The Defense Of The Star-Spangled Banner Poem by Brian Maloney

O! say can you see by the dawn’s early light
What so proudly we hailed at one point as redeeming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through each perilous fight
So gallantly streamed and gave depth to our meaning?
In what hollow desires that yielded ire
Gave proof there is lack of incomparable fire?
O! say does that Star-Spangled Banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

Now, pealing lavish from mouths of the reaped
To their foes, with a shrug to their gripes, indisposes
Themselves, entreats patience, trust, then retreats
From fury and din whilst he gently reposes,
Is a hum un-sated by vows to redeem,
Afraid, not crippled, of their flag being seen–
The Star-Spangled Banner that no longer doth wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

In this (the blanket that freedom adorns
To those, amidst havoc, sift through the confusion)
Burden sits squarely on those who have sworn
Defiance to all, save the Constitution.
No refuge need save the hireling or slave
On this oath, till justice We dole, or the grave
So that right may our Star-Spangled Banner long wave
As the land of the free and the home of the brave!

O! Thus be it ever, We freemen must stand
In war, in peace, toward the desired dissolution
Of the few in exchange for a land
That culls for the ego and not for the nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just
With God’s grace, to our own selves should we trust
Defend the Star-Spangled Banner, ever may it wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!