[Matt Q]

Hi John,

I also found this very striking. It pulled me in and held my attention throughout, and pulled me in back to reread it. It's an apocalyptic scenario. Approaching heat death. Stars dying, planets possibly out of orbit. Humanity clinging on, having moved underground. The sun is fiery, seemingly a constant presence, and the fire is "final". End of days stuff. At the same time it reads like an allegory.

Some thoughts:

And my songs are burned, so I will never have to sing

I agree with James on that initial "And". Also, with "and", "my songs are burned" seems to have more of a sense of finality to it, as if he had songs once, but just has burned them all. Whereas at the close we learn is it's an ongoing process: he continues to compose and then burn his songs.

In fact, even minus the "and", "my songs are burned" is ambiguous as to whether it means: "I burn my songs" or "I have burned my songs". I wonder if "I burn my songs" might not be an option for the opening.

To not sing is the greatest pleasure, much more so than watching the poor singers, the ones who had no reprieve from standing in the sun that never left, that pins them to the ground, a butterfly on a board, while their mouths open and close and their song bellows forth.

Contra James, I like "that never left" because since it seems to imply that the sun might have left, left the planet behind, and had perhaps even been expected to. It also can be read as suggesting it never leaves the sky, I think -- that on the surface, it is permanent day. Both of which, I think, are interesting possibilities that add something to the description of this world.

I did wonder if the butterfly might be a moth, since these are drawn from the darkness into flames to their doom, and something similar is happening to the singers. But I also suspect that this might be a very bad idea! Plus, you'd lose the alliteration, and currently the p and b sounds are combining nicely. I can see how the butterfly might be there to the evoke fragility and beauty of the singers.

Still, the butterfly strikes me as an image that doesn't quite belong in the poem, or at least not in the bleak world the poem evokes. These are a subterranean people, there would be no butterflies underground, and above ground, it seems would be scorched. What would the N know of butterfly collecting? Or at least, that's how I'm imagining this world. But maybe that's just me.

Each song is written by the singer, who works under pressure to make their songs hideous, to blare like a donkey wishing for death, or the squawk of a crow falling from the fired sky a last time.

Does the latter part say, "to blare like a donkey ... or to blare like the squawk of a crow falling from the fired sky a last time"? Can a squawk blare? If that's not the intention, there seems to be something missing -- and to me it does read like something is missing. It seems to need to be "to blare like a donkey ... or to [something] like the squawk of a crow falling from the fired sky a last time". Alternatively: "to blare like a donkey wishing for death, or squawk like a crow falling ...". Like James, I'm unsure about "blare".

My understanding is that these singers have been banished to the surface to go mad. I wonder why the singer "works under pressure". Who is applying the pressure? Are they applying it to themselves?

Songs are the most hated thing, here beneath the constant cacophony of planets roaring past and stars flashing into the final fire.

I wonder if you need "songs are the most hated thing here". We can deduce that songs are hated from the fact they are not loved and the reaction of the men to the N's question as to why they are not, and also from the fact that anyone who sings is expelled, forced up into the fiery sun. Maybe this spells things out too much?

I can imagine that even underground, the cacophony of planets roaring past could be heard, but the "flashing" of the stars gave me pause. The flashing would not be seen (and in fact, the stars could not be seen given the, as I read it, the constant fiery sunlight). And can flashing considered be part of a cacophony, if it's not a sound? OK, the flashing could be happening unseen, the flash could be deduced, and it could result in a cosmically loud noise, but I wonder if there's another word than "flashing" that gives an auditory image?

Finally, I think the title could be doing more. I don't think it really has any impact on the poem as it stands.

best,

Matt