The PORTLAND Daily Sun, Friday, May 24, 2013— Page 5
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I entered an exhibit hall named ‘War Letters: Lost and Found’ those outside the battlefield who are scoured in the cauldron of war. The In love since the early days of blunt verdict to Myra’s appeal puncthe war at age 15, nearly 700 lettuated a centuries-old reality, urging ters had passed between her and me to finish that day’s journey. BerBernie, many while they were nie’s and Dominic’s weathered headcity neighbors. In Feb. 1944, when stones, along with a million others drafted, he left college at CCNY. facing homeward, silently concurred. Myra remained at NYU, and the Later, my research showed that correspondence intensified. On that Myra went on to have a family of her April day, Bernie had been missing own as Myra Strachner Gershkoff, in action for almost a month. and died in 1997 at age 71. Bernie had In the fall of 2006, with midbeen killed in an artillery barrage just term elections approaching, Myra’s two months before the war in Europe drizzle pelted me as I walked along ended, and remained forever a teenMassachusetts Ave. in our nation’s ager, left to the ages. capital. The Iraq war was faltering, As Lynn Heidelbaugh, the exhibiAmericans were restless, and milition’s curator, wrote to me recently: tary coffins arrived stateside daily. “Strachner’s words of love and longOne of the casualties included ing are heartbreaking when you my college roommate, Dominic, learn her sweetheart had died before who died in Iraq 10 years ago this ever seeing them. Letters have the week. power to connect people in tangible Visiting Washington, D.C. for and personal ways that can carry the first time in years, the air was into history.” charged with negative electricity. Indeed. And the history of human Off of work that morning, I set conflict has a way of dismantling out for our seat of government to innocence forever. forsake the campaign’s malice in A World War II V-Mail letter, returned to sender on the home front. (Source: Smithsonian National Postal Museum) Back at the museum, and feeling search of my own answers. Also, on disturbingly voyeuristic, I left the my way to Congress, I tried to beat touched lightly and dug into those shoulders. My two young lovers to the long night the raindrops. lips have kissed that throat. And I knew you had to hours before them. Failing at the latter, I ducked into the National be alive, because you’re so alive! Do you know what The rain quickly passed during this reprieve. I Postal Museum, and drip-dried in its lobby. Waiting I mean? Someday when we have long night hours ventured out into the September morning, Myra’s out the showers, I entered a dimly lit exhibit hall before us, I’ll tell you all about this — how I felt, and hopeful sunshine beckoning. Capitol Hill loomed named “War Letters: Lost and Found,” and sought what people said ... Until then, love, your Myra.” ahead, and I resumed my cynical advance unfazed. a nearby bench. Leaning against the cool marble Neatly displayed next to her letter was the Behind me, however, Thanksgiving had come wall, my gaze fell onto the closest showcase. envelope. Huddled to the left of Myra’s handwritearly. Not even the foreign mud in which a 19-yearThere, Myra’s letter found its way home. ing, an official stamp heralded the unthinkable: old GI fell could sully his lover’s faith. And their “Darling — I was at your house tonight. They “Deceased 4/28: Returned Unopened.” lost letter, once returned unopened, was delivered showed me some pictures of you ... That hair is At another time in my life, I might have disto me after 61 years, just when I needed it most. cropped close, but still it curled around my finger missed this curating as thinly veiled romantias if it were grasping it. I’ve kissed those lips. Those cizing. After all, my own time as a young soldier (Telly Halkias is an award-winning freelance jourlegs were pressed against mine. I’ve held those didn’t register much introspection when quick nalist from Portland’s West End. You may contact wrists with my fingers. My hands have been in those action was the order of the day. him at tchalkias@aol.com or follow him on Twitter hands. My fingers have touched those sides and both But as a civilian, the exhibit also made me consider at @TellyHalkias.) HALKIAS from page 4
Staff are regular recipients of Certificates of Excellence from American Rose Society GALLANT from page 4
in the spring of 2006 by Robin Whitten, a breast cancer survivor and a member of Friends of Deering Oaks, an organization whose mission it is to preserve and protect the park. Robin conceived of the project in 2005 while attending the dedication ceremonies of the restored Castle in the Park, the intriguing small brick building by the pond. Last year the project raised over $120,000 in Maine and is gaining momentum as a national movement. If you’d like to help out, google The Pink Tulip Project and find out how you can buy some bulbs for planting this fall. The money couldn’t be going towards a better cause, and you can look forward to those sprightly pink tulips that will be coming up next spring. Since I opened my eyes to it all, in the last few days, more or less, I’ve discovered, what do you know, that tulips come in an endless variety of colors. There’s red and yellow ones around the new memorial to the city’s fallen firefighters at Central Fire Station, and the Loring family has planted a wonderful bed of pink, white, and, to
my surprise, black tulips, around the memorial to Major Charles Loring up on the Eastern Prom. Black tulips. I never knew they existed. There’s even striped tulips. Spotted some red and
white ones out in front of a house on the Eastern Prom. Then, of course, there’s lilacs. Even I know that there’s lavender and white ones and that lilac bushes can grow
In 2011, Valerie Hanlon trims the crimson bouquet variety of roses at the Deering Oaks Rose Circle. Hanlon is part of the city’s Forestry Division. (DAVID CARKHUFF FILE PHOTO)
to a very old age. There’s an interesting story about the lilac bush in the garden behind the Longfellow house, actually. The Longfellow Garden Club, which was founded in 1924 by a woman with the fetching name of Pearl Wing, has kept the garden to the rear of the Longfellow house in much the way the three generations of the Longfellow family who lived in the house kept it. When the Maine Historical Society Library next to the garden was renovated in 2007 a lilac bush dating to the time when the Longfellow family lived in the house was uprooted from the garden to facilitate the renovation and was cared for by O’Donal’s Nursery Center. With the completion of the restoration project the lilac bush was returned to the garden, many of the other flowers that the Longfellow family had in the garden were replicated, and today the garden looks remarkably similar to the way it did when the Longfellow family tended it. Flowers. Then as now. (Cliff Gallant of Portland is a regular columnist for The Portland Daily Sun. Email him at gallant.cliff555@ yahoo.com.)