I recorded names with three parts; I decided these could have either three full names or two and a middle initial, or a Jr, Sr or number at the end. The length and composition of those three part names carried a weight that I could feel; saying them out loud was incantation: Bobby Lee Wheeler, Frank T. Nevidomsky, Carlos Guzman Carbajal, Larry Gene Whitehead, Ronald Z. Katz, Dewayne M. Selby, Jimmie Dee Cook, Jerry Roe Grubbs, Billy Bob Leyerle, John A. Keepnews. In this group I wrote the name of one woman: Harlene E. Millette: hers was the only woman’s name I saw that time. Ronnie Lee Eckenroad, Jesus Robledo Jr, Kernell P. Bradsby, Leon T. Culverhouse, Donny Ray Chastain. I know you can see what I mean.

There are names that have four parts, like Willie F. Oxendine III and Everett E. Woolums Jr; these are impressive names, and I imagine them written in gold leaf on office doors, in calligraphy on diplomas, in raised ink on formal business cards.

The last thing I did was, I wrote down some names just because they charmed me: Arman Grushenkian, Frederick Mezzatesta, Rufus Sirmany, Victor Boochko. My love of these names may come from my training with grade books: every year, every semester in those years, I got new lists of names like these. From the beginning of my teaching, which was right around the beginning of people in the USA knowing about the war in Vietnam, my fascination and affection for high school Scarlattis and Finkels was strong. My class lists were filled with Antoninis and Greenbergs, punctuated occasionally with colonial exotica: Smith, Carpenter, MacGregor, Lawson. The cultural composition of Niles Township High School, notably skewed, must have seeded my affection for names that carry imagery, music and story.

One thing that happened last time at the Wall is that people asked me questions; they asked me for information, like how the names were arranged, and how to find a name you were looking for. I told them mostly common sense, like no, the numbers on the bottom couldn’t be years, because we weren’t over there in all those years, like 1949. The French were there then, not us, I said to one man and he smiled and said, Yes, right, that’s right, these couldn’t be years. I told them all to look for the ranger, who would know the answers I didn’t. And he did; I heard the ranger answering people up and down the line, sending them back to the books at each end, where all the names and locations are logged – sort of a memorial address book. No other time that I was at the Wall did anybody ask me these questions, and I think it was because of the notebook. They saw me writing things down. I looked like someone who knew something.

Occasionally I’d stand still and cry. No one asked me questions when I was crying. Even though I was a browser – writing in my notebook, finding names that appealed to me, wondering about lives I could only fictionalize, a visitor whose attachment to those thousands is generational and generic, not personal and specific – I cried. I wonder if my crying would be different if I could make myself believe they all died for a good reason – for liberty, for justice – for any good enough reason. I wonder if I can think of a good enough reason. I wonder if anybody can think of a good enough reason.

First published in VietNow 14.2, 2004