April 25th is Anzac Day, the sacredest of all days in Australia.
This year we are told that there will be no dawn services, nor any parades down George St flanked by flag waving kids wearing their forefather's brass medallions and crosses of bronze. And the pubs are shuttered like the eyes of the fallen; so there's nowhere we can stand in circle to bet on the toss of two coins. Besides, gathering is banned, five at a wedding, ten at a funeral, is all we're allowed. So in the early morning on that one day of the year we must stand alone in our picket fenced gardens, a mandatory metre and a half apart, reciting the
The Ode [to the Anzacs] repeatedly.
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
From "For the Fallen" by
Laurence Binyon
Thought I'd better post this now, in case…