Word: monumental
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...Washington Monument is the Orthanc of America. It is the ancient, magical tower of a Good Wizard, our National Ethos, whose magic has gone bad. Very bad. Until recently, we didn't know how bad; many of us still don't. We went to Isenbard last weekend to protest the Wizard's most evil, most horrible project, the War. But the Wizard has other projects. His magic pervades our souls. Can we do anything...
...MONUMENT. Eventually it became clear that we would have to stop, because we couldn't move much further. Somewhere on the side of the hill we sat down. The Monument rose on our left. A lot of people nearby had to stand. Some of them were very friendly; some were aloof. On the stage, wherever that was, Dick Gregory spoke, and later Arlo Guthrie spoke and sang. Soon someone started speechifying. We tuned out. We ate the best apple God ever made, and we passed eggs and cookies too. A friendly, crazy old man handed us a canteen of "cold...
Empty spaces appeared mysteriously in the crowd. We stood up and moved closer to the stage. The speeches and music went on. It grew colder; people started fires. Wisps of smoke wafted toward the Monument, but disappeared before they got there...
...long afterwards, people began to leave. The park beneath the Monument looked, in the early dusk, like a debris-strewn battlefield. But the Monument shone in the sunlight. Suddenly, as if they had erupted from some invisible door in its base, a huge crowd of black-jacketed demonstrators came charging down, waving NLF flags and chanting. "Revolution!! One More War!!" They surged past us, regrouped, and charged by one more time. They were very frightening. After a short rest, they headed off to the Justice Department, this time in a fast march...
...were leaving the park, still a little high, we looked up at the Monument. Suddenly it all became very clear. We dashed up the hill as fast as we could, joined hands, and began a mad round dance-the music was still playing-around the base of the Monument. But it was much wider than we thought, and there were only eleven of us: we pleaded with people to join us. They just stared. Soon we ran out of breath, and we quit...