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July 25, 2013

THE CREMATION OF SAM MCGEE


There are strange things done in the midnight sun
      By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
      That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
      But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
      I cremated Sam McGee.
ROBERT W. SERVICE

... june 1962, on our epic journey down the alcan highway ... looking at the curly hair on the smaller of the two, i've no doubt that she's my sister, sue, and, after very close examination of the original slide with a magnifying lens i'm going to go out on a limb and certify that the young man is my brother, michael ... as a child the poems of robert w. service were my favorites, and "the cremation of sam mcgee" is one we all memorized to the point that chanting it in unison was a frequent pass-the-miles activity ...