The POW/MIA (Missing Man) Table
A small table, set for one, sits near the entrance at Dining-Ins and veterans' halls across the country — every item on it is chosen to mean something, and no two scripts describing it are word-for-word identical.
How it actually works
The Missing Man Table is set apart, usually small and round, with a single place setting for one. Common elements include a white tablecloth (purity of intention in answering the call to serve), a single red rose in a vase (the blood shed and the family waiting at home), a yellow ribbon, a slice of lemon on the bread plate (the bitter fate of the missing), a pinch of salt (the tears of families still waiting for answers), an inverted glass (the toast they cannot share), and a lit candle. Service branch covers are sometimes placed at the setting, and the chair is left empty. The ceremony has become a standard fixture at military Dining-Ins and Dining-Outs and at American Legion and VFW posts nationwide, growing directly out of the Vietnam-era POW/MIA advocacy movement.
It gets presented as if there is one official, word-for-word DoD script — there is not. The American Legion, the VFW, the National League of POW/MIA Families, and individual service commands each publish their own version, and the details vary: some add a Bible, some add a black ribbon, some describe the candle being extinguished partway through rather than left burning. If the version you saw at your last Dining-In had different symbolism than the one from a different command, neither was wrong — this is a folk ceremony that grew organically out of 1970s POW/MIA advocacy, not a codified regulation.
Grew out of the Vietnam-era POW/MIA family advocacy movement of the 1970s; adopted widely into military and veteran-service-organization ceremonies since.