The Flag Goes By

The Flag Goes By

Hats off!

Along the streets there comes
A blare of bugles, a ruffle of drums,
A flash of color beneath the sky:
          Hats off!
The flag is passing by.
 
Blue and crimson and white it shines,
Over the steel-tipped, ordered lines.

            Hats off!

The colors before us fly;
But more than the flag is passing by.
 
Sea-fights and land-fights, grim and great,
Fought to make and save the state:
Weary marches and sinking ships;
Cheers of victory on dying lips;
 
Days of plenty and years of peace;
March of a small land’s swift increase;
Equal justice, right, and law,
Stately honor and reverend awe;
 
Sign of a nation, great and strong
To ward her people from foreign wrong:
Pride and glory and honor,-all
Live in the colors to stand or fall.

Hats off!

Along the streets there comes
A blare of bugles, a ruffle of drums,
A flash of color beneath the sky:
            Hats off!
The flag is passing by.

                        - Henry Halcomb Bennett

Just a poem i found and liked....