I spent the night in a sleepless rage,
Writing my thoughts upon a page,
Can we defend what we have today?
Can we rush head first into the fray?

The time for action is here and now,
Armed and ready, we will not bow,
A cruel and evil army is at our gate,
And it does not slow and it will not wait.

We have freedom and rights we’ve earned,
We fought hard and lessons we’ve learned,
And yet we can be sure if freedom is lost,
It can only be recovered at terrible cost. 

But the hardest thing perhaps to hear,
And the most frightening for all to fear,
If it’s taken by what we could not or did not do,
Then freedom will be gone for our children, too.

Everything we’ve done is with us still,
We continue to battle the fool on the hill,
The great experiment is still alive,
Helping our democracy to survive. 

Ray Potts
Mt. Iron