Share your favorite Poem With Us

That's an impossible question to answer accurately. I have too many and would be all day looking them up and pasting them here. So many poets come to mind: Done, Milton, Poe, Nash, Silverstein, etc., etc., etc.....

Here is one that I often think of when I see people worrying about cleaning up:

"Dust" by Sidney King Russell

Agatha Morley all her life
Grumbled at dust like a good wife.
Dust on a table, dust on a chair,
Dust on a mantle she could not bear.
She forgave faults in man and child,
But a dusty shelf would set her wild.
She bore with sin without protest,
But dust thoughts preyed upon her rest.
Agatha Morley is sleeping sound
Six feet under the moldy ground.
Six feet under the earth she lies,
With dust at her feet and dust in her eyes.

originally posted by: Cloudbuster
Here's another one from my childhood.

Baked beans make you fart.
Baked beans so good for your heart.
The more you fart the better you feel.
So eat baked beans for every meal.


Taught to me by my dad.

And another.......

Where ever you may be let your wind blow free.
It's better to bare the shame, than to bare the pain.

In the Desert
BY STEPHEN CRANE

In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
Who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, “Is it good, friend?”
“It is bitter—bitter,” he answered;

“But I like it
“Because it is bitter,
“And because it is my heart.”

too long to post in it's entirety, but "I Sing The Body Electric" from Walt Whitman's sprawling work "Leaves of Grass"

If
Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!

Solace by Dorothy Parker

There was a rose that faded young;
I saw its shattered beauty hung
Upon a broken stem.
I heard them say, "What need to care
With roses budding everywhere?"
I did not answer them.

There was a bird, brought down to die;
They said, "A hundred fill the sky-
What reason to be sad?"
There was a girl, whose lover fled;
I did not wait, the while they said,
"There's many another lad."



Gently adapted to song, by Myriam Gendron-

A NAUSEOUS NOCTURNE
Another night deprived of slumber,
Hours passing without number.
My eyes trace 'round the room. I lay
Dripping sweat and now quite certain
That tonight the final curtain
Drops upon my short life's precious play.
From the darkness, by the closet
Comes a noise, much like a faucet
Makes: a madd'ning drip-drip-dripping sound.

It seems some ill-proportioned beast,
Anticipating me deceased,
Is drooling puddles on the ground.
A can of Mace, a forty-five,
Is all I'd need to stay alive.
But no weapon lies within my sight
Oh my gosh! A shadow's creeping.
Ominous and black, it's seeping
Slowly 'cross a moonlit square of light!

Suddenly a floorboard creak
Announces the bloodsucking freak
Is here to steal my future years away!
A sulf'rous smell now fills the room
Heralding my imm'nent doom!
A fang gleams in the dark and murky gray!
Oh, blood-red eyes and tentacles!
Throbbing, pulsing ventricles!
Mucus-oozing pores and frightful claws!

Worse, in terms of outright scariness,
Are the suckers multifarious
That grab and force you in its mighty jaws!
This disgusting aberration
Of nature needs no motivation
To devour helpless children in their beds
Relishing despairing moans,
It chews kids up and sucks their bones,
And dissolves inside its mouth their li'l heads!

I know this 'cause I read it not
Two hours ago, and then I got
The heebie-jeebies and these awful shakes.
My parents swore upon their honor
That I was safe, and not a goner.
I guess tomorrow they'll see their sad mistakes.
In the morning, they'll come in
And say, "What was that awful din
We heard last night? You kept us both from sleep!"

Only then will they surmise
The gruesomeness of my demise
And see that my remains are in a heap.
Dad will look at Mom and say,
"Too bad he had to go that way."
And Mom will look at Dad, and nod assent.
Mom will add, "Still, it's fitting,
That as he was this world quitting,
He should leave another mess before he went."

They may not mind at first, I know.
They will miss me later, though,
And perhaps admit that they were wrong.
As memories of me grow dim,
They'll say, "We were too strict with him.
We shoud have listened to him all along."
As speedily my end approaches,
I bid a final "buenas noches"
To my best friend here in all the world.

Gently snoring, whiskers seeming
To sniff at smells (he must be dreaming),
He lies snuggled in the blankets, curled.
HEY! WAKE UP, YOU STUPID CRETIN!
YOU GONNA SLEEP WHILE I GET EATEN?!
Suddenly the monster know I'm not alone!
There's an animal in bed with me!
An awful beast he did not see!
The monster never would've come if he had known!

The monster, in his consternation,
Demonstrates defenestration,
And runs and runs and runs and runs away.
Rid of the pest,
I now can rest,
Thanks to my best friend, who saved the day.

by Bill Watterson

Only one for me:

Do not go gentle into that good night
Dylan Thomas

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

www.cgcs.org...

One of many ive commited to memory.....from 101 famous poems, cable piano company


Opportunity

This I beheld, or dreamed it in a dream:—
There spread a cloud of dust along a plain;
And underneath the cloud, or in it, raged
A furious battle, and men yelled, and swords
Shocked upon swords and shields. A prince's banner
Wavered, then staggered backward, hemmed by foes.
A craven hung along the battle's edge,
And thought, "Had I a sword of keener steel—
That blue blade that the king's son bears,— but this
Blunt thing—!" He snapped and flung it from his hand,
And lowering crept away and left the field.
Then came the king's son, wounded sore bested,
And weaponless, and saw the broken sword
Hilt-buried in the dry and trodden sand,
And ran and snatched it, and with battle-shout
Lifted afresh he hewed his enemy down
And saved a great cause that heroic day.

Edward Rowland Sill


www.ebay.com/itm/1924-Old-One-Hundred-and-One-Famous-Poems-Book-/391263586639

this one (about Annwn, Tir-Na-Nog, or the Otherworld) is from a favorite book I read in my late teens..

There one sees the Silver Land,
where dragonstones and diamonds rain,
and the sea breaks upon the sand
the crystal tresses from it's mane

Throughout Earth's ages..still it sings
To its own hosts its melody,
Its hundred-chorused music rings,
Undecaying, deathless, free..

Hawk of May, Gillian Bradshaw

a reply to: intrepid
That's one of my favorites. I was actually going to post it but I saw that you did.

If you've read Salem's Lot by Stephen King, you've read this one. According to Stephen King, it's about a dead woman.

The Sunlight on the Garden

The sunlight on the garden
Hardens and grows cold,
We cannot cage the minute
Within its nets of gold;
When all is told
We cannot beg for pardon.

Our freedom as free lances
Advances towards its end;
The earth compels, upon it
Sonnets and birds descend;
And soon, my friend,
We shall have no time for dances.

The sky was good for flying
Defying the church bells
And every evil iron
Siren and what it tells:
The earth compels,
We are dying, Egypt, dying

And not expecting pardon,
Hardened in heart anew,
But glad to have sat under
Thunder and rain with you,
And grateful too
For sunlight on the garden.

-Louis MacNeice

The Stolen Child
William Butler Yeats


Where dips the rocky highland
Of Sleuth Wood in the lake,
There lies a leafy island
Where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water rats;
There we’ve hid our faery vats,
Full of berrys
And of reddest stolen cherries.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than
you can understand.

Where the wave of moonlight glosses
The dim gray sands with light,
Far off by furthest Rosses
We foot it all the night,
Weaving olden dances
Mingling hands and mingling glances
Till the moon has taken flight;
To and fro we leap
And chase the frothy bubbles,
While the world is full of troubles
And anxious in its sleep.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than
you can understand.

Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glen-Car,
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams;
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than
you can understand.

Away with us he’s going,
The solemn-eyed:
He’ll hear no more the lowing
Of the calves on the warm hillside
Or the kettle on the hob
Sing peace into his breast,
Or see the brown mice bob
Round and round the oatmeal chest.
For he comes, the human child,
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world’s more full of weeping than
he can understand.

These are just wonderful! Thanks to everyone who has shared so far!

I'm not much of a poetry person, but I really like these two.

1) I saw this one referenced in a movie once and really liked it, so I looked up the entire text. (I *think* it might have been in "Interstellar", but I'm not sure now)

www.poets.org...
Do not go gentle into that good night
Dylan Thomas, 1914 - 1953

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.


and this one

2) I forget where I came across this one, but the 'trick' is that it is written such that it reads COMPLETELY differently if you read from line 1 to line X, or line X to line 1. One is extremely cynical and the other is extremely optimistic.

genius.com...

By: Jonathan Reed

I am part of a lost generation
and I refuse to believe that
I can change the world
I realize this may be a shock but
“Happiness comes from within.”
is a lie, and
“Money will make me happy.”
So in 30 years I will tell my children
they are not the most important thing in my life
My employer will know that
I have my priorities straight because
work
is more important than
family
I tell you this
Once upon a time
Families stayed together
but this will not be true in my era
This is a quick fix society
Experts tell me
30 years from now, I will be celebrating the 10th anniversary of my divorce
I do not concede that
I will live in a country of my own making
In the future
Environmental destruction will be the norm
No longer can it be said that
My peers and I care about this earth
It will be evident that
My generation is apathetic and lethargic
It is foolish to presume that
There is hope.

exaudi nos et misrere
exaudi, dominus
Dona nobis pacem
et salva nos a hostibus
salva nos, deus
Dominus exaudi nos
dominus misrere
dona nobis pacem
sanctus, gloria
Dona nobis pacem
e dona eis requiem
inter ovas locum
voca me cum benedictis
pie jesu domine, dona eis requiem
dominus deus, sanctus, gloria

lord god
hear us, the wretched
hear us, lord
Grant us peace
and save us from the enemy
save us, god
Lord hear us
lord have mercy
grant us peace
holy, glory
Grant us peace
and give them rest
amongst this rejoiced place
call me with the blessed
merciful jesus, give them rest
lord god, holy, glory

Another one by Robert Frost
The Road Not Taken


Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

A seasonal favorite by James Whitcomb Riley


When The Frost Is On The Punkin

When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock
And you hear the kyouck and gobble of the struttin' turkey cock
And the clackin' of the guineys, and the cluckin' of the hens
And the rooster's hallylooyer as he tiptoes on the fence
O, it's then's the times a feller is a-feelin' at his best
With the risin' sun to greet him from a night of peaceful rest
As he leaves the house, bareheaded, and goes out to feed the stock
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock

They's something kindo' harty-like about the atmusfere
When the heat of summer's over and the coolin' fall is here
Of course we miss the flowers, and the blossums on the trees
And the mumble of the hummin'-birds and buzzin' of the bees
But the air's so appetizin'; and the landscape through the haze
Of a crisp and sunny morning of the airly autumn days
Is a pictur' that no painter has the colorin' to mock
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.

The husky, rusty russel of the tossels of the corn,
And the raspin' of the tangled leaves, as golden as the morn;
The stubble in the furries kindo' lonesome-like, but still
A-preachin' sermuns to us of the barns they growed to fill;
The strawstack in the medder, and the reaper in the shed;
The hosses in theyr stalls below the clover over-head!
O, it sets my hart a-clickin' like the tickin' of a clock,
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock!

Then your apples all is gethered, and the ones a feller keeps
Is poured around the celler-floor in red and yeller heaps;
And your cider-makin' 's over, and your wimmern-folks is through
With their mince and apple butter, and theyr souse and saussage, too!
I don't know how to tell it but ef sich a thing could be
As the Angels wantin' boardin', and they'd call around on me
I'd want to 'commodate 'em all the whole-indurin' flock
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock!

Some of my favourites have already been posted. This one is a smartass poem by the late poet Arun Kolatkar:

The Butterfly by Arun Kolatkar


There is no story behind it.
It is split like a second.
It hinges around itself.

It has no future.
It is pinned down to no past.
It's a pun on the present.

It's a little yellow butterfly.
It has taken these wretched hills
under its wings.

Just a pinch of yellow,
it opens before it closes
and it closes before it o

where is it?

Yeah, I know, not to everyone's taste. There was just something about his poems that chimed inside.

a reply to: ladyinwaiting

Manley-Hopkins wrote *maybe* two or three other poems that come anywhere close to that one - an all time favourite of mine. As a comment on the passage of time and life's longing for its innocence and lost childhood, is there a better one? A short-tempered antidote to that might be Spring by Edna SV Millay. She undercuts the value of life altogether by suggesting it's so ubiquitous as to be meaningless:

Life in itself
Is nothing,
An empty cup, a flight of uncarpeted stairs.