It is not patriotic
to desecrate a flag
or even denigrate a nationalistic anthem
celebrating a war-torn patriotic flag.

Yet is it even anti-patriotic
to refuse to bow to it,
the flag, that is,
to not stand with supremacist intentions
while singing about it
to each other?
And usually rather badly
I might snobbishly add.

And the lyrics?
Well they do not favorably compare
to T.S. Elliot,
especially the one about
how we might sometimes consider
taking the history bending road less traveled.

Pretentious played out WinLose roads
all leading both to and from Rome,
monoculturally agreeing we share a just war right
to train our children
how best to resolve our territorial threats of violence
is further threat of militarizing
and policing
and militia ethno-supremacist violence
against basic civil humane decency
to at least pretend to flirt for an invitation to visit first.

It matters not to me
if overpaid and celebrated athletes
stand or bow
or simply stay comfortably seated
on their well-developed asses
during nationalistic commemorations
that feel to them
as if they are sadly sung as Other;
this is not a patriotic history that has
over-invested in pretending All Hues and Textures Matter
and are equally invited to co-reside,
not even much of a childhood visit
to consider significant investment
in singing praise futures
for civil war-torn flags
flown most flagrantly
at sexist
and racist
and ballistics for better business associations–
which all feels quite anti-democratic
and anti-most of North American voting populations
and anti-most trees and forests,
our nonvoting yet shared-climate populations.

But, hey,
who’s counting patriotically correct positions,
right?

To stand
to bow
to remain seated as self-restraint
against fake historic news
during entire mindless operas
and WinLose ball game operations
celebrating MightMakesRight
means patriotic
right or rather more weakly and humbling wrong.

I do care what
is RightWing undervalued
as the very EarthBound Climate HealthyHeart
of Patriotism,
because what is pathological for planet Earth
cannot be so much sacredly patriotic
for any American nation,
North or South
or that hot creolizing latino/a strip
in-between,
or for any tribe
or species
or branch of nature,
including humane nature-spirits,
body-minds of and for nondual patriotic-matriotic
polypathic maturation,
cooperative regenerativity,
health trends patriotically reconnected
with ecological wealth trends,
to include those nonvoting trees and forests
in our ecopolitical party plans
and full-color invitations to please participate.

If the NFL has earned
a patriotic boycott,
for me this is about
investing in more democratically inclusive
cooperative
nutritious WinWin health-wealth games
and co-ownership exploits
but with more commitment
than mere flirtations
around the edges of Earth flagging worship
and waving trends.

EarthMatriotic patriotism not all about
who stands
who sits
who bows and scrapes
who farts
who crosses hearts
and hopes to die
during any seemingly endless nation’s anthems
and self-congratulatory flag-waving,
as entertaining as this may be
for the younger kids
who didn’t forget their sunscreen.

Even they might prefer cooperative circles
for Hokey Pokey Anthems
full-voiced song
and active healthy dance
more patriotically AllAmerican together.