changing hands.

It was in a baggie in a box for more than 50 years.
Stars and stripes mingling with mothballs and cedar smells.
Covered by blankets and keepsakes, sweaters and nightgowns.
Forgotten at the bottom of the box.
She rescued the cloth, placing it in another box, this one with a window, so we could see the pride in the colors.
The cloth of a war long gone, for a man long dead.
It had sat draped on top of his box, covering his body,
that he bore to foreign lands to save us all.

Folded by warriors and into another's hands it had gone,
And then into the bag,
Into the box,
For more than 50 years.
Until we brought it out.
Unrolled, not unfurled.
To see the sun and feel the wind, but never again to blow in it.
We unrolled to count the holes and the stars,
48 stars in all, more holes.

Passed to another's hands and onto another box, covering another body
that was carried all over the earth.
Another warrior.
More lands seen by those closed eyes,
More stories told,
Wars fought,
Children loved,
Life lived.

It covered this body and then passed hands again,
Folded again in the spring warmth.
Folded with painstaking care and presented to a son, uncle, father, brother, grandpa.
48 stars in all, more holes.
To go onto a mantle, as far from a box as possible.
For how long?
Until another box is needed.
Or until the holes consume it.