The Artwork of Grief

As I was reading Find an Outlet's blog recently, I remembered a country cemetery near here that reminded much of what Debra's article was saying. So, with camera in hand, I headed off to see what this resting place could offer to me on a cold, windy and dreary day.

Ben Ficklin Cemetery is on top of a lonely hill that once over looked the river that washed away the little community of Ben Ficklin long ago. The flood was so severe that not only did it destroy the community and its inhabitants, it also destroyed the cemetery and caused graves to open up and float downstream. The community was never rebuilt but the citizens did create a new cemetery on this hill in the hopes it will never be washed away again.

Floods may not erase these graves but time certainly will as I saw this afternoon. Most of the graves are unmarked except for the broken rocks and monuments that are hanging on for as long as it can.

 Some of the graves a have large rock walls and gates surrounding plots of the deceased. I don't know if it was to protect the graves or serve as a kind of monument but they were built with great care and great labor.

 A family rests together in eternity.

 Rusty old gates still protect and preserve a forgotten soul.

 The oldest grave I saw today was dated as a burial in 1907.

 Many of the headstones and markers had been destroyed I guess by vandals but caretakers had pieced them together as best they could. A caretaker group still monitors and cleans up this cemetery.

 Over the decades and through the previous century, these graves have seen much take place from its lonely hilltop. What was once quiet prairie and river country, now is a bustling community of over 100,000 living souls. Noisy highways and bridges have replaced the solitude and busy people pass by these markers by the thousands every. The travelers are too busy to notice these stones or the stories they tell on their fading markers. And I guess that is the way it is even with modern cemetery's. Life goes on...

 Above, the most recent of internments.

 Some of the graves above had these concrete monuments for the family members buried here.

I guess it is not an entertaining way to spend a Sunday afternoon but sometimes I think coming face to face with reality is often very healthy. A little unsettling but still healthy for the soul...