George W. Martin, Rally Round the Flag</head><body><center><center><img src=http://www.saviodsilva.com/p1.gif border=0 alt=Saviodsilva></center><hr color=3C00FF size=4><br><font size=4 face=arial><b><a href=78.htm>George W. Martin</a></b></font><br><center><img src=http://www.saviodsilva.net/poem/a/1.JPG border=0 alt=Poem></center><br><font size=3 face=arial><b>Rally Round the Flag</a></b></font></center><blockquote><blockquote><p align=left><font face=arial size=2><b>Can you rally 'round the flag boys, and burn 'er?<br>Don't ask those rheumy eyed old savants on the Hill,<br>Whose sympathies toss like spittle in the wind,<br>Whose words of wisdom are the swill<br>Of swineherds and their kind.<br>Ask George Washington and Betsy Ross,<br>Ask those who crossed the Delaware<br>And held her high o'er Valley Forge<br>In ice numbed hands,<br>And watched her wave against the war red skies<br>With snow blind eyes.<br>Ask Lincoln at Gettysburg,<br>Ask Generals Lee and Grant,<br>Ask those who manned our Alamos,<br>They will not give you can't.<br>Ask Teddy Roosevelt how he felt<br>About your right to burn the flag on San Juan Hill;<br>Ask the boys on Iwo Jima who flung it high<br>Above the shell pocked scree,<br>If you can hew it down<br>And torch it and still live free.<br>Ask Barbara Frietchie and Nathan Hale,<br>The Green Mountain Boys and Perry,<br>Ask the men at Chateau Thierry<br>And those on the Arizona.<br>Ask the VFW and DAR,<br>The mothers of the Golden Star;<br>Ask the millions of others to match their sacrifices<br>Against your puny rites and rituals,<br>Your willingness to wrap yourselves<br>In its protective folds,<br>And mouth the amendments<br>That suit your petty purposes.<br>Why don't you ask Francis Scott Key<br>If you can burn the flag?<br>Why don't you ask me?<br>You spineless slugs and mindless troglodytes -<br>So protective of your rights! ASK ME!<br>Try to burn enough to sift o'er Arlington<br>And scruff the Unknown Soldier's tomb,<br>And dust the blood red womb of Omaha;<br>The sun baked sands<br>Can't still its heroes' tongues,<br>But flag ash might.<br>When you tinder one in Washington<br>Make sure its on the lap of Lincoln,<br>The sun may meld its colors in the stone.<br>Install<br>A clotheline string around the Wall<br>So that the blaze may haze<br>The fifty thousand names whose tongues are mute<br>But still refute<br>Your so called right to burn their country's flag.<br>Try to burn one at Appomattox or Bull Run;<br>The very ground would shun<br>The ash,<br>The silent breath of heroes<br>Gutter your vandal torch!<br>Go to the VA hospitals and ask the legless<br>Who saluted her when they had hands<br>If you can burn their flag.<br>DAMN YOU, GO AND ASK THEM!<br>Go to Mount Rushmore<br>If you can stand to face them,<br>Go to the hamlets and villages of this great land,<br>To the mountains and the prairies<br>And the plains and ask -<br>Ask the Americans there<br>If you can burn the neatly folded triangles<br>That brought their loved ones home.<br>ASK THEM, DAMN YOU!<br>And last of all go to your mirrors and ask,<br>Am I small souled enough<br>To burn this proud, bold symbol<br>Of a nation's heritage,<br>This banner of Freedom,<br>This Emblem of Liberty,<br>This - GLORY!</b></font></p></blockquote></blockquote><hr color=0000ca size=3><center><font size=2 face=arial><b><a href=http://www.isavo.net/poem/sk1.htm>This Poem's Index Page 1</a><br><a href=http://www.yensa.net/poem/sk1.htm>This Poem's Index 2</a><br><a href=http://www.isavo.com/poems.htm>Poetry Website</a><br><a href=http://www.saviodsilva.com>Saviodsilva</a><br><a href=http://www.isavo.com>Isavo Site</a></b></font></center><SCRIPT LANGUAGE=JavaScript SRC=http://www.saviodsilva.org/r/fantasy.js></SCRIPT></body></html>