Remembering the Dead.

national | arts and media | other press Thursday November 11, 2004 20:44 by ;-) iosaf

just in case you missed it.

-"Non-religious songs cannot be sung at funerals under new guidelines for funeral masses published by the Archbishop of Cashel and Emly, Dr Dermot Clifford.
that's like if you want to get buried a catholicke."

Today's RTE national news message along with her exellency's an uachtarán Mary Mc Aleese's oath which now sworn gives her a second term under our constitution as president of Ireland.

Great stuff.

Lots of people don't or didn't.

the mortal remains of Yasser Arafat who died aged 75 this morning at Percy hospital Paris
is now on route to Cairo to receive muslim funeral rites within a day of death according to ancient tradition in the confines of Egypt.

His will and last testament shall someday honour /"honor" his request to be buried in Jerusalem.

Meanwhile Europe and America and Canada and Australia today remember the armistice of 11h11, declared this day the 11th of the 11th month.

There are still many millions without names,
without graves, without wills or testaments spoken, listened to or marked.

No European people were untouched by the Great War.

The War to end all Wars.

you ought to have heard this sometime:-

"Well, how do you do, Private William McBride?
Do you mind if I sit here down by your graveside?
I'll rest for a while in the warm summer sun.
I've been walking all day, and I'm nearly done.

And I see by your gravestone, you were only nineteen
When you joined the dead heroes in 1915.
Well, I hope you died quick, and I hope you died clean.
Or, Willie McBride, was it slow and obscene?

Did they beat the drum slowly; did they sound the fifes lowly;
Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down?
Did the bugle play The Last Post And Chorus;
Did the pipes play The Flowers Of The Forest?

And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind;
In some faithful heart is your memory enshrined?
And, though you died back in 1915,
In some faithful heart are you forever nineteen?

Or are you a stranger without even a name,
Enshrined forever behind a glass frame,
In an old photograph, torn and tattered and stained,
And fading to yellow in a bound leather frame?

Did they beat the drum slowly; did they sound the fifes lowly;
Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down?
Did the bugle play The Last Post And Chorus;
Did the pipes play The Flowers Of The Forest?

Well, the sun, it shines down on these green fields of France.
The warm wind blows gently, and the red poppies dance.
The trenches have vanished now, under the plow.
No gas and no barbed wire, no guns fire now.

But here in this graveyard it's still no man's land.
And the countless white crosses in mute witness stand
To man's blind indifference to his fellow man.
And a whole generation who butchered and damned.

Did they beat the drum slowly; did they sound the fifes lowly;
Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down?
Did the bugle play The Last Post And Chorus;
Did the pipes play The Flowers Of The Forest?

Well, I can't help but wonder now, Willie McBride,
Do all those who lie here know why they died?
Did you really believe them when they told you the cause?
Did you really believe this war would end all wars?

Well, the suffering, the sorrow, the glory, the shame,
The killling, the dying, it was all done in vain.
For William McBride, it's all happened again,
And again, and again, and again, and again.

Did they beat the drum slowly; did they sound the fifes lowly;
Did the rifles fire o'er you as they lowered you down?
Did the bugle play The Last Post And Chorus;
Did the pipes play The Flowers Of The Forest?

.:.
Cairo is a lovely place just down the road from Thebes, Mr Arafat will be afforded a military funeral but not the same as President Reagan's who lived a longer life. Mr Arafat is suceeded by nieghbouring middle east leaders who vary in age from Mr Sharon (one year younger) and the Syrian leader who doesn't say the right things.

I don't say the right things either, but that's ok I'm not fighting a war.

Peace = Siochan = Pais = Pax = Shalom = Saleem = lots of other manipulations of linguistics.