THE NAKED ACRE
“That’s the old part of the cemetery,” Mémère once told me,
Motioning toward the gray expanse beyond her husband’s grave.
Her words were neither hopeful invitation nor dread warning,
Just something for a grandson to preserve until its time.
It came this year while laying flowers in the usual spots—
Mother and Dad, mémères, pépères, neighbors, uncles, aunts—
When a years-old itch caused me to think of touring the old ground
Where black-stained markers led away toward a boundary fence.
This yard was consecrated back in 1881
To house the mortal shells of peasant farmers lately dead
Of mangling, typhus, overwork in noisy linen mills
Among their kind in tongue and creed, here in alien dirt.
But though I travelled every path cut through the close-mown turf,
No stone or plaque of bronze was lain before nineteen-oh-five
So, where were the memorials with earlier bookend dates?
Where were they, those first planted? Where the relics of their fate?
I saw it, then, the broad expanse across the central square
Formed by the roads, where not a single granite base was lain.
Beneath that soil, stiff, scrubby grass, must be a thousand plots
Where wooden markers, over years, had crumbled into sawdust.
That instant, shades in peasant dress, sabots, ceintures flecheés,
Bottines, bretelles, filets, gavroches, chemises bleues, tabliers,¹
Burst from the ground, their hands outstretched to ask that I restore
Their dreams, their pain, last panting breath to memory’s parade.
I watched this deathless host cavort above the grassy lot.
I nodded, tipped my cap, regarded faces—oh, so young!
I pledged to visit, call to mind what heedless time effaced
And sprinkle their last resting place with prayers, pleas and tears.
This acre should be marked by an advancing pair in bronze—
A doughty gars² and stern-faced demoiselle³ with scroll in hand
Announcing “Here our bones, unnamed, unmarked, in silence lie.
We loved, we toiled, we fell while under heaven’s watchful eye.”
I send my heart’s petition, both to heaven and to all
Who share my wish to honor those whose footfalls prefaced ours;
Whose grassy tombs cry out for more than mowers’ weekly dirge,
With hopes that someone hallows this neglected holy ground.
Notes
¹Clogs, arrowhead sashes, work boots, suspenders, hairnets, newsboy caps, blue shirts, aprons
²Gars: boys
³Demoiselles: girls