The National War Memorial

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The National War Memorial

By Harrison Lowman

            Raindrops dance across a granite cenotaph.  Endless liquid finds its way between cobblestones, racing through indentations and crevices.  The wind groans.

            The storm feeds surrounding foliage.  Blossoms peer upward, delighted by their skyward visitors.  Sprouts stand shoulder to shoulder in cracks, pushing aside their brothers in a fight for sustenance. Plants are given life in a place that honours death.

            Leaves sag as branches tremor under immense weight.  The trunks that support them buckle.  They shrug every so often, allowing excess to fall to the earth below.

            The square is all but empty.  Plaques remain unread; their raised text sits in bronze.  Rental bikes are perched on their racks.  The maple leaf flag above is jovial.  The storm has injected life into its stagnant cloth.  Cars drone by, like a hive of bees humming in formation.  They form temporary paths on lubricated pavement.  A lone jogger pushes by.  His muscles tense and veins jut as he tries to outmaneuver the water that falls around him.

            Passersby dart in and out of buildings.  They walk with vigor, wincing as raindrops make contact with their skin.  They don colourful domes to shield themselves from the sky’s secretions.  Bureaucrats hide themselves under today’s news. Their eyes peek over the brims of jackets.  Although they make this pilgrimage each day, they cannot help but crane their necks towards the statue before them.

            Bronze sentinels stand steadfast before their preoccupied audience.  The strokes of their sculptor are still visible on their jackets and boots.  The soldiers march into an invisible expanse.  Their eyes are transfixed.  Their limbs are battered and bruised, wound with dressings of gauze and cloth.  Caught in midstep, they trudge through muck and sludge towards an objective never to be achieved.  They haul mechanical burdens of soldered metal; artillery that will never be fired, grenades that will never be thrown.  These men and women wear their livelihood on their backs- rifles, canteens, picks, gasmasks.  Temporary waterfalls trickle down the frozen figures.  Some remain untouched by rain.  Protected by an arch, they stand out amongst their blackened counterparts. 

            High above, two angels are intertwined.  One holds a wreath, the other a torch.  Their flowing garments cascade over rocks below.  A crow makes home atop the holy beings and heckles at passersby. 

            Determined tourists begin to make their way up saturated stone steps.  An elderly man in a cream coloured trench coat raises his Nikon towards his face; his tote bag balanced precariously in the crook of his arm.  He is etched with wrinkles.  The soaked lenses of his glasses magnify his pupils as his shutter snaps.  A young woman in a black suit approaches a man in uniform.  His shirt is teal, garnished with shiny golden epaulettes.  A military crest is stitched neatly on the corner of his emerald beret.  Their conversation pauses as they look down upon the tomb below them.

            The sound of bells cuts through the pitter-patter of rain.  Two o’clock.  The chimes mark an end to the afternoon showers.

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