Famous Accidents Poems by Famous Poets

These are examples of famous Accidents poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous accidents poems. These examples illustrate what a famous accidents poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).

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A Historical Breakfast

...ld catch it on film, 
how much it would mean to the future. Oops, spilled it all 
over his lap. One of those historical accidents that will 
influence the next thousand years; unpredictable, and 
really rather uncomfortable . . . But history is never easy, 
he thinks . . ....Read more of this...
by Edson, Russell


August 17th

...to patient to patient
throwing up little paper medicine cups and playing
catch with vials of dope as they wait for new accidents.
Bodies made of synthetics. Bodies swaddled like dolls
whom I visit and cajole and all they do is hum
like computers doing up our taxes, dollar by dollar.
Each body is in its bunker. The surgeon applies his gum.
Each body is fitted quickly into its ice-cream pack
and then stitched up again for the long voyage
back....Read more of this...
by Sexton, Anne

Ballade of a Special Edition

...et;
His gloating fancy's fain to bide
Where human-freighted vessels meet,
And misdirected trains collide.
With Shocking Accidents supplied,
He tramps the town from end to end.
How often have we heard it cried--
A double murder in Mile End.

War loves he; victory or defeat,
So there be loss on either side.
His tale of horrors incomplete,
Imagination's aid is tried.
Since no distinguished man has died,
And since the Fates, relenting, send
No great catastrophe, he's spied
This d...Read more of this...
by Levy, Amy

Being Late

...se upon the Earth, 
Moon is never late to cause the tides, 
Earth is never late to greet the Sun and the Moon; 
Thus accidents are not accidents 
But precise arrivals at the wrong right time.
 Love is almost never simple; 
Too often, feelings arrive too soon, 
Waiting for thoughts that often come too late.
 I wanted too, to be simple and precise 
Like the Sun, 
Like the Moon, 
Like the Earth
But the Earth was booked 
Billions of years in advance; 
Designed to me...Read more of this...
by Stojanovic, Dejan

Epithalamion

...ong! made in lieu of many ornaments, 
With which my love should duly have been dect, 
Which cutting off through hasty accidents, 
Ye would not stay your dew time to expect, 430 
But promist both to recompens; 
Be unto her a goodly ornament, 
And for short time an endlesse moniment. 



GLOSS: tead] torch. ruddock] redbreast. croud] violin....Read more of this...
by Spenser, Edmund


Identity

...1) An individual spider web
identifies a species:

an order of instinct prevails
 through all accidents of circumstance,
  though possibility is
high along the peripheries of
spider
   webs:
   you can go all
  around the fringing attachments

  and find
disorder ripe,
entropy rich, high levels of random,
 numerous occasions of accident:

2) the possible settings
of a web are infinite:

 how does
the spider keep
  identity
 while creating the web
 in...Read more of this...
by Ammons, A R

In Reference to Her Children

...were never.
Alas, my birds, you wisdom want,
Of perils you are ignorant;
Oft times in grass, on trees, in flight,
Sore accidents on you may light.
O to your safety have an eye,
So happy may you live and die.
Meanwhile my days in tunes I'll spend,
Till my weak lays with me shall end.
In shady woods I'll sit and sing,
And things that past to mind I'll bring.
Once young and pleasant, as are you,
But former toys (no joys) adieu.
My age I will not once lament,
But sing, my time s...Read more of this...
by Bradstreet, Anne

Invitation to Miss Marianne Moore

...s all awash with morals this fine morning,
so please come flying.

Mounting the sky with natural heroism,
above the accidents, above the malignant movies,
the taxicabs and injustices at large,
while horns are resounding in your beautiful ears
that simultaneously listen to
a soft uninvented music, fit for the musk deer,
please come flying.

For whom the grim museums will behave 
like courteous male bower-birds,
for whom the agreeable lions lie in wait
on the step...Read more of this...
by Bishop, Elizabeth

Last Instructions to a Painter

...sperse. 
All the two Coventrys their generals chose 
For one had much, the other nought to lose; 
Nor better choice all accidents could hit, 
While Hector Harry steers by Will the Wit. 
They both accept the charge with merry glee, 
To fight a battle, from all gunshot free. 
Pleased with their numbers, yet in valour wise, 
They feign a parley, better to surprise; 
They that ere long shall the rude Dutch upbraid, 
Who in the time of treaty durst invade. 

Thick was the morning,...Read more of this...
by Marvell, Andrew

Mazeppa

...tless dream or two, some glances
At Warsaw's youth, some songs, and dances, 
Awaited but the usual chances,
Those happy accidents which render
The coldest dames so very tender,
To deck her Count with titles given,
'Tis said, as passports into heaven;
But, strange to say, they rarely boast
Of these, who have deserved them most.

V

'I was a goodly stripling then;
At seventy years I so may say, 
That there were few, or boys or men,
Who, in my dawning time of day,
Of vassal or o...Read more of this...
by Byron, George (Lord)

Paragraphs from a Day-Book

...n walk out
of the small park toward the shopping streets
into a present tense
where what’s ineffaceable repeats
itself. Accidents.
I dash ahead, new whistle in my hand
She runs behind. The car. The almost-silent
thud. Gísela, prone, also silent, on the ground. 

Death is the scandal that was always hidden.
I never saw my grandmother again
Who took me home? Somebody did. In
the next few days (because that afternoon
and night are blank) I don’t think I cried, I didn’t
know what...Read more of this...
by Hacker, Marilyn

Phantasmagoria CANTO VI ( Dyscomfyture )

...hat isn't badly put. 

"And certainly you've given me
The best of wine and victual -
Excuse my violence," said he,
"But accidents like this, you see,
They put one out a little. 

"'Twas MY fault after all, I find -
Shake hands, old Turnip-top!"
The name was hardly to my mind,
But, as no doubt he meant it kind,
I let the matter drop. 

"Good-night, old Turnip-top, good-night!
When I am gone, perhaps
They'll send you some inferior Sprite,
Who'll keep you in a constant fright
An...Read more of this...
by Carroll, Lewis

Poetics

...ugh
and "Lady," he gravely says, "I sure hope your team wins."

A story many times told in many ways,
The set of random accidents redeemed 
By one more accident, as though chaos
Were the order that was before the creation came.
That is the way things happen in the world:
A joke, a disappointment satisfied,
As we walk through doing our daily round,
Reading the meter, making things add up....Read more of this...
by Nemerov, Howard

Samson Agonistes

...rable
In heart, head, brest, and reins;
But must secret passage find 
To th' inmost mind,
There exercise all his fierce accidents,
And on her purest spirits prey,
As on entrails, joints, and limbs,
With answerable pains, but more intense,
'Though void of corporal sense.
My griefs not only pain me
As a lingring disease,
But finding no redress, ferment and rage,
Nor less then wounds immedicable 
Ranckle, and fester, and gangrene,
To black mortification.
Thoughts my Tormenters a...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror

...I can know only the straight way out,
The distance between us. Long ago
The strewn evidence meant something,
The small accidents and pleasures
Of the day as it moved gracelessly on,
A housewife doing chores. Impossible now
To restore those properties in the silver blur that is
The record of what you accomplished by sitting down
"With great art to copy all that you saw in the glass"
So as to perfect and rule out the extraneous
Forever. In the circle of your intentions certain...Read more of this...
by Ashbery, John

Silent Equality

...s own life, 
Kill someone else's desire to fly, 
Cut their wings, suck their air. 
Get out, but don't cause unneeded accidents; 
There is only as much space, only as much time, 
Only as much desire, only as many words, 
Only as many pages, only as much ink 
To accept all of us at light-speed 
Hurrying into the Promised Land 
Of oblivion that is waiting for us sooner or later. 
No reason for a feverish rush 
For we will all arrive in the same place 
At the right ti...Read more of this...
by Stojanovic, Dejan

Sonnet 115: Those lines that I before have writ do lie

...n my judgment knew no reason why
My most full flame should afterwards burn clearer,
But reckoning Time, whose millioned accidents
Creep in 'twixt vows, and change decrees of kings,
Tan sacred beauty, blunt the sharp'st intents,
Divert strong minds to the course of alt'ring things—
Alas, why, fearing of Time's tyranny,
Might I not then say, "Now I love you best,"
When I was certain o'er incertainty,
Crowning the present, doubting of the rest?
Love is a babe; then might I not s...Read more of this...
by Shakespeare, William

The Albion Battleship Calamity

...be taken away
At the launching of the good ship Albion,
But when she heard of the catastrophe she felt woebegone. 

But accidents will happen without any doubt,
And often the cause thereof is hard to find out;
And according to report, I've heard people say,
'Twas the great crowd on the bridge caused it to give way. 

Just as the vessel entered the water the bridge and staging gave way,
Immersing some three hundred people which caused great dismay
Amongst the thousands of spec...Read more of this...
by McGonagall, William Topaz

The Beautiful American Word Sure

...whatever's near,

And hope for day when the whole world has that face:
For what assures her present every year?
In dark accidents the mind's sufficient grace....Read more of this...
by Schwartz, Delmore

To Stella Who Collected and Transcribed His Poems

...on faces;
Before he could his poem close,
The lovely nymph had lost her nose.
Your virtues safely I commend;
They on no accidents depend:
Let malice look with all her eyes,
She dare not say the poet lies.
Stella, when you these lines transcribe,
Lest you should take them for a bribe,
Resolved to mortify your pride,
I'll here expose your weaker side.
Your spirits kindle to a flame,
Moved by the lightest touch of blame;
And when a friend in kindness tries
To show you where your...Read more of this...
by Swift, Jonathan

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