The Blue Boy

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Part I: Portrait

A patriotic monument,
the boy in Union blue:
A rifle clutched in quaking hands,
a tilt upon a single shoe.
A starry gash coagulates,
the visage striped with rivers red,
whose gallant depths foretell his fate,
a member of the dead.

Part II: Eulogy

In death, his face is blue and red,
In death, his face is white.
Long live the Stars and Stripes, my friend,
for whom you fought, for whom we fight!
A patriotic monument:
for sacrifice beyond his due,
we honor him, our flag in flesh,
the boy in Union blue.

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I liked this a lot; it was really traditional which I usually don't dig because, you know, it's been done (hence the traditional). But this felt different. It felt patriotic and emotional, but still formal and strong. I did really like this, and I don't have any complaints.
Keep writing,
StoryWeaver

En extremely eloquent poem with sets of images which, although patriotic, aren't overpowering. Very well done - you effortlessly pulled off what would have been quite a tricky piece

I love this. I just have to say, I ultimately, wonderfully, heart-breakingly love this. I especially love the first part, the portrait. It gives off a sense of pride and foreboding; the only thing I would change would probably be the length of the line "the visage striped with rivers red". Perhaps exclude the word "rivers"; then it would read a bit more smoothly as "the visage striped with red... a member of the dead".

The second stanza, the eulogy, I have a couple of issues with. First of all, a matter of punctuation preference that's probably just me - the comma at the end of the first line ought to, grammatically, be a semicolon. Other than that, some of the lines read off awkwardly. The exclamation point at the end of the fourth line looks out of place, especially on the end of a longer line, but again, my preference. By no means let this come out rude or condescending - I wouldn't presume to know half as much about this as you, it's just me being a little neurotic.