Homeless Memorial

Yesterday I attended the Primavera Foundation Homeless Memorial held at Evergreen Cemetery in Tucson. There were several speakers, some sad guitar music sung in Spanish, and then Taps was played by a lone trumpeteer out among the little grave markers. There's a little corner at the northwest part of the cemetery that has been reserved for the homeless for many years. Now that section is full and so they just cremate people and place their ashes in little lockers without names.

Between 11-07 and 10-08, there were 45 homeless who died without name or family, 30 homeless who died with names and family, 53 homeless who died with names only and no family, and 183 people died crossing the border.

I wanted to think of this as a funeral for my father that I never got to attend. Let's just say it was powerful and good for me.

The following poem was read and I liked it very much, so here it is:

What The Living Do
by Marie Howe

Johnny, the kitchen sink has been clogged for days, some utensil probably fell down there.
And the Drano won’t work but smells dangerous, and the crusty dishes have piled up

waiting for the plumber I still haven’t called. This is the everyday we spoke of.
It’s winter again: the sky’s a deep headstrong blue, and the sunlight pours through

the open living room windows because the heat’s on too high in here, and I can’t turn it off.
For weeks now, driving, or dropping a bag of groceries in the street, the bag breaking,

I’ve been thinking: This is what the living do. And yesterday, hurrying along those
wobbly bricks in the Cambridge sidewalk, spilling my coffee down my wrist and sleeve,

I thought it again, and again later, when buying a hairbrush: This is it.
Parking. Slamming the car door shut in the cold. What you called that yearning.

What you finally gave up. We want the spring to come and the winter to pass. We want
whoever to call or not call, a letter, a kiss – we want more and more and then more of it.

But there are moments, walking, when I catch a glimpse of myself in the window glass,
say, the window of the corner video store, and I’m gripped by a cherishing so deep

for my own blowing hair, chapped face, and unbuttoned coat that I’m speechless:
I am living, I remember you.