96: burner of flags

Burner of flags - those colours don't run!
Yet the flames are in love, swallowing it whole.
With greedy, selfish,
manifestations: A call to mind:
they burn with pride.

Stripped of stripes, the red and white
are a blackened, ashy, piece of cloth - Not even - as synthetic fibres
bite the dust,
And the stars fall out of the battlefield skies.

Alone, he stands before the gates that
precede cold, chalk-white, grandiose columns.
Before that white house, a fountain spews wasteful water;
Surrounded by lush greenery, well-maintained.