The Lost Boys

"Before we kill another child
for righteousness' sake, to serve
some blissful killer's sacred cause,
some bloody patriot's anthem
and his flag, let us leave forever
our ancestral lands, our holy books,
our god thoughtified to the mean
of our smallest selves. Let us go
to the graveyard and lie down
forever among the speechless stones."
             --Wendell Berry,  in Leavings

This war in Iraq and Afghanistan that has taken over 5,000 of our finest men and women must not be forgotten. Even though it has slipped back to the second section of almost every paper, I suggest that you read Dexter Filkins's splendid article accompanied by Ashley Gilbertson's moving photographs. The New York Times Sunday Magazine features six pages of the bedrooms of boys that have died in this seemingly endless war. Pictures often tell stories that words cannot.

Look at the photographs for yourself. The bedroom of a 19 year old from Alexandria Bay, NY. Just a boy's room.  A quilt somebody made. A jam box. A TV. A baseball bat--running shoes. An empty wine bottle and a stuffed teddy bear. There was the bedroom of a 21 year old boy from East Northport, NY. Then there was a 24 year old Marine that will not be coming back home who lived in Downers Grove, Illinois. Books, pictures of tigers on the wall--his shoes still under his bed--the dog lying sadly in the middle of the bed. There was a 20 year old from Livingston, California and two boys from South Carolina. Read for yourself--study the pictures and then pray for all the families with these empty bedrooms and all the loved ones they left behind. We must not forget.