Oh say, can you sing?

The success of American athletes at the London Olympics gave NBC plenty of opportunity to show medal ceremonies where the US national anthem was played. I always thought the lyrics of “The Star Spangled Banner” were corny. But after listening more closely, I think they are interesting. Try to think afresh about the lyric :

“Oh, say, can you see? by the dawn's early light, what so proudly we hailed, at the twilight's last gleaming?“

Was it just a dream? This is not a chest thumping paean to an inevitable, ever-triumphant victor. Instead it asks a neighbor (maybe the questioner doesn't want to look!) whether the symbol of a beautiful idea they were so proud about last night survived the “existential threat” (current parlance) through the night. The tone is hopeful, a little worried, and maybe even a little desperate.

“Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight,
Over the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming?”

It was a bold and bright idea being battered...but we just watched.  The challenges, the attacks themselves test and prove the continued existence of the dream.

“And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof thro' the night that our flag was still there.”

The ending asks two questions:

“O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?”

The first is rhetorical in the context of the awards ceremony, where we see the flag, but the second we should ask ourselves all the time: are we free? Are we brave?