Distant Trumpets

Distant trumpets

blaring our wedding march,

a fanfare yet unwritten.

You were a stranger,

everything I wasn’t.

It was the only thing about you

that I’ve ever known for certain.

 

We argue, stamp out of the room.

We don’t speak for days,

not of anything significant.

We forget, not long,

but enough to remember,

remember why -

the meaning of it all.

 

We are twins,

yet you favour the bull

and I the crab.

Chocolate undoes us.

Books, music,

our passions.

 

Uneasy duet, rehearsing,

got to get that passage right

No, not that way! Well, maybe. 

You know always know best.

Well get there eventually,

Someday we’ll understand

the complex rhythms of love.

Reviews

[Crimson Shadow]

I love the final stanza especially - This is like a dueling duet - "we must get that passage right!" Reminds me a perfectionist piano teacher I had once. Trumpets blaring a wedding march - great opening...seems they tune has evolved into "taps". I enjoy the way you represent the conflict between the two - twins yet under different signs ...one the bull the other the crab. You did a great job with this poem. I am very impressed. I felt the frustration and yet .... longevity....wanting to work out all the kinks in this love knot.

Atlanta, you really pulled out the stops on this one! The emotion is carried throughout and the metaphor works brilliantly.

[Catrinka]

A very real capture of the complexities of a long term relationship - an enjoyable read! I liked the reference of the bull and crab, (being a fish, we like astrology!) The strongest part for me
Distant trumpets
blaring our wedding march,
a fanfare yet unwritten.
You were a stranger,
everything I wasn't.
It was the only thing about you
that I've ever known for certain.

LOVED THAT!

[Blackbirdsong]

An really interesting way of basically saying, "you don't know someone until you live with them." I don't think most people get that at all and it can years to achieve this if ever. So many expect the other person to be everything for them and they don't want to work at their relationship just sort of have it easily evolve. If only, but then we'd miss all the fun stuff too.

[S. P. Vaporis]

loved this:

You were a stranger,
everything I wasn't.
It was the only thing about you
that I've ever known for certain

it set a grey tone for the whole piece. well done. ~peace~

[Chan]

This is so very true for so many married couples:

We argue, stamp out of the room.
We don't speak for days,
not of anything significant.
We forget, not long,
but enough to remember,
remember why -
the meaning of it all.

I, myself, love my husband very much but there are times that sometimes we don't talk for days and sometimes we forget why we married each other in the first place, but when all is said and done, we remember how much we love each other.

This rings true for so many people. A great write!!!!!!!!

[Lydia Breakfast]

Rough but true, oh so very true. This para:
We are twins,
yet you favour the bull
and I the crab.
Chocolate undoes us.
Books, music,
our passions.
does seem to interrupt the flow a little. See how you like it without. I thought it made it tighter. The information is very interesting, but it is back story compared to the struggle of daily life you present here. (Still you could say this is where the couple agrees so they do like eachother sometimes....)

BTW my parents were bull and crab and together they learned (over nearly 50 years) to relax into their roles and be content.

[A.M. Nelson]

Well, the astrology thing with the bull and crab was a bit offputting...this is interesting though, specifically in the way that you handle the premise...but I must say that I was listening to Mr Armstrong play Summertime...you know those opening trumpet lines..or whatever they are...and well this sounds nothing like the way I hear the trumpet played...Satchmo, Davis, or anyone.
It doesn't exactly call out through space and enchant your soul with melody. The way I think it should.
But what would I know? I am just the fool on the hill, strumming chords that have no sound.
It isn't brass, Its more one or two violins for me.

[Alia]

Hey, I'll get right into the technical aspects, if you don't mind.

In the first stanza, I feel that if you changed "blaring" to "blare" it would really add more spice to it because the action of blaring will be more in the moment. The intro will start with the actual playing of trumpets... for some reason the -ing weakens the sound. Also, it'd be stronger I think to have everything in the present tense.

In the last stanza, "You know always know best." Did you mean, "You always know best." And after that, I believe it should be, "We'll..."

I've been exposed to excerpts from Proust lately. His style is reflection upon reflection upon reflection until you think everything is being repeated so much that it's a struggle to get through to his point... but in a way I guess the thing I like about that is that it offers a unique peek into his soul. One of the excerpts I read was about a trip to Balbec, and from a train he spotted this girl, and immediately became infatuated with her, and rambled on and on about her. This poem is what the condensed version of Proust's writing would be.

There is a lot here that works in the poem's favor, and some that's kind of hit or miss with me. I'd like to believe this is REALLY love at first sight... and maybe a more compulsive infatuation could be expressed with more dreamy imagery. The areas where astrological signs were mentioned as well as the shared passions... those were spot on and hit something I connected with immediately because they were very real in a world where imagination is dominant. I think it would be interesting to include more fantasy-based images and see how reality/dreams could weave in and out of one another.

Alia