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Famous Artistic Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Murray, Les
...se plum tree 
was shedding in spring, we speculated
there among the drizzling petals

what kind of exquisitely precious
artistic bloom might be gendered
in a pure ethereal compost

of petals potted as they fell.
From unpetalled gun-debris
we know what is grown continually,

a tower of fabulous swish tatters,
a map hoisted upright, a crusted
riverbed with up-country show towns....Read more of this...



by Hikmet, Nazim
...lack Congolese regiment.
The accused:
Gioconda.
The attorney for the defense:
an overly razed
--that is, overly artistic--
 French painter.
The scene is set.
 We're starting.


The defense attorney presents his case:


"Gentlemen,
this masterpiece
 that stands in your presence as the accused
is the most accomplished daughter of a great artist.
Gentlemen,
 this masterpiece...
Gentlemen...
my mind is on fire...
Gentlem...Read more of this...

by Brecht, Bertolt
...When the Academy of Arts demanded freedom
Of artistic expression from narrow-minded bureaucrats
There was a howl and a clamour in its immediate vicinity
But roaring above everything
Came a deafening thunder of applause
From beyond the Sector boundary.
Freedom! it roared. Freedom for the artists!
Freedom all round! Freedom for all!
Freedom for the exploiters! Freedom for the warmongers!
Freedom ...Read more of this...

by Chesterton, G K
...me,

I had a rather funny dream,
Intense, that is, and mystic;
I dreamed that, with one leap and yell,
The world became artistic.

The Shopmen, when their souls were still,
Declined to open shops-
And Cooks recorded frames of mind
In sad and subtle chops.

The stars were weary of routine:
The trees in the plantation
Were growing every fruit at once,
In search of sensation.

The moon went for a moonlight stroll,
And tried to be a bard,
And gazed enraptured at itsel...Read more of this...

by Ashbery, John
...aily activity, changing everything
Slightly and profoundly, and tearing the matter 
Of creation, any creation, not just artistic creation
Out of our hands, to install it on some monstrous, near
Peak, too close to ignore, too far
For one to intervene? This otherness, this
"Not-being-us" is all there is to look at
In the mirror, though no one can say
How it came to be this way. A ship
Flying unknown colors has entered the harbor.
You are allowing extraneous matters
To b...Read more of this...



by Lindsay, Vachel
.... THE . . . FIREMEN'S . . . BALL . . . 


SECTION THREE

In Which, contrary to Artistic Custom, the moral of the piece is placed before the reader.

(From the first Khandaka of the Mahavagga: "There Buddha thus addressed his disciples: 'Everything, O mendicants, is burning. With what fire is it burning? I declare unto you it is burning with the fire of passion, with the fire of anger, with the fire of ignorance. It is burni...Read more of this...

by Lowell, Amy
...Say the people of the Three Towns,
As they walk about the dockyard
To the sound of the evening church-bells.
And so artistic, too, each one tells his neighbour.
What immense taste and labour!
Miss Jessie Prime, in a pink silk bonnet,
Titters with delight as her eyes fall upon it,
When she steps lightly down from Lawyer Green's whisky;
Such amazing beauty makes one feel frisky,
She explains.
Mr. Nichols says he is delighted
(He is the firm);
His work is all req...Read more of this...

by Service, Robert William
...s game of poker now and then,
And "raising up my elbow", that's what got away with me.
We're merely "Undesirables", artistic more or less;
My horny hands are Chopin-wise; you quote your Browning well;
And yet we're fooling round for gold in this damned wilderness:
The joke is, if we found it, we would both go straight to hell.

Well, maybe we won't find it -- and at least we've got the "life".
We're both as brown as berries, and could wrestle with a bear:
(That ba...Read more of this...

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