Beat

by Izzy

  • Poetry

Published November 29, 2012

They wonder why we’re going deaf,
Forcing pounding music through our heads,
It’s what we’ve always done,
Though the style has changed for worse,
And underneath the electronics,
It’s just the primal urge,
To feel the coursing waves,
Of four beats on the floor,
The throb of stamping feet,
Ear to foot to planet core,
And if we lose our hearing now,
Or in twenty years to come,
I’ll still have that relentless sound,
A coursing surging beat,
That flows straight from my brain to shoe to street,
And I’ll know that I’m alive,
By the song that’s stuck inside my head,
And if ever it should cease to play,
I’ll know that I’m already dead.
Comments & reviews · 2
User avatar
Cadi
Review
Cadi wrote a review Review · Dec 12, 2012

Hey there, Izzy,

I love the theme of this poem, and the conclusion of it - I, too, always have music in my head, and it's a wonderful thing. Also, favourite line, because I can: "ear to foot to planet core" made me smile in a good way, so that'll have to be it.

Now, poetry isn't really my forte, so I'm not going to have a lot to say, but there is one thing that strikes me about this poem, and that is to do with the rhythm of it. See, it's called 'Beat', and it's talking about the beat of music, but then the poem itself... almost has a beat. It's not quite there, and I think that with a bit of careful rewriting, you could have something really clever, with a nice, solid beat of its own.

To see what I'm talking about with the rhythm, read the poem aloud, and work out where the stresses fall. For example...

They wonder why we're going deaf


Now, if you go through the whole thing, there are some lines where the stresses line up really nicely, but there are others where the way you would naturally stress the words doesn't quite work with the way the poem's pattern makes it feel they should go. This makes the reader stumble over the line a bit, whether they're reading aloud or in their head, and that breaks the flow of the poem. If you can work out where those stumbles happen, and reword them to avoid stumbling, you can make the poem as a whole fit a really nice rhythm, and I think that, especially in a poem about music and beat, would be a really awesome thing.

I hope I managed to say that clearly - if not, please feel free to message me about it.
Happy writing!
Cadi x

User avatar
aouther2b
Review
aouther2b wrote a review Review · Dec 1, 2012

I love this piece. Its message is really well written and played out. I especially liked how you repeated the idea of one thing to another to another, it helped move the poem along. I can't find much wrong with it. Grammar is good. I think I would only say it could use some imagery, but not much because it doesn't need alot. I love the last two lines for it wraps the idea perfectly. Great piece! :)



Defeat has its lessons as well as victory.
— Pat Buchanan