Get Your Premium Membership

Famous Barks Poems by Famous Poets

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

See also:

by Robinson, Mary Darby
...kness, and alone
"My mother sleeps, beneath yon stone.


XI. 

"See how the stars begin to gleam
"The sheep-dog barks, 'tis time to go;--
"The night-fly hums, the moonlight beam
"Peeps through the yew-tree's shadowy row--
"It falls upon the white grave-stone,
"Where my dear mother sleeps alone.--


XII. 

"O stay me not, for I must go
"The upland path in haste to tread;
"For there the pale primroses grow
"They grow to dress my mother's bed.--
"They must, e...Read more of this...



by Collins, Billy
...The neighbors' dog will not stop barking.
He is barking the same high, rhythmic bark
that he barks every time they leave the house.
They must switch him on on their way out.

The neighbors' dog will not stop barking.
I close all the windows in the house
and put on a Beethoven symphony full blast
but I can still hear him muffled under the music,
barking, barking, barking,

and now I can see him sitting in the orchestra,
his head raised co...Read more of this...

by Sidney, Sir Philip
...waite well, I neuer thence would moue;
If he be faire, yet but a dog can be;
Little he is, so little worth is he;
He barks, my songs thine owne voyce oft doth proue;
Bidden, perhaps he fetched thee a gloue,
But I, vnbid, fetch euen my soule to thee.
Yet, while I languish, him that bosome clips,
That lap doth lap, nay lets, in spite of spite,
This sowre-breath'd mate taste of those sugred lips.
Alas, if you graunt onely such delight
To witlesse things, then L...Read more of this...

by Paterson, Andrew Barton
...f handy things about in everybody's yard, 
There's cocks and hens a-runnin' to an' fro, 
And little dogs what comes and barks -- we take 'em off their guard 
And we puts 'em with the Empty Bottle-O! 

Chorus -- 
So it's any "Empty bottles! Any empty bottle-O!" 
You can hear us round for half a mile or so 
And you'll see the women rushing 
To take in the Monday's washing 
When they 'ear us crying, "Empty Bottle-O!" 

I'm driving down by Wexford-street and up a winder goes, 
A ...Read more of this...

by Lindsay, Vachel
...ouse bright. 

There were dry fagots piled, 
Nuts and dry leaves and roots, 
Stores there of furs and hides, 
Sweet-barks and grains and fruits. 
There wrapped in fur we lay, 
Half-burned, half-frozen still — 
Ne'er will my soul forget 
All the night's bitter chill. 
We had not learned to speak, 
I was to you a strange 
Wolfling or wounded fawn, 
Lost from his forest-range. 

Thirsting for bloody meat, 
Out at the dawn we went. 
Weighed with our prey at ev...Read more of this...



by Swift, Jonathan
...our frightful paws,
And let poor Tiger 'scape your furious jaws.
Let her go safe to the Elysian plains,
Where Hylax barks among the Mantuan swains;
There let her frisk about her new-found love:
She loved a dog when she was here above.

The Epitaph

Here lies beneath this marble
An animal could bark, or warble:
Sometimes a *****, sometimes a bird,
Could eat a tart, or eat a t -....Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...r>
Cooper he was and carpenter, and wrought
To make the boatmen fishing-nets, or help'd
At lading and unlading the tall barks,
That brought the stinted commerce of those days;
Thus earn'd a scanty living for himself:
Yet since he did but labor for himself,
Work without hope, there was not life in it
Whereby the man could live; and as the year
Roll'd itself round again to meet the day
When Enoch had return'd, a languor came
Upon him, gentle sickness, gradually
Weakening the ma...Read more of this...

by Bishop, Elizabeth
...Still dark.
The unknown bird sits on his usual branch.
The little dog next door barks in his sleep
inquiringly, just once.
Perhaps in his sleep, too, the bird inquires
once or twice, quavering.
Questions--if that is what they are--
answered directly, simply,
by day itself.

Enormous morning, ponderous, meticulous;
gray light streaking each bare branch,
each single twig, along one side,
making another tree, of glassy veins.Read more of this...

by Bronte, Anne
...How brightly glistening in the sun
The woodland ivy plays!
While yonder beeches from their barks
Reflect his silver rays. 
That sun surveys a lovely scene
From softly smiling skies;
And wildly through unnumbered trees
The wind of winter sighs:

Now loud, it thunders o'er my head,
And now in distance dies.
But give me back my barren hills
Where colder breezes rise;

Where scarce the scattered, stunted trees
Can yield an answering swell,
But...Read more of this...

by Sexton, Anne
...
And you too! 
La de dah. 
What's the point of fighting the dollars 
when all you need is a warm bed? 
When the dog barks you let him in. 
All we need is someone to let us in. 
And one other thing: 
to consider the lilies in the field. 
Of course earth is a stranger, we pull at its 
arms and still it won't speak. 
The sea is worse. 
It comes in, falling to its knees 
but we can't translate the language. 
It is only known that they are here to worsh...Read more of this...

by Levertov, Denise
...they see perfectly,
and his voice
measures forth the treasure
in music sharp and loud,
sharp and bright,
bright flaming barks,
and growling smoky soft, the Dog
of Art turns to the world
the quietness of his eyes....Read more of this...

by Whittier, John Greenleaf
...oping down to drink. 

But hard! -- from wood and rock flung back, 
What sound come up the Merrimac? 
What sea-worn barks are those which throw 
The light spray from each rushing prow? 
Have they not in the North Sea's blast 
Bowed to the waves the straining mast? 
Their frozen sails the low, pale sun 
Of Thulë's night has shone upon; 
Flapped by the sea-wind's gusty sweep 
Round icy drift, and headland steep. 
Wild Jutland's wives and Lochlin's daughters 
Have watche...Read more of this...

by Lowell, Robert
...vy with sand. We weight the body, close
Its eyes and heave it seaward whence it came,
Where the heel-headed dogfish barks it nose
On Ahab's void and forehead; and the name
Is blocked in yellow chalk.
Sailors, who pitch this portent at the sea
Where dreadnaughts shall confess
Its heel-bent deity,
When you are powerless
To sand-bag this Atlantic bulwark, faced
By the earth-shaker, green, unwearied, chaste
In his steel scales: ask for no Orphean lute
To pluck life back.<...Read more of this...

by Kipling, Rudyard
...st of the sere river-courses.

Song of the Dead in the East -- in the heat-rotted jungle-hollows,
Where the dog-ape barks in the kloof -- in the brake of the buffalo-wallows.

Song of the Dead in the West in the Barrens, the pass that betrayed them,
Where the wolverine tumbles their packs from the camp and the grave-rnound they made them;
 Hear now the Song of the Dead!

 I
We were dreamers, dreaming greatly, in the man-stifled town;
We yearned beyond the sky-line whe...Read more of this...

by Frost, Robert
...The old dog barks backwards without getting up.
I can remember when he was a pup....Read more of this...

by Field, Eugene
...the way you contrive to get at
Those sugar-plums tempting you so: 
You say but the word to that gingerbread dog
And he barks with such terrible zest
That the chocolate cat is at once all agog,
As her swelling proportions attest.
And the chocolate cat goes cavorting around
From this leafy limb unto that,
And the sugar-plums tumble, of course, to the ground---
Hurrah for that chocolate cat! 
There are marshmallows, gumdrops, and peppermint canes,
With stripings of scarlet ...Read more of this...

by Clare, John
...Among the taller wood with ivy hung,
The old fox plays and dances round her young.
She snuffs and barks if any passes by
And swings her tail and turns prepared to fly.
The horseman hurries by, she bolts to see,
And turns agen, from danger never free.
If any stands she runs among the poles
And barks and snaps and drive them in the holes.
The shepherd sees them and the boy goes by
And gets a stick and progs the hole to try.
They get all sti...Read more of this...

by Marvell, Andrew
...eir mistress' name: 
Little, alas! they know or heed 
How far these beauties hers exceed! 
Fair trees! wheres'e'er your barks I wound, 
No name shall but your own be found. 

When we have run our passions' heat, 
Love hither makes his best retreat: 
The gods, that mortal beauty chase, 
Still in a tree did end their race; 
Apollo hunted Daphne so 
Only that she might laurel grow; 
And Pan did after Syrinx speed 
Not as a nymph, but for a reed. 

What wondrous life in t...Read more of this...

by Poe, Edgar Allan
...Helen thy beauty is to me
Like those Nicean barks of yore 
That gently o'er a perfumed sea 
The weary wayworn wanderer bore
To his own native shore.

On desperate seas long wont to roam 
Thy hyacinth hair thy classic face 
Thy Naiad airs have brought me home
To the glory that was Greece
And the grandeur that was Rome.

Lo! in yon brilliant window-niche
How statue-like I see thee st...Read more of this...

by Rumi, Jalal ad-Din Muhammad
...plan it.
When I’m outside the saying of it,
I get very quiet and rarely speak at all. Trans. Coleman Barks. poetseers.org/the-poetseers/rumis-poetry/be-with-those-who-help-your-being">NEXT Poem Links poetseers.org/the-poetseers/rumi">Rumi Homepage 

Read more of this...


Dont forget to view our wonderful member Barks poems.


Book: Reflection on the Important Things