”
“Maya Ying Lin,” said Mary.
“Pardon?”
“Maya Ying Lin. That’s the name of the woman who designed this.”
“Ah,” said Ponter. “Well, surely her purpose—the purpose of anyone who designs a memorial—is to make sure people never forget.”
“Yes?” said Mary, sounding irritated by whatever picayune distinction she felt Ponter was making.
“And the reason to not forget the past,” said Ponter, “is so that the same mistakes can be avoided.”
“Well, yes, of course,” said Mary.
“So has this memorial served its purpose? Has the same mistake—the mistake that led to all these young people dying—been avoided since?”
Mary thought for a time, then shook her head. “I suppose not. Wars are still fought, and—”
“By America? By the people who built this monument?”
“Yes,” said Mary.
“Why?”
“Economics. Ideology. And…”
“Yes?”
Mary lifted her shoulders. “Revenge. Getting even.”
“When this country decides to go to war, where is the war declared?”
“Um, in the Congress. I’ll show you the building later.”
“Can this memorial be seen from there?”
“This one? No, I don’t think so.”
“They should do it right here,” said Ponter, flatly. “Their leader—the president, no?—he should declare war right here, standing in front of these fifty-eight thousand, two hundred and nine names. Surely that should be the purpose of such a memoriaclass="underline" if a leader can stand and look at the names of all those who died a previous time a president declared war and still call for young people to go off and be killed in another war, then perhaps the war is worth fighting.”
Mary tilted her head to one side but said nothing.
“After all, you said you fight to preserve your most fundamental values.”
“That’s the ideal, yes,” said Mary.
“But this war—this war in Vietnam. You said it was to support a corrupt government, to prevent elections from being held.”
“Well, yes, in a way.”
“In Philadelphia you showed me where and how this country began. Is not the United States’s most cherished belief that of democracy, of the will of the people being heard and done?”
Mary nodded.
“But then surely they should have fought a war to ensure that that ideal was upheld. To have gone to Vietnam to make sure the people there had a chance to vote would have been an American ideal. And if the Vietnam people…”