Famous Short Food Poems
Famous Short Food Poems. Short Food Poetry by Famous Poets. A collection of the all-time best Food short poems
by
William Shakespeare
Under the greenwood tree
Who loves to lie with me,
And turn his merry note
Unto the sweet bird's throat,
Come hither, come hither, come hither:
Here shall he see
No enemy
But winter and rough weather.
Who doth ambition shun,
And loves to live i' the sun,
Seeking the food he eats,
And pleas'd with what he gets,
Come hither, come hither, come hither:
Here shall he see
No enemy
But winter and rough weather.
by
Adrian Green
New moon on the lake.
Your voice and the nightingale
serenade springtime.
Full moon on the lake.
Your voice and the waterbirds
celebrate summer.
Old moon on the lake.
Owls hunting autumnal food -
your voice still singing.
by
Sylvia Plath
the slime of all my yesterdays
rots in the hollow of my skull
and if my stomach would contract
because of some explicable phenomenon
such as pregnancy or constipation
I would not remember you
or that because of sleep
infrequent as a moon of greencheese
that because of food
nourishing as violet leaves
that because of these
and in a few fatal yards of grass
in a few spaces of sky and treetops
a future was lost yesterday
as easily and irretrievably
as a tennis ball at twilight
by
Allen Ginsberg
Now mind is clear
as a cloudless sky.
Time then to make a
home in wilderness.
What have I done but
wander with my eyes
in the trees? So I
will build: wife,
family, and seek
for neighbors.
Or I
perish of lonesomeness
or want of food or
lightning or the bear
(must tame the hart
and wear the bear).
And maybe make an image
of my wandering, a little
image—shrine by the
roadside to signify
to traveler that I live
here in the wilderness
awake and at home.
by
R S Thomas
Dear parents,
I forgive you my life,
Begotten in a drab town,
The intention was good;
Passing the street now,
I see still the remains of sunlight.
It was not the bone buckled;
You gave me enough food
To renew myself.
It was the mind's weight
Kept me bent, as I grew tall.
It was not your fault.
What should have gone on,
Arrow aimed from a tried bow
At a tried target, has turned back,
Wounding itself
With questions you had not asked.
by
Robert Graves
Children born of fairy stock
Never need for shirt or frock,
Never want for food or fire,
Always get their hearts desire:
Jingle pockets full of gold,
Marry when they're seven years old.
Every fairy child may keep
Two ponies and ten sheep;
All have houses, each his own,
Built of brick or granite stone;
They live on cherries, they run wild--
I'd love to be a Fairy's child.
by
Philip Larkin
The little lives of earth and form,
Of finding food, and keeping warm,
Are not like ours, and yet
A kinship lingers nonetheless:
We hanker for the homeliness
Of den, and hole, and set.
And this identity we feel
- Perhaps not right, perhaps not real -
Will link us constantly;
I see the rock, the clay, the chalk,
The flattened grass, the swaying stalk,
And it is you I see.
by
Isaac Watts
How doth the little busy Bee
Improve each shining Hour,
And gather Honey all the day
From every opening Flower!
How skilfully she builds her Cell!
How neat she spreads the Wax!
And labours hard to store it well
With the sweet Food she makes.
In Works of Labour or of Skill
I would be busy too:
For Satan finds some Mischief still
For idle Hands to do.
In Books, or Work, or healthful Play
Let my first Years be past,
That I may give for every Day
Some good Account at last.
by
Hart Crane
The host, he says that all is well
And the fire-wood glow is bright;
The food has a warm and tempting smell,—
But on the window licks the night.
Pile on the logs.
.
.
Give me your hands,
Friends! No,— it is not fright.
.
.
But hold me.
.
.
somewhere I heard demands.
.
.
And on the window licks the night.
by
Adrienne Rich
Miracle's truck comes down the little avenue,
Scott Joplin ragtime strewn behind it like pearls,
and, yes, you can feel happy
with one piece of your heart.
Take what's still given: in a room's rich shadow
a woman's breasts swinging lightly as she bends.
Early now the pearl of dusk dissolves.
Late, you sit weighing the evening news,
fast-food miracles, ghostly revolutions,
the rest of your heart.
by
Richard Brautigan
1.
Get enough food to eat,
and eat it.
2.
Find a place to sleep where it is quiet,
and sleep there.
3.
Reduce intellectual and emotional noise
until you arrive at the silence of yourself,
and listen to it.
by
Emily Dickinson
A Word made Flesh is seldom
And tremblingly partook
Nor then perhaps reported
But have I not mistook
Each one of us has tasted
With ecstasies of stealth
The very food debated
To our specific strength --
A Word that breathes distinctly
Has not the power to die
Cohesive as the Spirit
It may expire if He --
"Made Flesh and dwelt among us"
Could condescension be
Like this consent of Language
This loved Philology.
by
Marge Piercy
We sat across the table.
he said, cut off your hands.
they are always poking at things.
they might touch me.
I said yes.
Food grew cold on the table.
he said, burn your body.
it is not clean and smells like sex.
it rubs my mind sore.
I said yes.
I love you, I said.
That's very nice, he said
I like to be loved,
that makes me happy.
Have you cut off your hands yet?
by
Emily Dickinson
Fame is a fickle food
Upon a shifting plate
Whose table once a
Guest but not
The second time is set.
Whose crumbs the crows inspect
And with ironic caw
Flap past it to the
Farmer's Corn --
Men eat of it and die.
by
Ellis Parker Butler
Whene’er I feed the barnyard folk
My gentle soul is vexed;
My sensibilities are torn
And I am sore perplexed.
The rooster so politely stands
While waiting for his food,
But when I feed him, what a change!
He then is rough and rude.
He crowds his gentle wives aside
Or pecks them on the head;
Sometimes I think it would be best
If he were never fed.
And so I often stand for hours
Deciding which is right—
To impolitely have enough,
Or starve and be polite.
by
Les Murray
Humans are flown, or fall;
humans can't fly.
We're down with the gravity-stemmers,
rare, thick-boned, often basso.
Most animals above the tides are airborne.
Typically tuned keen, they
throw the ground away with wire feet
and swoop rings round it.
Magpies, listening askance
for their food in and under lawn,
strut so hair-trigger they almost
dangle on earth, out of the air.
Nearly anything can make their
tailcoats break into wings.
by
Richard Crashaw
See here an easy feast that knows no wound,
That under hunger's teeth will needs be sound;
A subtle harvest of unbounded bread,
What would ye more? Here food itself is fed.
by
Anonymous
There’s a nest in the hedge-row,
Half bid by the leaves,
And the sprays, white with blossom,
Bend o’er it like eaves.
God gives birds their lodging,
He gives them their food,
And they trust He will give them
Whatever is good.
Ah! when our rich blessings,
My child, we forget;
When for some little trouble
We murmur and fret;Hear sweet voices singing
In hedges and trees:
Shall we be less thankful,
Less trustful than these?
[Pg 030]
by
Omar Khayyam
The world's annoys I rate not at one grain,
So I eat once a day I don't complain;
And, since earth's kitchen yields no solid food,
I pester no man with petitions vain.
by
Katherine Mansfield
Babies must not eat the coal
And they must not make grimaces,
Nor in party dresses roll
And must never black their faces.
They must learn that pointing's rude,
They must sit quite still at table,
And must always eat the food
Put before them--if they're able.
If they fall, they must not cry,
Though it's known how painful this is;
No--there's always Mother by
Who will comfort them with kisses.
by
Edward Lear
There was an old person of Putney,
Whose food was roast spiders and chutney,
Which he took with his tea, within sight of the sea,
That romantic old person of Putney.
by
Emily Dickinson
I fit for them --
I seek the Dark
Till I am thorough fit.
The labor is a sober one
With this sufficient sweet
That abstinence of mine produce
A purer food for them, if I succeed,
If not I had
The transport of the Aim --
by
Emily Dickinson
Art thou the thing I wanted?
Begone -- my Tooth has grown --
Supply the minor Palate
That has not starved so long --
I tell thee while I waited
The mystery of Food
Increased till I abjured it
And dine without Like God --
--
Art thou the thing I wanted?
Begone -- my Tooth has grown --
Affront a minor palate
Thou could'st not goad so long --
I tell thee while I waited --
The mystery of Food
Increased till I abjured it
Subsisting now like God --
by
Emily Dickinson
Had I not This, or This, I said,
Appealing to Myself,
In moment of prosperity --
Inadequate -- were Life --
"Thou hast not Me, nor Me" -- it said,
In Moment of Reverse --
"And yet Thou art industrious --
No need -- hadst Thou -- of us"?
My need -- was all I had -- I said --
The need did not reduce --
Because the food -- exterminate --
The hunger -- does not cease --
But diligence -- is sharper --
Proportioned to the Chance --
To feed upon the Retrograde --
Enfeebles -- the Advance --
by
Eugene Field
When thou dost eat from off this plate,
I charge thee be thou temperate;
Unto thine elders at the board
Do thou sweet reverence accord;
And, though to dignity inclined,
Unto the serving-folk be kind;
Be ever mindful of the poor,
Nor turn them hungry from the door;
And unto God, for health and food
And all that in thy life is good,
Give thou thy heart in gratitude.