I have written in the past of my love for this time of year. Halloween is my favorite holiday, maybe because it is my birthday, maybe because it is spooky, maybe because of the candy. Who is to say? But each year it comes, and each year I get as excited as the year prior. I still look forward to my special Halloween birthday cake with witches and jack-o-lanterns and other ghoulish things used as decoration. For me, it is the most wonderful time of the year. I have also written in the past about my affinity for cemeteries, which, of course, ties nicely into the theme for the season.
A cemetery can be many things to many people. For some, it is a place to pay respect to those who have passed. For others, it is perhaps a place of solace where songbirds drown out the noise of everyday life. A walk through an old cemetery will take a fellow down winding lanes canopied by tall trees that sway in the breeze, a serene setting home to flora and fauna alike. Its headstones tell stories of times long ago, of fallen heroes and innocent victims of disaster and disease, many older stones left with an empty oval where a picture of the deceased was once placed. Some stones are bright and terrifically artistic, others faded, their engraved words illegible. Tall structures shoot toward the sky, some gothic and some angelic. Flat stones, overgrown with grass, go unnoticed to the passers-by. New stones have gone the way of technology, with lights and sensors that detect visitors and greet them with song.
When I was a kid, the Easton Cemetery served as a playground for the local children. It was a safe haven away from traffic and parents. For my sisters and me the cemetery was particularly special as it was located practically in our back yard. Baseball in the summer, football in the fall and sleigh riding in the winter were the order. And, truth be told, that same cemetery became a pretty cool party zone for my gang of friends when we got older. It was there we felt welcome and comfortable for some reason. I knew the terrain like the back of my hand, and this came in handy during nighttime visits when some quick exits were necessary.
“For some, it is a place to pay respect to those who have passed. For others, it is perhaps a place of solace where songbirds drown out the noise of everyday life.”
Cemeteries are well represented in literature and song. I can remember in the sixth grade when I was introduced to Dickens' Great Expectations. We were, of course, expected to read the book, an ambitious goal for our teacher and certainly a tall order for kids our age. But as fate would have it, the local PBS channel was airing a movie version as well. My mom made me watch it on a small black-and-white television in the kitchen. The movie was very long and tough to take. I was a youngster, the movie had no color, and the actors' accents were thick. It didn't help either that a pre-season Mets game was on that evening. Back then pre-season baseball meant a lot. What I do recall from the movie, however, was the opening scene when our hero, Pip, visits a graveyard, the final resting place for most of his family, only to be confronted by the villain, Magwitch, who scares the daylights out of him. The film was grainy but a few of the images stayed with me, especially ones from that opening graveyard scene. Magwitch was tattered and dirty, Pip was wide-eyed and very young. And the graveyard was dark and rocky, its hills dotted with old tombstones. The plot was too much for me to comprehend, but the opening scene made a lasting impression.
Mark Twain makes great reference to a graveyard in Tom Sawyer, where he describes a very old place with crooked fences and weather-beaten tombstones. His description makes it easy for the reader to picture the scene. Twain goes on to describe a gruesome murder that Tom witnessed. Local cemeteries are not unfamiliar with gruesome events either. The Easton Cemetery was the site of a grisly scene in 1996 and Bethlehem's Nisky Hill Cemetery suffered the same fate in 2003, but enough about those things.
The 1980s British alternative rock band The Smiths took a rather whimsical and light-hearted approach to their description of a cemetery in “Cemetry Gates,” a fun song that describes playful times in the cemetery on sunny days, recalling verses from Keats, Yeats and Wilde. This little ditty also gives an ethical lesson on plagiarism, of all things. I love to sing along with the song but must confess that my knowledge of the aforementioned writers is limited at best. I remember reading works from the poets in Sister Patricia's British Literature class during my junior year of high school, but not much else. To my recollection we did not cover Wilde. Keats, like many artists, wasn't recognized until after his untimely death at age 25. When is death timely? Yeats lived longer and actually won a Nobel Prize, so he got his due. Wilde, known more as a playwright, lived up to his name and died in Paris, a penniless ex-con at age 46.
Pantera, the hard-rocking metal band that brought us Texas thrash, wrote “Cemetery Gates,” a dark song that possesses strong lyrics of death and regret, as well as powerful vocals and a haunting guitar riff that stays in your head forever. It is classic metal. I could make mention of a few more cemetery references in the world of heavy metal, particularly death metal, but will not. Okay, maybe one more. Mercyful Fate's “Evil,” for example, takes life in the cemetery to an entirely different place that we dare not discuss on these pages. Embarrassingly though, I must confess that when I play the song I cannot help but fall victim to its catchy riff, terrifying lyrics aside. I'm a big boy now, but Mercyful Fate still gives me chills.
The local cemeteries carry their own stories and places in history. God's Acre in downtown Bethlehem dates back to the 1700s and is the final home for many Moravians who helped build the town. This small area just off Main Street has tall trees and flat headstones. The Moravians apparently considered everyone equal, thus no headstone was designed to outshine another. The aforementioned Nisky Hill Cemetery is further east in town and runs along Church Street. It is home to writers, poets, war heroes and Bethlehem Steel magnates. Both are beautiful places that belie the fact they are located in the heart of town.
“But the change in season means that soon I will go back to the cemetery. I will sit at the half-moon alone with my thoughts and memories.”
A little-known bit of history can be found in the Fairview Cemetery in Pen Argyl, where Jayne Mansfield, 1950s star of stage and screen, is laid to rest. Apparently the blonde bombshell had family roots in the Slate Belt area. She died tragically in 1967 at the age of 34, the result of a car accident. Fans still gather there on her birthday to celebrate her abbreviated life.
My heart, of course, belongs to the old Easton Cemetery, with its rolling hills, towering trees, mausoleums and narrow roads. Most people familiar with the cemetery know of the George Taylor memorial and burial place for the local man who signed the Declaration of Independence. But I have always found myself more attracted to another plot, that of Colonel Charles A. Wikoff, veteran of the United States Army. Wikoff was a true Eastonian and graduate of Lafayette College. He fought and was wounded in the Battle of Shiloh during the American Civil War, only to later suffer his ultimate demise in the Battle of San Juan Hill during the Spanish-American War. Wikoff has an awesome tombstone that sits on a corner at the top of a hill in the old cemetery. The stone is large and grabs your attention because of the soldier's belt affixed on the front. The belt was one of many things in the cemetery that interested me when I was a little boy. It was really cool to look at, and it still is. Fortunately the belt has not been harmed over the past 100 years.
I spent many days in the cemetery during my adulthood as well. When I worked in Easton my lunch breaks sometimes seemed better spent alone in the graveyard than in the office where the lights were too bright and the conversation often too depressing. Somehow the cemetery was more inspirational and uplifting, if that makes any sense. There I ate, sat, listened to music and thought about everything and sometimes nothing at all. A change in jobs a few years ago has taken me away from Easton most days, and I miss those opportunities to get lost in the cemetery.
But the change in season means that soon I will go back to the cemetery. I will sit at the half-moon alone with my thoughts and memories. I will go on my birthday hoping to be spooked by things otherworldly. And I will go with my wife and child to roam the hillside. We will wrestle in the leaf-covered grass and stare up at the bright autumn sky. We will venture down to the creek, reading the headstones along the way. I will tell tall tales of how I used to ride my sled down its steepest of slopes, and of ballgames in its empty fields. And I will feel at home. Happy Halloween to one and all. Peace.
by vince ramunni | illustration by melissa rose
