Cue The Fireworks Please....

There is the National Flag. He must be cold, indeed, who can look upon its folds rippling in the breeze without pride of country. If he be in a foreign land, the flag is companionship and country itself, with all its endearment...The very colors have a language which was recognized by our fathers; white is for purity; red, for valor; blue, for justice. And altogether, bunting, stripes, stars, and colors, blazing in the sky, make the flag of our country, to be cherished by all our hearts, to be upheld by all our hands. -Charles Sumner

FIREWORKS Not guns, not thunder, but a clutter of clouded drums That announce a fiesta: abruptly, fiery needles Circumscribe on the night boundless chrysanthemums. Softly, they break apart, they flake away, where Darkness, on a svelte hiss, swallows them. Delicate brilliance: a bellflower opens, fades, In a sprinkle of falling stars. Night absorbs them With the sponge of her silence -Babette Deutsch

BY THE RUDE BRIDGE By the rude bridge that arched the flood, Their flag to April's breeze unfurled, Here once the embattled farmers stood, And fired the shot heard round the world. The foe long since in silence slept; Alike the conqueror silent sleeps; And Time the ruined bridge has swept Down the dark stream which seaward creeps. On this green bank, by this soft stream, We set today a votive stone; That memory may their deed redeem, When, like our sires, our sons are gone. Spirit that made those heroes dare To die, and leave their children free, Bid Time and Nature gently spare The shaft we raise to them and thee. -Ralph Waldo Emerson

FOURTH OF JULY NIGHT The little boat at anchor in black water sat murmuring to the tall black sky A white sky bomb fizzed on a black line. A rocket hissed it's red signature into the west. Now a shower of Chinese fire alphabets, A cry of flower pots broken in flames, A long curve to a purple spray, three violet balloons--- Drips of seaweed tangled in gold, shimmering symbols of mixed numbers, Tremulous arrangements of cream gold folds of a bride's wedding gown--- A few sky bombs spoke their pieces, then velvet dark. The little boat at anchor in black water sat murmuring to the tall black sky. - Carl Sandburg

Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty. -John F. Kennedy Inaugural Address Washington, D.C. January 20, 1961