Monday, April 16, 2012


This morning, it was literally morning in America.

The sun warms my stripes and stars

On Lexington Green, redcoats were seen.

March we off to war
And then we wait

Troops ready to die for king and country.  Meanwhile, their captain took the morning air.

Three-quarter profile is my best look.

The Yankees assembled and considered their next move.

Is a graveyard an ominous sign?

War was upon us, 237 years ago, a bloodletting that made America, and made American lore.  Today it was remembered in Lexington, Massachusetts.

Much time has passed since then.  These battles here are mere replicas of those there.  

Unlike George Bernard Shaw's famous quip that the British and Americans are two people separated by a common language, these men -- re-enactors, infantrymen and irregulars, British and American -- have no trouble forming a single line.  

After laying a wreath at the tomb of a British soldier killed in 1775, they fired a loud salute to war's dead.  A car alarm went off in the parking lot nearby.

And afterward, New England's other great export -- prattling pedantry.

"And so why weren't rifles preferred over these guns?"  [Silence ensues.]