The Remnant

They cut their beloved banner
To scrap
Distributing the remnant
To those
Who would have died.

Not long before
That tattered cloth
Snapped like a cannonball
In the smoke and fury
The blood and moans of the dying.

Years and tears passed and fell
And as each old warrior
Went to his grave
The grieving families
Buried with him his torn rag.

Reduced now to dust and ash
Those shabby bits
Have become the grass and petal
The soil and memory
Of the Southland.

Remember her not
For her inglorious shame
For there was never a cause
As poor as that championed
By so brave a people.

Remember her colors
As the marrow
Bone and blood
The flesh and breath
Of her sons and daughters.

We cut them to pieces
Like they did their flags
Laying their bodies
And memory
In the dirt for which they fought.

And now we have a generation
Who has forgotten those
From whom they come.
They are now the remnant
The torn and forgotten flag.