Patriotic Poems

Guest Author - Danielle Hollister

TO THE FOUNDING FATHERS

Your light still lingers in our distant morning,
A star that we perceive across the void.

We chart our passage by your words, still burning
Long after your bright core has been destroyed.

No longer do we speak of "natural" rights,
Nor can we think that Reason guides our will.

We've been through far too many gruesome nights
To hope we have reduced our lust to kill.

Yet hope remains the engine of our fire,
Hope that someday all of us will be

Happy in the least that we require:
Well-fed, well-housed, safe, secure, and free.

This dream we still pursue. Though darkness come,
Your wisdom, hope, and courage through us run.

~~ Author Unknown ~~

Faith in America

UNKNOWN SOLDIER

He went where others feared to go,

and did what others failed to do.

He cried, pained and hoped--

but most of all he lived times--

never to be forgotten.

~~ Author Unknown ~~

INDEPENDENCE DAY

Today they locked the gates and declared a holiday:
Independence Day.

For we are free at last,
Free from fear,
Free from war,
Free from the past and free from the future.

Only the present bothers us;
hence the locks on the door preventing "undesirables"
from entering or leaving.

(To guard the present moment)

Like Jericho of old,
no one comes and no one leaves.

Inside our compound we are happy.
We rejoice – with fire and flame,
with parades and picnics, with song.

Only the gates are locked,
from dusk to dusk and then to dawn,
as in an old movie.

Inside our fortress, dogs bark freely, proclaiming liberty throughout the land.

They are happy.
They can sing; they are in Paradise:
The Land of Canine, where no one enters and no one leaves, even dogs.

And children wave flags,
and adults place pennants on their cars
and we all sing a song of freedom,
along with our dogs, and our children, and the parking attendants,
along with the soldiers on guard duty at the closed gates of city and country Halleluiah!

~~ Author Unknown ~~