Famous Admiralty Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Macavity: The Mystery Cat

...here's the wonder of the thing! Macavity's not there!

And when the Foreign Office finds a Treaty's gone astray,
Or the Admiralty lose some plans and drawings by the way,
There may be a scap of paper in the hall or on the stair--
But it's useless of investigate--Macavity's not there!
And when the loss has been disclosed, the Secret Service say:
"It must have been Macavity!"--but he's a mile away.
You'll be sure to find him resting, or a-licking of his thumbs,
Or engaged in do...Read more of this...
by Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns)


MFingal - Canto I

...liver,
Fill that high bench with ignoramus,
Or has it councils by mandamus?
Who made that wit of water-gruel
A judge of admiralty, Sewall?
And were they not mere earthly struggles,
That raised up Murray, say, and Ruggles?
Did heaven send down, our pains to medicine,
That old simplicity of Edson,
Or by election pick out from us
That Marshfield blunderer, Nat. Ray Thomas;
Or had it any hand in serving
A Loring, Pepperell, Browne or Irving?


"Yet we've some saints, the very thi...Read more of this...
by Trumbull, John

MFingal - Canto II

...oclamations call
Your Gov'rnor and Vice-Admiral,
Whose power gubernatorial still
Extends as far as Bunker's hill,
Whose admiralty reaches, clever,
Near half a mile up Mistic river,
Whose naval force yet keeps the seas,
Can run away whene'er he'd please.
Nay, stern with rage grim Putnam boiling
Plunder'd both Hogg and Noddle Island;
Scared troops of Tories into town,
Burn'd all their hay and houses down,
And menaced Gage, unless he'd flee,
To drive him headlong to the sea;
As ...Read more of this...
by Trumbull, John

My Reward for Being was This

...My Reward for Being, was This.
My premium -- My Bliss --
An Admiralty, less --
A Sceptre -- penniless --
And Realms -- just Dross --

When Thrones accost my Hands --
With "Me, Miss, Me" --
I'll unroll Thee --
Dominions dowerless -- beside this Grace --
Election -- Vote --
The Ballots of Eternity, will show just that....Read more of this...
by Dickinson, Emily

Preface to Hunting of the Snark

...ightest use to 
appeal to the Bellman about it---he would only refer to his Naval 
Code, and read out in pathetic tones Admiralty Instructions which 
none of them had ever been able to understand---so it generally ended 
in its being fastened on, anyhow, across the rudder. The helmsman 
used to stand by with tears in his eyes: he knew it was all wrong, 
but alas! Rule 42 of the Code, ``No one shall speak to the Man at the 
Helm'', had been completed by the Bellman himself wit...Read more of this...
by Carroll, Lewis


The Hammers

...e lines and a capful 
of wind.
Three broad flags ripple out behind
Where the masts will be:
Royal Standard at the main,
Admiralty flag at the fore,
Union Jack at the mizzen.
The hammers tap harder, faster,
They must finish by noon.
The last nail is driven.
But the wind has increased to half a gale,
And the ship shakes and quivers upon the ways.
The Commissioner of Chatham Dockyard is coming
In his ten-oared barge from the King's Stairs;
The Marine's band will play "God Save G...Read more of this...
by Lowell, Amy

The Hunting Of The Snark

...slightest use to appeal to the Bellman about it--he would only refer to his Naval Code, and read out in pathetic tones Admiralty Instructions which none of them had ever been able to understand--so it generally ended in its being fastened on, anyhow, across the rudder. The helmsman* used to stand by with tears in his eyes; he knew it was all wrong, but alas! Rule 42 of the Code, "No one shall speak to the Man at the Helm," had been completed by the Bellman himself with the w...Read more of this...
by Carroll, Lewis

The Rhyme of the Three Captains

...the sheer,
Lifting again from the outer main with news of a privateer;
Flying his pluck at our mizzen-truck for weft of Admiralty,
Heaving his head for our dipsey-lead in sign that we keep the sea.
Then fore-sheet home as she lifts to the foam -- we stand on the outward tack,
We are paid in the coin of the white man's trade -- the bezant is hard, ay, and black.
The frigate-bird shall carry my word to the Kling and the Orang-Laut
How a man may sail from a heathen coast to be r...Read more of this...
by Kipling, Rudyard

The Song of the Dead

...lish dead:
We have strawed our best to the weed's unrest,
 To the shark and the sheering gull.
If blood be the price of admiralty,
 Lord God, we ha' paid in tull!

There's never a flood goes shoreward now
 But lifts a keel we manned;
There's never an ebb goes seaward now
 But drops our dead on the sand --
But slinks our dead on the sands forlore,
 From the Ducies to the Swin.
If blood be the price of admiralty,
If blood be the price of admiralty,
 Lord God, we ha' paid it in!...Read more of this...
by Kipling, Rudyard

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