«
»

Too many boots

This past weekend, the United States celebrated Memorial Day, a holiday created to remember our war dead. Aside from parades down America’s main streets, though, it has devolved into a fun three-day weekend. The unofficial kick-off of summer, a time to fire up the grill perhaps for the first time of the season, a time when municipal beaches and pools open.

Sunday we went to an outdoor exhibit that brought the original intent of the holiday home: EYES WIDE OPEN, an exhibition on the human cost of the Iraq War.

boots.jpg

The exhibition, created by the American Friends Service Committee, features a pair of boots for each U.S. military casualty as well as a field of shoes and a Wall of Remembrance to memorialize the Iraqis killed in the conflict. It started in January 2004 in Chicago’s Federal Plaza. Then there were 504 pairs of boots on display. This trip through Chicago, there were 3,452 pairs of boots.

I really try to keep my politics out of Blue Kitchen. To me, this exhibit transcends politics. Whatever your political beliefs, as you walk among the grid of far too many boots, stopping to read the names of the young men and women they represent, looking at mementos left by friends and parents and spouses, you can’t help but be confronted by the real and awful cost of war. Any war.

boots_flowers.jpg boots_photos.jpg

Back to Blue Kitchen

This entry was posted on May 30, 2007 at 10:02 pm and is filed under Chicago, Iraq. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “Too many boots”

  1. W. B. Burkholder Says:
    May 8, 2008 at 5:55 pm | Reply

    Black Boots Remembered

    Black boot prints;
    They were the first thing
    I saw on the door,

    As the ratcheting of handcuffs,
    That sound,
    Reached my ears.

    The free man,
    The democratic man,
    Was being led away
    To a terrorist’s gallows;

    A dictators pulpit,
    To be bandied as the
    Sacrificial Mutt.

    But Mutts have teeth,
    They have been known
    To slip their chains.

    Thoroughbreds,
    Rearing hind leg,
    And pissing on,

    The feet,
    The foundations of,
    Fascist ideal,

    Of mustachioed,
    Uniform clad
    Rats.

    Aye I remember,
    The black boot prints,
    I remember the boots,

    We used them to knock down
    A German wall;
    Russian Built,

    I remember,
    The ratcheting of those handcuffs;
    Slipped over the wrist of a Panamanian,

    Binding his drugged dirty hands.
    Those black boots,
    Yes I remember,

    Counting them in flag draped coffins;
    U.S.A. stamped on the bottom,
    Black and bloodied,

    Strong and sturdy still.
    Foot prints that any good man would walk in.
    Those damn black boots,

    Spit shined to high gloss,
    Measured steps, clicking,
    At the Tomb of the Unknown,

    Remembering,
    Honoring,

    Their footsteps.

Leave a comment