The Boys Who Used to Raise the Flag

The boys who get

To raise the flags

Are chosen

Based on complex criteria

That is a mishmash

Of grades

Behavior

And how well they play

On the school’s basketball team

One is the son

Of the school principal

And he’s the only one

Who fails to meet the criteria

But is allowed

To raise the flag each day

Because his father thinks

It will instill in him

A sense of cause and duty

Twenty years from the last day

Of fifth grade

The principal’s son

Will set fire to a flag

At a protest against an oil company

Attempting to demolish and drill

At a wildlife sanctuary

One of the boys

Is the star of the school basketball team

The Mad Frogs

Perhaps the meanest elementary

Basketball team

In the history of northern Connecticut

Ten years from the last day

Of fifth grade

This boy will be in his dorm room

And another boy will be leaving

With an American flag t-shirt

Sleeves cut off

And as he’s leaving

He’ll turn and smile

At the former star

Mad Frog

Basketball player

And the boy

Who used to raise the flag

Will fall in love

For the first time

With someone

Who can love him back

The third boy gets the best grades

In all of fifth grade

The teacher loves him

And every day he goes home

Not sure if the door will be

Unlocked or even wide open

Because his father

Had to run in quick

Grab some money

And run back out again

Sometimes whole weeks go by

And he eats by ordering pizza

With the cash his father leaves for him

In one of the assigned places

He knows that if the phone rings

And someone reads four numbers to him

He’s to go across the street

To Mrs. Lawrence’s house

And wait for further instructions

Thirty years from the last day

Of fifth grade

He’ll be visiting his father

At a facility

And his father will be humming

The national anthem

On a loop

And when his son asks him

To stop

His father will hum louder

Until the boy

Who used to raise the flag

Gets up and leaves

Deciding never

To visit

Again

Nowadays the flag is up

But only because

Nobody bothered

To take it down

When school emptied out

If it rains, it rains

If it’s dark, it’s dark

One of the boys

Who used to raise the flag

Drives by

For old times sake

Sees the flag

And decides

It needs to come down

He stops his car

But he can’t get out

What would it look like

If someone saw

The man he is now

In this nice residential area

With all these houses

Circulated on a hillside

Trying to take down a flag

That doesn’t belong to him?

Would he remember

How to fold it up properly?

Would he be able

To keep it

From touching

The ground?

Would he stand there

With it wrapped around him

Waiting for someone

To come

And ask him

What he’s doing?

He stares up at the flag

And wonders

If it’s the same flag

He used to raise

And lower

Every day

It doesn’t seem

So high anymore

But still high enough

To require

Attendance