D-Day

At Gettysburg in the Fall of 1863 Abraham Lincoln said this, words that can, that should be said again on the beaches at normandy on D-Day’s 75th Anniversary:

“But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

Important histories and memoirs have been written major motion pictures have depicted and countless words are being published on this anniversary about D-Day. There is no end to the words that can be written about the event — that moment when, literally, LITERALLY, everything that is decent and civilized hung in the balance.

I offer these few more.

I have been there, Normandy, but only as a visitor/tourist of course.

You celebrate nothing there. You contemplate, you witness, you are grateful, you are silent.

You stand on the rises above Omaha Beach, close your eyes and try to imagine what the Germans saw from there as they poured massive mortar, artillery and machine gun fire onto the beach on which at lest 2,000 Americans died that day. But even in your mind’s eye you cannot imagine it. No one can but those who fought – and hardly any of them ever would talk about it.

You leave in hushed silence the American Cemetery at Normandy where 9,200 Americans are buried beneath row after row of white crosses and six-pointed stars and, silently from within, you say to them, “Thank you.” You say thank you knowing that is not the right thing to say, that nothing can ever be adequate to say to a man, to 9,200 men who died for you.