I watched the flag pass by one day,
  It fluttered in the breeze.
 A young Marine saluted it,
 And then he stood at ease..
>
 I looked at him in uniform
 So young, so tall, so proud,
 With hair cut square and eyes alert
 He'd stand out in any crowd.
>
 I thought how many men like him
 Had fallen through the years.
 How many died on foreign soil
 How many mothers' tears?
>
How many pilots' planes shot down?
 How many died at sea
 How many foxholes were soldiers' graves?
 No, freedom isn't free.
>
 I heard the sound of Taps one night,
 When everything was still,
 I listened to the bugler play
 And felt a sudden chill.
>
I wondered just how many times
That Taps had meant "Amen,"
When a flag had draped a coffin.
Of a brother or a friend.
>
 I thought of all the children,
Of the mothers and the wives,
Of fathers, sons and husbands
With interrupted lives.
>
I thought about a graveyard

At the bottom of the sea
Of unmarked graves in Arlington.

No, freedom isn't free.

 Auther: unknown