Ragged Old Flag

My computer was has been on the fritz, so I am just not getting this posted. Below is a song that every time I hear it, my tears get all waterty, and goose bumps cover my arms. Just picture a mid summer night at the rodeo, the local little boys and girls come thundering in horseback for the grand entry. Whoopin' and a'hollerin'. And then the announcer asks you to stand tall and remove cover. He starts the music. In comes that pickup man or rodeo queen or local kid that won the coin toss and was chosen to carry the American Flag. The only sounds are Johnny Cash's voice a crackin'; A baby crying; Roping cattle bawling; Bareback horses bangin' in the chute; and that semi roarin' down the highway next to the arena, oblivious as to what is going on. I'm telling you it gives me goose bumps just thinking about it.

Ragged Old Flag

By John R. Cash, © 1974 House of Cash, Inc.



I walked through a county courthouse square,

On a park bench an old man was sitting there.

I said, "Your old courthouse is kinda run down."

He said, "Naw, it'll do for our little town."

I said, "Your old flagpole has leaned a little bit,

And that's a Ragged Old Flag you got hanging on it."



He said, "Have a seat," and I sat down.

"Is this the first time you've been to our little town?"

I said, "I think it is." He said, "I don't like to brag,

But we're kinda proud of that Ragged Old Flag.



"You see, we got a little hole in that flag there when

Washington took it across the Delaware.

And it got powder-burned the night Francis Scott Key

Sat watching it writing Say Can You See.

And it got a bad rip in New Orleans

With Packingham and Jackson tuggin' at its seems.



"And it almost fell at the Alamo

Beside the Texas flag, but she waved on though.

She got cut with a sword at Chancellorsville

And she got cut again at Shiloh Hill.

There was Robert E. Lee, Beauregard, and Bragg,

And the south wind blew hard on that Ragged Old Flag.



"On Flanders Field in World War I

She got a big hole from a Bertha gun.

She turned blood red in World War II.

She hung limp and low by the time it was through.

She was in Korea and Vietnam.

She went where she was sent by her Uncle Sam.



"She waved from our ships upon the briny foam,

And now they've about quit waving her back here at home.

In her own good land here she's been abused --

She's been burned, dishonored, denied, and refused.



"And the government for which she stands

Is scandalized throughout the land.

And she's getting threadbare and wearing thin,

But she's in good shape for the shape she's in.'

Cause she's been through the fire before

And I believe she can take a whole lot more.



"So we raise her up every morning, take her

down every night.

We don't let her touch the ground and we fold

her up right.

On second thought, I do like to brag,

'Cause I'm mighty proud of the Ragged Old Flag."