Taps

Brassy bugle,
Harmonious hymn,
Such a moan you mouth
like a wounded warrior
or a gambling gust
outside a tiny house

Sacred sounds
Vivid vibrations,
Such a note you knead
like batter for baking
or scars for soothing,
scars caused by a good deed

Dreary dwindling
Hovering hues
Such a finale you perform
like a princess posing
or a woman weeping
at the sight of her son's uniform

Hi,

I loved loved loved this! It is haunting and beautiful, your imagery is great, I love the alliteration and it flows perfectly. I especially loved the first three and final lines of the first stanza. "Note you kneaded" is brilliant.

I'd reconsider "scars caused by a good deed" as it bored me a little after all of the vivid and fresh lines which had come before it.

I'd cut "such" from the final stanza as you don't need it and it makes the line too long.

A very enjoyable read,

Hope this helps,

Jas

If the first thing I made sure to do was to *like* this, then you can be certain you've done a good job.

First of all, the subject matter itself is wonderfully unique. I mean, how many poems do you see written about taps, anyway? Here we are, poets madly trying to find the meaning of the universe, tackling big subjects like love and war (and everything in between), while the simple joy of the commonplace is forgotten. You remind us that there is the here-and-now to remember, that we still live in an ultimately tangible world, and that there is an effortless joy in contemplating the most ordinary and even mundane of things. You have a delightful centre point for the poem and you expand on it, relate it to possible and impossible examples and then finish with a final bang, a well-plucked metaphor - 'a woman weeping / at the sight of her son's uniform.' Brilliant.

Brassy bugle,
Harmonious hymn,
Such a moan you mouth
like a wounded warrior
or a gambling gust
outside a tiny house

Just curious - you've been great at forgetting punctuation here, and this adds such a toss-of-the-head-I'm-gonna-keep-it-free effect to it - are you sure you want the big scary capitals dominating the start of each line? It seems sort of odd to me. The beginning two lines - I almost missed the alliteration, by the way (actually, on second inspection, there's quite a lot of it, isn't there? ^^) - almost put me off since they seemed a bit listy. Kind of like a list of descriptions. But the next bit - especially that verb in 'such a moan you mouth' brought me back again. Even so, this stanza still seems a tad list-like - that kind of ruins that effect of appreciating the little things. I see taps. I see them described in multiple forms. I don't see what they're doing, why they matter, who they matter to or are important to (of course, the last line totally refutes that statement, so you clearly do know what you're doing here).

Granted, now that I reread it, the rest of the poem does read like a list of alliteration-descriptions. You could jazz this up a lot more. You definitely need more verbs here - a bit more action never goes amiss. Make something happen throughout the piece, rather than just at the last line!

Anyway, a great poem. Thanks for the read. PM me if you have questions or would just like to discuss something!

Thanks for all the great comments! Thanks for the advice, Jasmine Hart, and I'll consider "scars caused by a good deed," but I'd prefer to keep "such," because, if you look more closely, it repeats in that same spot throughout the poem, and I like to be consistent in my repetition. Navita, I'll definitely look into the verbs. Actually, my first draft of the poem started out with, "You brassy bugle/ your harmonious hymn," but I cut that since I didn't think it added much. I'll see what else I can do. I'll consider the capitalization, too. Believe it or not, the poem started out as one of those ones that it's fun to look at -- I had the last three lines of every stanza sort of glide out like stairs, but all that fun formatting (I have an aptitude for alliteration) was cut when I submitted it. Thanks once again for the comments and the like!