3 cheers for the Red, White, and Blue

THE FLAG GOES BY

By Henry H. Bennett

‘Hats off! Along the street there comes

A blare of bugles, a ruffle of drums

A flash of color beneath the sky: Hats off!

The flag is passing by!’ (repeat at the end)

Blue and crimson and white it shines,

Over the steel-tipped ordered lines.

Hats off! The colors before us fly;

But more than the flag is passing by..

Sea-fights and land-fights, grim and great,

Fought to make and to save the State:

Weary marches and sinking ships;

Cheers of victory on dying lips;

Days of plenty and years of peace;

March of strong land’s swift increase;

Equal justice, right and law,

Stately honor and reverend awe;

Sign of a nation, great and strong

To ward her people from foreign wrong;

Pride and glory and honor, – all

Live in the colors to stand or fall.

‘Hats off! Along the street there comes…’

H.H. Bennett wrote this poem in 1897.

Notice how much of its imagery came true

right here on Saipan and Tinian islands

50 years later during WWII and during our

Liberation Day Parade today on Beach Road.

SWEET SENRYU RED WHITE AND BLUE

Candy red apples on a stick give em a lick

half moon cookies chocolate and white

watch the moon tonight and take a bite

my sister’s rhubarb raspberries and blue

plenty of penny pies for you

blueberry raspberry apple cherry

fresh pumpernickel rye bread

many hungry mouths are fed

vanilla ice cream on a stick

pink and white cotton candy fluff

eat and lick before they melt. quick!

popsicles and ice keke red and blue

vanilla shakes and banana smoothie

summer delights for me and you.

Joey aka “Pepe Batbon” Connolly is a retired educator who taught in the CNMI, NOLA, and LVNV. He is the Poet Laureate of Tinian and enjoys stargazing.