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A Joyous Memory…

by Marshall Jamison

…Of Sunday morning in the little town where my mother was born and my brother and I first saw the light literally and spiritually.

My great aunt Mame used to worship our Lord at the top of her rich, contralto voice out on her front porch across the street from our house. For an hour before she and Uncle Will walked across the green to church she sang the glorious old hymns, Rock of Ages, Onward Christian Soldiers, Lead, Kindly Light, The Old, Rugged Cross and other favorites.

Occasionally passersby would pause to listen, eyeing the Doctor’s sign beside the door, weather-beaten by the passing years. Uncle Will had been a true horse and buggy practitioner in his early days. Later he drove his ancient Nash with great care on his round of house calls. When he sometimes took my brother and me with him, we would sing the hymns we learned from Aunt Mame on Sunday.

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The Judge's Decision

by Marshall Jamison

He was a tall man, proud, and at seventy-eight
The Judge, his eyes steel blue, held a steady gaze
As he looked down at me, he stood ramrod straight.
Without raising his voice he revealed my fate. To me,
It seemed a fair if severe one, at the age of eight.
My crime? The third grade teacher had reported to my
Mother my one day’s absence from his class. There,
When riding my new bike to school, I had eyed
In the rippling water under the river bridge, a truly enormous bass.
And as I told the Judge, the chance for such a
Magnificent catch drove all thoughts of proceeding to class to pass.
The Judge, who was himself a fisherman of note,
Had often taken me on the Delaware River in his old rowboat
So to the river I raced for my gear, pole, and bait.
After a long careful casting, an interminable wait,
The allure of my lures spelled that big bass’ fate.
My own, the judge decided would rest on my reply
To his wish for a piece of that magnificent, glorious fish to cook!
So supplied, with a grin, my grandfather let me
off the hook.

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A Month of Terror

by Marshall Jamison

The Time: January 1944.

Men who’d sailed the North Atlantic in convoy for up to four or more years began to breathe a little easier on the crossings from Boston and Halifax to the waiting ports in England. It looked then as if the U-Boat Wolfpack that had used the merchant ships as targets for their torpedoes for those years were almost cleared from the North Atlantic.

Continue reading → A Month of Terror

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Meeting at the Ritz

by Marshall Jamison

The others who were there that day have answered their last page at the glorious old hotel. Your reporter, hopefully, will answer to several more.
To a New Englander born in downtown Boston over three quarters of a century ago, the ancient city grows more appealing in the heart of an old campaigner as the years follow each other in swift, but dwindling, procession.

So many memories; as a little fellow in Cambridge, hitching a ride on the horse-drawn sleigh that delivered blocks of ice to ancient neighborhood ice boxes. With my Dad and little brother seeing Charlie Devens pitch for Harvard with, I think, Herman Fink catching, “Rabbit” Maranville artfully displaying his patented vest pocket catch at old Braves Field in Alston, Clarence De Mar and Johnny Kelley making yet another great run over the Newton Hills to a downtown finish in the Boston Marathon, Evening at Pops, nostalgic rides on the Garden’s swan boats, Christmas caroling around the State House and on Beacon Hill.

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April Nineteenth (Part II)

by Marshall Jamison

Our father, as we grew older, included us in the group of his college students who shared, each year on April Nineteenth, a bus ride from Faneuil Hall in downtown Boston to Lexington and Concord where the day was spent with such as Thoreau, Revere, Alcott and Emerson (to drop a name or two.)

The Green at Lexington is the natural first stop on the trail to the magic wrought by those glorious historic fellows. While now surrounded by the traffic of busy city streets, the Green itself retains the atmospheric mystery of the brave Minute Men who stood their ground and fought for the freedom some of them would die for.

But it is “by the rude bridge that arched the flood” in old Concord Town that the spirit of our land and its indomitable founders is most evident. To two awestruck lads, the legend of heroism eulogized by Ralph Waldo Emerson in his epoch verse was unforgettable. It greets the visitor on the path that leads to and over the bridge to the simple heroic statue of the rugged Minute Man. There the bravery and resolution of the “embattled farmers” of the poem are illustrated with artistic integrity and simple dignity.

Now the Concord River flows peacefully through on green fields and quiet farms which epitomize rural America. May it flow thus always.

To those of us who have had the unearned glorious privilege of growing up in this country and calling it our own, the Nineteenth of April is a day of incredible historic significance. But now the celebration of its glory is deeply scarred for all of us by the unforgivable sin of the Oklahoma Massacre.

We pray the future will bring peace and deep solace to our countrymen who have suffered pain, loss and death. May their forefather’s courage serve as a guiding example for their lives.

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Too Late for Thanks: A Partial Recall (Part I)

by Marshall Jamison

As a small boy growing up in historic Cambridge, Massachusetts, my first hero was the old man who lived next door and told me stories. On clear days he would be out early in the morning to watch his son run up the flag on the tall flag pole that stood in his blossom filled garden. His own experiences, real life stories of the Civil War, describing the heroism and glory of his comrades, found me a fascinated listener.

Then when I realized my own grandfather had served in that war as a Marine, could also tell true stories that thrilled my heart and mind, I become a hopeless hero worshiper, stirred by such tales of Valor.

Continue reading → Too Late for Thanks: A Partial Recall (Part I)

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A Promise Kept

by Marshall Jamison

(Publisher’s Note: We are pleased to announce that this poem, after being seen in GO INSIDE Magazine, has been selected for publication in The National Library of Poetry’s book: “The Best Poetry of 1997”)

He held her again as he had when she first told him.
Then she told him again and then he promised
To marry her as soon as he was eighteen
And he did.

At twenty-two after two more babies
And before they could conceive again
He volunteered for the Navy, took basic training in California,
Was assigned to Pacific duty, finally to Hawaii
and the battleship USS Arizona forever.