I've done with flags

Last Saturday as I walked among the graves at Mt. Olivet, an ancient Southern cemetery, I was suddenly overwhelmed with emotion. Next to many gravestones fresh Civil War battle flags were planted. These graves often had bronze plaques telling of their service to country (not the U.S.). They are maintained by Sons of the Confederate War Veterans who rightfully wish to preserve this piece of our heritage. Yet, as I looked around I was certain that some of these stones were also those of citizens who supported the Union (a word carefully avoided on the bronze plaques). Tennessee was the last state to secede and it was the first to re-unite with the Union following the conflict.

War always leaves a trail of death and hatred in its wake --- maybe that is what I was feeling when I wrote this:

I'm done with flags
That in death divide us
Fields of cloth stained red with blood
Charging into battle colors flying
To fields of green
Now soon-to-be stained red with blood

We mark the divides with
Graves that sprout stars and bars
Next to those that would sprout stars and stripes
While the dead lie, oblivious, at peace
Sharing the same earth
Sharing the same sky

It is left to the living
Who are stirred
By blood stained rags
Crying for "justice"
Crying "avenge the wrongs"
So that we, too,

Can charge into battle
Blood-stained colors flying
So that we, too, have their chance
To lie here in the same earth
Under the same sky
At peace with their mortal enemies

I'm done with flags
That in death divide us, the living!