Congressional Cemetery

Author's Comments

The first time I walked into Congressional Cemetery I had the place almost entirely to myself, and I remember thinking that this was the kind of quiet Washington rarely offers. It sits on a slope above the Anacostia, not hidden exactly but somehow overlooked, and the longer you stay the stranger and more beautiful it becomes. The cenotaphs are what you come for without knowing it. Low sandstone boxes, neoclassical, lined up in rows like some abandoned architectural experiment, weathered to a color that is neither gray nor tan but something in between. I have not seen anything like them anywhere else. November is the month I keep returning to. The grass has gone dormant, the trees are mostly bare, and the light comes in low and sideways in the last hour before the gates close. On overcast days the cenotaphs go soft and almost silver, and the whole cemetery takes on the mood of an old painting. On clear days at golden hour, the sandstone warms and the long shadows between the rows become the photograph. Some sections are kept neat. Others are allowed to go romantic, which is the word I will use for it, with ivy climbing the older stones and the ground uneven underfoot. Sousa is here. Hoover is here. But the famous names are almost beside the point. This is a place that rewards a slow walk with a camera and no particular agenda, and the dogs that are often being walked along the paths are part of the texture rather than an intrusion. Come alone. Come unhurried. Let it be quiet.

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