Retired to a place where men die
old and comfortable by their favored brand of cigarettes,
burned themselves down and down into heroic coals 

down and down , the flags of the fathers
ashes reigning benevolence over sons in memoriam 
a tired, doomed sphere in the middle of nowhere,
dandered with bones and renamed home.
It's all just a place with a hearth for hearts
where these earned embers leave their marks
a thousand crosses carried to an elephant graveyard n'er forgotten
forever and ever amen