I watched the flag pass by one day.
                                    It fluttered in the breeze
                              A young Marine saluted it, and then
                                       He stood at ease.

                                  I looked at him in uniform
                                  So young, so tall, so proud
                              With hair cut square and eyes alert
                                 He'd stand out in any crowd.

                               I thought, how many men like him
                                 Had fallen through the years?
                                How many died on foreign soil?
                                  How many mothers' tears?

                             How many Pilots' planes shot down?
                           How many foxholes were soldiers' graves?
                                    No, Freedom is not free.

                              I heard the sound of taps one night,
                                   When everything was still.
                                  I listened to the bugler play
                                    And felt a sudden chill.

                                I wondered just how many times
                                 That taps had meant "Amen"
                                When a flag had draped a coffin
                                    of a brother or a friend.

                                  I thought of all the children,
                                 Of the mothers and the wives,
                                 Of fathers, sons and husbands
                                    With interrupted lives.

                                  I thought about a graveyard
                                    at the bottom of the sea
                               Of unmarked graves in Arlington.
                                    No, Freedom isn't free!!

                                  Copyright 1981 by Kelly Strong


FREEDOM IS NOT FREE
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