So I searched. Helen Mar Kimball Orgill (1885-1982). I was initiallly interested to see how she was connected into the extended Kimball family I married into. She is a granddaughter of Heber C. and Vilate – so she’s a cousin of my wife’s grandfather through a different wife of Heber C.

Then I saw her husband’s death. April 17, 1944. But he wasn’t a soldier. He was a bus driver in Salt Lake City who died of a heart condition at age 55. (Pretty close to my age. And they lived right up in your neighborhood, Ardis.) There is no indication of them losing a son during the war. But there is no doubt Sister Orgill understood the pain and the meaning of the stars.

All stars should lead us to the only hope we have for peace on earth and an end to death in all its forms.

Thank, Ardis, for sharing these beautiful poems.

And yet 65 years later we’re no closer to answering why the “wise men of earth” are robbing youth of their lives than we were when this was written.