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Best Famous Old School Poems

Here is a collection of the all-time best famous Old School poems. This is a select list of the best famous Old School poetry. Reading, writing, and enjoying famous Old School poetry (as well as classical and contemporary poems) is a great past time. These top poems are the best examples of old school poems.

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Written by Andrew Barton Paterson | Create an image from this poem

Old Schooldays

 Awake, of Muse, the echoes of a day 
Long past, the ghosts of mem'ries manifold -- 
Youth's memories that once were green and gold 
But now, alas, are grim and ashen grey. 
The drowsy schoolboy wakened up from sleep, 
First stays his system with substantial food, 
Then off for school with tasks half understood, 
Alas, alas, that cribs should be so cheap! 

The journey down to town -- 'twere long to tell 
The storm and riot of the rabble rout; 
The wild Walpurgis revel in and out 
That made the ferry boat a floating hell. 

What time the captive locusts fairly roared: 
And bulldog ants, made stingless with a knife, 
Climbed up the seats and scared the very life 
From timid folk, who near jumped overboard. 

The hours of lessons -- hours with feet of clay 
Each hour a day, each day more like a week: 
While hapless urchins heard with blanched cheek 
The words of doom "Come in on Saturday". 

The master gowned and spectacled, precise, 
Trying to rule by methods firm and kind 
But always just a little bit behind 
The latest villainy, the last device, 

Born of some smoothfaced urchin's fertile brain 
To irritate the hapless pedagogue, 
And first involve him in a mental fog 
Then "have" him with the same old tale again. 

The "bogus" fight that brought the sergeant down 
To that dark corner by the old brick wall, 
Where mimic combat and theatric brawl 
Made noise enough to terrify the town. 

But on wet days the fray was genuine, 
When small boys pushed each other in the mud 
And fought in silence till thin streams of blood 
Their dirty faces would incarnadine. 

The football match or practice in the park 
With rampant hoodlums joining in the game 
Till on one famous holiday there came 
A gang that seized the football for a lark. 

Then raged the combat without rest or pause, 
Till one, a hero, Hawkins unafraid 
Regained the ball, and later on displayed 
His nose knocked sideways in his country's cause. 

Before the mind quaint visions rise and fall, 
Old jokes, old students dead and gone: 
And some that lead us still, while some toil on 
As rank and file, but "Grammar" children all. 

And he, the pilot, who has laid the course 
For all to steer by, honest, unafraid -- 
Truth is his beacon light, so he has made 
The name of the old School a living force.


Written by Joyce Kilmer | Create an image from this poem

The New School

 (For My Mother)

The halls that were loud with the merry tread of 
young and careless feet
Are still with a stillness that is too drear to seem like holiday,
And never a gust of laughter breaks the calm of the dreaming street
Or rises to shake the ivied walls and frighten the doves away.
The dust is on book and on empty desk, and the 
tennis-racquet and balls
Lie still in their lonely locker and wait for a game that is never 
played,
And over the study and lecture-room and the river and meadow falls
A stern peace, a strange peace, a peace that War has made.
For many a youthful shoulder now is gay with an 
epaulet,
And the hand that was deft with a cricket-bat is defter with a sword,
And some of the lads will laugh to-day where the trench is red and 
wet,
And some will win on the bloody field the accolade of the Lord.
They have taken their youth and mirth away
from the study and playing-ground
To a new school in an alien land beneath an alien sky;
Out in the smoke and roar of the fight their lessons and games are 
found,
And they who were learning how to live are learning how to die.
And after the golden day has come and the war is 
at an end,
A slab of bronze on the chapel wall will tell of the noble dead.
And every name on that radiant list will be the name of a friend,
A name that shall through the centuries in grateful prayers be said.
And there will be ghosts in the old school,
brave ghosts with laughing eyes,
On the field with a ghostly cricket-bat, by the stream with a ghostly 
rod;
They will touch the hearts of the living with a flame that sanctifies,
A flame that they took with strong young hands
from the altar-fires of God.
Written by Robert William Service | Create an image from this poem

Treat Em Rough

 First time I dared propose,
 A callow lad was I;
I donned my Sunday clothes,
 I wore my Old School Tie.
Awaiting me Louise
 Was dolled to beat the band,
So going on my knees
 I begged her hand.

Oh yes, she gave me her hand,--
 A box upon the ear;
I could not understand,
 I blinked away a tear.
Then scornfully she said:
 'Next time you kneel before
A maid, young man don't spread
 Your hankey on the floor.'

So next time I proposed,
 Thinks I, I'll treat 'em rough.
Her name was Lily Rose,
 I gave her he-man stuff.
I yanked her on my knee,
 And as her ear I bit,
To my amazement she
 Seemed to like it.

The old cave-men knew best;
 Grab girlies by the hair,
And though they may protest
 Drag them into your lair.
So young men seeking mates,
 Take my tip, if rejected:
A modern maid just hates
 To be respected.
Written by Carl Sandburg | Create an image from this poem

Killers

 I AM put high over all others in the city today.

I am the killer who kills for those who wish a killing today.

Here is a strong young man who killed.
There was a driving wind of city dust and horse dung blowing and he stood at an intersection of five sewers and there pumped the bullets of an automatic pistol into another man, a fellow citizen.
Therefore, the prosecuting attorneys, fellow citizens, and a jury of his peers, also fellow citizens, listened to the testimony of other fellow citizens, policemen, doctors, and after a verdict of guilty, the judge, a fellow citizen, said: I sentence you to be hanged by the neck till you are dead.

So there is a killer to be killed and I am the killer of the killer for today.
I don’t know why it beats in my head in the lines I read once in an old school reader: I’m to be queen of the May, mother, I’m to be queen of the May.
Anyhow it comes back in language just like that today.

I am the high honorable killer today.
There are five million people in the state, five million killers for whom I kill
I am the killer who kills today for five million killers who wish a killing.
Written by Robert William Service | Create an image from this poem

Dunce

 At school I never gained a prize,
Proving myself the model ass;
Yet how I watched the wistful eyes,
And cheered my mates who topped the class.
No envy in my heart I found,
Yet bone was worthier to own
Those precious books in vellum bound,
Than I, a dreamer and a drone.

No prize at school I ever gained
(Shirking my studies, I suppose):
Yes, I remember being caned
For lack of love of Latin prose.
For algebra I won no praise,
In grammar I was far from bright:
Yet, oh, how Poetry would raise
In me a rapture of delight!

I never gained a prize at school;
The dullard's cap adorned my head;
My masters wrote me down a fool,
And yet - I'm sorry they are dead.
I'd like to go to them and say:
"Yours is indeed a tricky trade.
My honoured classmates, where are they?
Yet I, the dunce, brave books have made."

Oh, I am old and worn and grey,
And maybe have not long to live;
Yet 'tis my hope at some Prize Day
At my old school the Head will give
A tome or two of mine to crown
Some pupil's well-deserved success -
Proving a scapegrace and a clown
May win at last to worthiness.



Book: Radiant Verses: A Journey Through Inspiring Poetry