Famous Bank Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Eugene Carman

by Edgar Lee Masters
 Rhodes' slave! Selling shoes and gingham,
Flour and bacon, overalls, clothing, all day long
For fourteen hours a day for three hundred and thirteen days
For more than twenty years.
Saying "Yes'm" and "Yes, sir", and "Thank you"
A thousand times a day, and all for fifty dollars a month.
Living in this stinking room in the rattle-trap "Commercial."
And compelled to go to Sunday School,...Read more of this...

A Dream Of Whitman Paraphrased Recognized And Made More Vivid By Renoir

by Delmore Schwartz
 Twenty-eight naked young women bathed by the shore
Or near the bank of a woodland lake
Twenty-eight girls and all of them comely
Worthy of Mack Sennett's camera and Florenz Ziegfield's
Foolish Follies.

They splashed and swam with the wondrous unconsciousness
Of their youth and beauty
In the full spontaneity and summer of the fieshes of
 awareness
Heightened, intensified and softened
By the soft and the silk of...Read more of this...

To Penshurst

by Ben Jonson
  II. — TO PENSHURST.                Thou hast no lantern whereof tales are told ; Or stair, or courts ;  but stand'st an ancient pile, And these grudg'd at, art reverenced the while. Thou joy'st in better marks, of soil, of air, Of wood, of water ;  therein thou art fair. Thou hast thy walks for health, as well as sport :...Read more of this...

264. Song—On a Bank of Flowers

by Robert Burns
 ON a bank of flowers, in a summer day,
 For summer lightly drest,
The youthful, blooming Nelly lay,
 With love and sleep opprest;
When Willie, wand’ring thro’ the wood,
Who for her favour oft had sued;
 He gaz’d, he wish’d
 He fear’d, he blush’d,
And trembled where he stood.


Her closèd eyes, like weapons sheath’d,
 Were seal’d in soft repose;
Her lip, still as she...Read more of this...

Primrose

by Patrick Kavanagh
 Upon a bank I sat, a child made seer
Of one small primrose flowering in my mind.
Better than wealth it is, I said, to find
One small page of Truth's manuscript made clear.
I looked at Christ transfigured without fear--
The light was very beautiful and kind,
And where the Holy Ghost in flame had signed
I read it through the lenses of a tear.
And...Read more of this...

Song of the Fifth River

by Rudyard Kipling
 "The Treasure and the Low"--Puck of Pook's Hills.
Where first by Eden Tree
The Four Great Rivers ran,
To each was appointed a Man
Her Prince and Ruler to be.

But after this was ordained
(The ancient legends' tell),
There came dark Israel,
For whom no River remained.

Then He Whom the Rivers obey
Said to him: "Fling on the ground
A handful of yellow clay,
And a Fifth Great River...Read more of this...

On Moonlit Heath and Lonesome Bank

by A E Housman
 On moonlit heath and lonesome bank 
The sheep beside me graze; 
And yon the gallows used to clank 
Fast by the four cross ways. 

A careless shepherd once would keep 
The flocks by moonlight there, * 
And high amongst the glimmering sheep 
The dead man stood on air. 

They hang us now in Shrewsbury jail: 
The whistles blow forlorn,...Read more of this...

In the sweet spring a grassy bank I sought,

by Omar Khayyam
In the sweet spring a grassy bank I sought,
And thither wine, and a fair Houri brought;
And, though the people called me graceless dog,
Gave not to Paradise another thought!...Read more of this...

Bank Robber

by Robert William Service
 I much admire, I must admit,
 The man who robs a Bank;
It takes a lot of guts and grit,
 For lack of which I thank
The gods: a chap 'twould make of me
 You wouldn't ask to tea.

I do not mean a burglar cove
 Who climbs into a house,
From room to room flash-lit to rove
 As quiet as a mouse;
Ah...Read more of this...

126. Lines written on a Bank-note

by Robert Burns
 WAE worth thy power, thou cursed leaf!
Fell source o’ a’ my woe and grief!
For lack o’ thee I’ve lost my lass!
For lack o’ thee I scrimp my glass!
I see the children of affliction
Unaided, through thy curst restriction:
I’ve seen the oppressor’s cruel smile
Amid his hapless victim’s spoil;
And for thy potence vainly wished,
To crush the villain in the dust:
For lack o’...Read more of this...

Last night upon the river bank we lay,

by Omar Khayyam
Last night upon the river bank we lay,
I with my wine-cup, and a maiden gay,
So bright it shone, like pearl within its shell,
The watchman cried, «Behold the break of day!»...Read more of this...

A Note Left In Jimmy Leonards Shack

by James Wright
 Near the dry river's water-mark we found
 Your brother Minnegan,
Flopped like a fish against the muddy ground.
Beany, the kid whose yellow hair turns green,
Told me to find you, even if the rain,
 And tell you he was drowned.

I hid behind the chassis on the bank,
 The wreck of someone's Ford:
I was afraid to come and wake you drunk:
You told...Read more of this...

The Further Bank

by Rabindranath Tagore
 I long to go over there to the further bank of the river.
Where those boats are tied to the bamboo poles in a line;
Where men cross over in their boats in the morning with
ploughs on their shoulders to till their far-away fields;
Where the cowherds make their lowing cattle swim across to the
riverside pasture;
Whence they all come back home in...Read more of this...

the singing dog

by Rg Gregory
 when the dog began to sing
the people ran amok
a man shinned up a flagpole
a woman chewed her sock

children danced the drainpipe
a policeman robbed a bank
the mayor and all the councillors
fired doughnuts from a tank

the queen embraced the dustman
the clergy showed their knees
librarians in their thousands
begged mercy from the trees

the dog sang in the market
it didn't understand
the panic and predicament
it'd...Read more of this...

I think to Live -- may be a Bliss

by Emily Dickinson
 I think to Live -- may be a Bliss
To those who dare to try --
Beyond my limit to conceive --
My lip -- to testify --

I think the Heart I former wore
Could widen -- till to me
The Other, like the little Bank
Appear -- unto the Sea --

I think the Days -- could every one
In Ordination stand --
And Majesty -- be...Read more of this...

Lines Written by the Side of a River

by Mary Darby Robinson
 FLOW soft RIVER, gently stray, 
Still a silent waving tide 
O'er thy glitt'ring carpet glide, 
While I chaunt my ROUNDELAY, 
As I gather from thy bank, 
Shelter'd by the poplar dank, 
King-cups, deck'd in golden pride, 
Harebells sweet, and daisies pied; 
While beneath the evening sky, 
Soft the western breezes fly. 
Gentle RIVER, should'st thou be 
Touch'd with mournful...Read more of this...

A Memory

by William Allingham
 Four ducks on a pond,
A grass-bank beyond, 
A blue sky of spring, 
White clouds on the wing; 
What a little thing 
To remember for years- 
To remember with tears!...Read more of this...

The Character Of Holland

by Andrew Marvell
 Holland, that scarce deserves the name of Land,
As but th'Off-scouring of the Brittish Sand;
And so much Earth as was contributed
By English Pilots when they heav'd the Lead;
Or what by th' Oceans slow alluvion fell,
Of shipwrackt Cockle and the Muscle-shell;
This indigested vomit of the Sea
Fell to the Dutch by just Propriety.
Glad then, as Miners that have found the Oar,
They with...Read more of this...

The Right to Grief

by Carl Sandburg
 To Certain Poets About to Die

TAKE your fill of intimate remorse, perfumed sorrow,
Over the dead child of a millionaire,
And the pity of Death refusing any check on the bank
Which the millionaire might order his secretary to
scratch off
And get cashed.

Very well,
You for your grief and I for mine.
Let me have a sorrow my own if I want to.

I shall cry...Read more of this...

Morning in the Burned House

by Margaret Atwood
 In the burned house I am eating breakfast.
You understand: there is no house, there is no breakfast,
yet here I am.

The spoon which was melted scrapes against 
the bowl which was melted also.
No one else is around.

Where have they gone to, brother and sister,
mother and father? Off along the shore,
perhaps. Their clothes are still on the hangers,

their dishes piled beside...Read more of this...

A Tale of the Miser and the Poet

by Anne Kingsmill Finch
 A WIT, transported with Inditing, 
Unpay'd, unprais'd, yet ever Writing; 
Who, for all Fights and Fav'rite Friends, 
Had Poems at his Fingers Ends; 
For new Events was still providing; 
Yet now desirous to be riding, 
He pack'd-up ev'ry Ode and Ditty 
And in Vacation left the City; 
So rapt with Figures, and Allusions, 
With secret Passions, sweet Confusions; 
With...Read more of this...

The Native-Born

by Rudyard Kipling
 We've drunk to the Queen -- God bless her! --
 We've drunk to our mothers' land;
We've drunk to our English brother,
 (But he does not understand);
We've drunk to the wide creation,
 And the Cross swings low for the mom,
Last toast, and of Obligation,
 A health to the Native-born!

They change their skies above them,
 But not their hearts that roam!
We...Read more of this...

Reconstruction

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 So, the bank has bust it's boiler! And in six or seven year 
It will pay me all my money back -- of course! 
But the horse will perish waiting while the grass is germinating, 
And I reckon I'll be something like the horse. 

There's the ploughing to be finished and the ploughmen want their pay, 
And I'd like...Read more of this...

Canal Bank Walk

by Patrick Kavanagh
 Leafy-with-love banks and the green waters of the canal
Pouring redemption for me, that I do
The will of God, wallow in the habitual, the banal,
Grow with nature again as before I grew.
The bright stick trapped, the breeze adding a third
Party to the couple kissing on an old seat,
And a bird gathering materials for the nest for the Word
Eloquently new and...Read more of this...

The Left Bank

by David Lehman
 Don't walk away, Renee,
I'm just getting warmed up
your body is like a river
and I'm going to swim across
I want to explore the left
bank of you then the right
you're the only woman in
this room with a sunflower
in her hair and you take
forever in the bathroom
making me wait finally you
emerge with a bottle of beer
in one hand an ashtray in
the other...Read more of this...

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