Personal items of dead people always make me emotional.. do you know what I mean? Even ~2000 years after the fact.. This person's life ended and all that he was and thought and felt is now gone.. so we do not know much, except that this item was important to him.
Davenports and kettle drums
And swallowtail coats
Tablecloths and patent leather shoes
Bathing suits and bowling balls
And clarinets and rings
And all this radio really needs is a fuse
A tinker, a tailor, a soldier's things
His rifle, his boots full of rocks
And this one is for bravery and this one is for me
And everything's a dollar in this box
Cuff links and hubcaps
Trophies and paperbacks
It's good transportation
But the brakes aren't so hot
Neckties and boxing gloves
This jackknife is rusted
You can pound that dent out on the hood
A tinker or tailor, a soldier's things
His rifle, his boots full of rocks
Oh, and this one is for bravery, oh, and this one is for me
And everything's a dollar in this box
I often find myself overcome with sonder and dustsceawung (the infinite complexity of others lives, and that the dust all around me is made from the lives and civilisations before us [and alongside us])
I most definitely am reminded of how few people leave an archaeological mark when I read these. Though from my perspective, I see him as one of the special ones, even if we know very little. There are so few folks remembered even a generation later -- even the wealthiest industrialists and movie stars quickly fade.
