Their name liveth for evermore
It was the war to end all war and it started
a century ago. That unsuspecting generation.
Their name liveth for evermore
on monument and cenotaph. Shrieking
shells, gas, guns dispatched them to hell. Sure
Their name liveth for evermore
but downpour of rain and wind abrade,
hallowed names become decayed; memory falters.
Their name liveth for evermore.
Azevedo ponders perishability. She sculpts, creates
Minimum Monument, an anonymous army of fragility,
tiers of tiny figures carved from ice. They sit, briefly, and
buckle, lose their heads, drip tears that evaporate like lives
we would commemorate. Ice catches light, fires, wears thin,
shatters. And, in the distance, the din of war today, continuing.
© Sue Norton
Sue Norton lives and writes in York.
