THE SOLDIER AT the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu could not have yet been in his 20s. By my estimation, none of them, standing there sweltering in the sun with their sprouting mustaches, were. Names from the Global South were stitched onto their uniforms. My grandfather joined the ancestors some years before, but this was my first time back in Hawai’i since his passing. We traced his steps backward across the Pacific to return him to my grandmother and their childhood home.
Long dormant grief flared and family members grimaced awkwardly as the ritual began. The soldiers’ cadence, turns, bugling—the ceremony of it all! Stars and stripes creased as if made of origami paper, delicate movements of the hand like a master at a tea ceremony, reminding me of long afternoons learning scouting creeds, knots, and flag-folding technique while away at camp: “On my honor, I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country ... .”
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