I wonder where he lies. Wedged under a rock, with a thousand small mouths already sucking on his spongy flesh. Or floating still, on and down, on and down, to wider, calmer reaches of the river. I see them gathering: the drowned, the shot. Their hands float out to touch each other, fingertip to fingertip. In a day, two days, they will glide on, a funeral flotilla, past the unfinished white dome rising out of its scaffolds on a muddy hill in Washington. Will the citizens recognize them, the brave fallen, and uncover in a gesture of respect? Or will they turn away, disgusted by the bloated mass of human rot?

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About Geraldine Brooks

Geraldine Brooks was a contemporary American american journalist and novelist. Geraldine Brooks is an Australian-American journalist and novelist. She won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for her 2005 novel March. Read more on Wikipedia →

Themes

  • War — Reflections on conflict, peace, and the human cost of war

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