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Best Famous Pretty Poems

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

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Written by William Blake | Create an image from this poem

Cradle Song

SLEEP sleep beauty bright  
Dreaming in the joys of night; 
Sleep sleep; in thy sleep 
Little sorrows sit and weep

Sweet babe in thy face
Soft desires I can trace  
Secret joys and secret smiles  
Little pretty infant wiles.

As thy softest limbs I feel 
Smiles as of the morning steal 
O'er thy cheek and o'er thy breast 
Where thy little heart doth rest.

O the cunning wiles that creep 
In thy little heart asleep! 
When thy little heart doth wake
Then the dreadful night shall break.


Written by Maya Angelou | Create an image from this poem

Phenomenal Woman

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,
It's in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It's the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can't touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can't see.
I say,
It's in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I'm a woman

Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Now you understand
Just why my head's not bowed.
I don't shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It's in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
'Cause I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.
Written by Kobayashi Issa | Create an image from this poem

In spring rain

 In spring rain
a pretty girl
 yawning.
Written by Robert William Service | Create an image from this poem

Why Do Birds Sing?

 Let poets piece prismatic words,
Give me the jewelled joy of birds!

What ecstasy moves them to sing?
Is it the lyric glee of Spring,
The dewy rapture of the rose?
Is it the worship born in those
Who are of Nature's self a part,
The adoration of the heart?

Is it the mating mood in them
That makes each crystal note a gem?
Oh mocking bird and nightingale,
Oh mavis, lark and robin - hail!
Tell me what perfect passion glows
In your inspired arpeggios?

A thrush is thrilling as I write
Its obligato of delight;
And in its fervour, as in mine,
I fathom tenderness divine,
And pity those of earthy ear
Who cannot hear . . . who cannot hear.

Let poets pattern pretty words:
For lovely largesse - bless you, Birds!
Written by David Berman | Create an image from this poem

Self-Portrait At 28

 I know it's a bad title
but I'm giving it to myself as a gift
on a day nearly canceled by sunlight
when the entire hill is approaching
the ideal of Virginia
brochured with goldenrod and loblolly
and I think "at least I have not woken up
with a bloody knife in my hand"
by then having absently wandered
one hundred yards from the house
while still seated in this chair
with my eyes closed.

It is a certain hill
the one I imagine when I hear the word "hill"
and if the apocalypse turns out
to be a world-wide nervous breakdown
if our five billion minds collapse at once
well I'd call that a surprise ending
and this hill would still be beautiful
a place I wouldn't mind dying
alone or with you.

I am trying to get at something
and I want to talk very plainly to you
so that we are both comforted by the honesty.
You see there is a window by my desk
I stare out when I am stuck
though the outdoors has rarely inspired me to write
and I don't know why I keep staring at it.

My childhood hasn't made good material either
mostly being a mulch of white minutes
with a few stand out moments,
popping tar bubbles on the driveway in the summer
a certain amount of pride at school
everytime they called it "our sun"
and playing football when the only play
was "go out long" are what stand out now.

If squeezed for more information
I can remember old clock radios
with flipping metal numbers
and an entree called Surf and Turf.

As a way of getting in touch with my origins
every night I set the alarm clock
for the time I was born so that waking up
becomes a historical reenactment and the first thing I do
 is take a reading of the day and try to flow with it like
 when you're riding a mechanical bull and you strain to learn
 the pattern quickly so you don't inadverantly resist it.

II two

I can't remember being born
and no one else can remember it either
even the doctor who I met years later
at a cocktail party.
It's one of the little disappointments
that makes you think about getting away
going to Holly Springs or Coral Gables
and taking a room on the square
with a landlady whose hands are scored
by disinfectant, telling the people you meet
that you are from Alaska, and listen
to what they have to say about Alaska
until you have learned much more about Alaska
than you ever will about Holly Springs or Coral Gables.

Sometimes I am buying a newspaper
in a strange city and think
"I am about to learn what it's like to live here."
Oftentimes there is a news item
about the complaints of homeowners
who live beside the airport
and I realize that I read an article
on this subject nearly once a year
and always receive the same image.


I am in bed late at night
in my house near the airport
listening to the jets fly overhead
a strange wife sleeping beside me.
In my mind, the bedroom is an amalgamation
of various cold medicine commercial sets
(there is always a box of tissue on the nightstand).

I know these recurring news articles are clues,
flaws in the design though I haven't figured out
how to string them together yet,
but I've begun to notice that the same people
are dying over and over again,
for instance Minnie Pearl
who died this year
for the fourth time in four years.

III three

Today is the first day of Lent
and once again I'm not really sure what it is.
How many more years will I let pass
before I take the trouble to ask someone?


It reminds of this morning
when you were getting ready for work.
I was sitting by the space heater
numbly watching you dress
and when you asked why I never wear a robe
I had so many good reasons
I didn't know where to begin.


If you were cool in high school
you didn't ask too many questions.
You could tell who'd been to last night's
big metal concert by the new t-shirts in the hallway.
You didn't have to ask
and that's what cool was:
the ability to deduct
to know without asking.
And the pressure to simulate coolness
means not asking when you don't know,
which is why kids grow ever more stupid.


A yearbook's endpages, filled with promises
to stay in touch, stand as proof of the uselessness
of a teenager's promise. Not like I'm dying
for a letter from the class stoner
ten years on but...

Do you remember the way the girls
would call out "love you!"
conveniently leaving out the "I"
as if they didn't want to commit
to their own declarations.

I agree that the "I" is a pretty heavy concept
and hope you won't get uncomfortable
if I should go into some deeper stuff here.

IV four

There are things I've given up on
like recording funny answering machine messages.
It's part of growing older
and the human race as a group
has matured along the same lines.
It seems our comedy dates the quickest.
If you laugh out loud at Shakespeare's jokes
I hope you won't be insulted
if I say you're trying too hard.
Even sketches from the original Saturday Night Live
seem slow-witted and obvious now.

It's just that our advances are irrepressible.
Nowadays little kids can't even set up lemonade stands.
It makes people too self-conscious about the past,
though try explaining that to a kid.

I'm not saying it should be this way.

All this new technology
will eventually give us new feelings
that will never completely displace the old ones
leaving everyone feeling quite nervous
and split in two.

We will travel to Mars
even as folks on Earth
are still ripping open potato chip
bags with their teeth.

Why? I don't have the time or intelligence
to make all the connections
like my friend Gordon
(this is a true story)
who grew up in Braintree Massachusetts
and had never pictured a brain snagged in a tree
until I brought it up.
He'd never broken the name down to its parts.
By then it was too late.
He had moved to Coral Gables.

V five

The hill out my window is still looking beautiful
suffused in a kind of gold national park light
and it seems to say,
I'm sorry the world could not possibly
use another poem about Orpheus
but I'm available if you're not working
on a self-portrait or anything.

I'm watching my dog have nightmares,
twitching and whining on the office floor
and I try to imagine what beast
has cornered him in the meadow
where his dreams are set.

I'm just letting the day be what it is:
a place for a large number of things
to gather and interact --
not even a place but an occasion
a reality for real things.

Friends warned me not to get too psychedelic
or religious with this piece:
"They won't accept it if it's too psychedelic
or religious," but these are valid topics
and I'm the one with the dog twitching on the floor
possibly dreaming of me
that part of me that would beat a dog
for no good reason
no reason that a dog could see.


I am trying to get at something so simple
that I have to talk plainly
so the words don't disfigure it
and if it turns out that what I say is untrue
then at least let it be harmless
like a leaky boat in the reeds
that is bothering no one.

VI six

I can't trust the accuracy of my own memories,
many of them having blended with sentimental
telephone and margarine commercials
plainly ruined by Madison Avenue
though no one seems to call the advertising world
"Madison Avenue" anymore. Have they moved?
Let's get an update on this.

But first I have some business to take care of.

I walked out to the hill behind our house
which looks positively Alaskan today
and it would be easier to explain this
if I had a picture to show you
but I was with our young dog
and he was running through the tall grass
like running through the tall grass
is all of life together
until a bird calls or he finds a beer can
and that thing fills all the space in his head.

You see,
his mind can only hold one thought at a time
and when he finally hears me call his name
he looks up and cocks his head
and for a single moment
my voice is everything:

Self-portrait at 28.


Written by William Wordsworth | Create an image from this poem

We Are Seven

  A simple child, dear brother Jim,  That lightly draws its breath,  And feels its life in every limb,  What should it know of death?

  I met a little cottage girl,  She was eight years old, she said;  Her hair was thick with many a curl  That cluster'd round her head.

  She had a rustic, woodland air,  And she was wildly clad;  Her eyes were fair, and very fair,  —Her beauty made me glad.

  "Sisters and brothers, little maid,  How many may you be?"  "How many? seven in all," she said,  And wondering looked at me.

  "And where are they, I pray you tell?"  She answered, "Seven are we,  And two of us at Conway dwell,  And two are gone to sea."

  "Two of us in the church-yard lie,  My sister and my brother,  And in the church-yard cottage, I  Dwell near them with my mother."

  "You say that two at Conway dwell,  And two are gone to sea,  Yet you are seven; I pray you tell  Sweet Maid, how this may be?"

  Then did the little Maid reply,  "Seven boys and girls are we;  Two of us in the church-yard lie,  Beneath the church-yard tree."

  "You run about, my little maid,  Your limbs they are alive;  If two are in the church-yard laid,  Then ye are only five."

  "Their graves are green, they may be seen,"  The little Maid replied,  "Twelve steps or more from my mother's door,  And they are side by side."

  "My stockings there I often knit,  My 'kerchief there I hem;  And there upon the ground I sit—  I sit and sing to them."

  "And often after sunset, Sir,  When it is light and fair,  I take my little porringer,  And eat my supper there."

  "The first that died was little Jane;  In bed she moaning lay,  Till God released her of her pain,  And then she went away."

  "So in the church-yard she was laid,  And all the summer dry,  Together round her grave we played,  My brother John and I."

  "And when the ground was white with snow,  And I could run and slide,  My brother John was forced to go,  And he lies by her side."

  "How many are you then," said I,  "If they two are in Heaven?"  The little Maiden did reply,  "O Master! we are seven."

  "But they are dead; those two are dead!  Their spirits are in heaven!"  'Twas throwing words away; for still  The little Maid would have her will,  And said, "Nay, we are seven!"

ANECDOTE for FATHERS,   Shewing how the practice of Lying may be taught.

  I have a boy of five years old,  His face is fair and fresh to see;  His limbs are cast in beauty's mould,  And dearly he loves me.

  One morn we stroll'd on our dry walk,  Our quiet house all full in view,  And held such intermitted talk  As we are wont to do.

  My thoughts on former pleasures ran;  I thought of Kilve's delightful shore,  My pleasant home, when Spring began,  A long, long year before.

  A day it was when I could bear  To think, and think, and think again;  With so much happiness to spare,  I could not feel a pain.

  My boy was by my side, so slim  And graceful in his rustic dress!  And oftentimes I talked to him  In very idleness.

  The young lambs ran a pretty race;  The morning sun shone bright and warm;  "Kilve," said I, "was a pleasant place,  And so is Liswyn farm."

  "My little boy, which like you more,"  I said and took him by the arm—  "Our home by Kilve's delightful shore,  Or here at Liswyn farm?"

  "And tell me, had you rather be,"  I said and held-him by the arm,  "At Kilve's smooth shore by the green sea,  Or here at Liswyn farm?"

  In careless mood he looked at me,  While still I held him by the arm,  And said, "At Kilve I'd rather be  Than here at Liswyn farm."

  "Now, little Edward, say why so;  My little Edward, tell me why;"  "I cannot tell, I do not know."  "Why this is strange," said I.

  "For, here are woods and green hills warm:  There surely must some reason be  Why you would change sweet Liswyn farm,  For Kilve by the green sea."

  At this, my boy hung down his head,  He blush'd with shame, nor made reply;  And five times to the child I said,  "Why, Edward, tell me, why?"

  His head he raised—there was in sight,  It caught his eye, he saw it plain—  Upon the house-top, glittering bright,  A broad and gilded vane.

  Then did the boy his tongue unlock,  And thus to me he made reply;  "At Kilve there was no weather-cock,  And that's the reason why."

  Oh dearest, dearest boy! my heart  For better lore would seldom yearn  Could I but teach the hundredth part  Of what from thee I learn.

LINES  Written at a small distance from my House, and sent by  my little boy to the person to whom they are addressed.

  It is the first mild day of March:  Each minute sweeter than before,  The red-breast sings from the tall larch  That stands beside our door.

  There is a blessing in the air,  Which seems a sense of joy to yield  To the bare trees, and mountains bare,  And grass in the green field.

  My Sister! ('tis a wish of mine)  Now that our morning meal is done,  Make haste, your morning task resign;  Come forth and feel the sun.

  Edward will come with you, and pray,  Put on with speed your woodland dress,  And bring no book, for this one day  We'll give to idleness.

  No joyless forms shall regulate  Our living Calendar:  We from to-day, my friend, will date  The opening of the year.

  Love, now an universal birth,  From heart to heart is stealing,  From earth to man, from man to earth,  —It is the hour of feeling.

  One moment now may give us more  Than fifty years of reason;  Our minds shall drink at every pore  The spirit of the season.

  Some silent laws our hearts may make,  Which they shall long obey;  We for the year to come may take  Our temper from to-day.

  And from the blessed power that rolls  About, below, above;  We'll frame the measure of our souls,  They shall be tuned to love.

  Then come, my sister I come, I pray,  With speed put on your woodland dress,  And bring no book; for this one day  We'll give to idleness.

Written by John Masefield | Create an image from this poem

A Ballad of John Silver

 We were schooner-rigged and rakish, 
with a long and lissome hull, 
And we flew the pretty colours of the crossbones and the skull; 
We'd a big black Jolly Roger flapping grimly at the fore, 
And we sailed the Spanish Water in the happy days of yore. 

We'd a long brass gun amidships, like a well-conducted ship, 
We had each a brace of pistols and a cutlass at the hip; 
It's a point which tells against us, and a fact to be deplored, 
But we chased the goodly merchant-men and laid their ships aboard. 

Then the dead men fouled the scuppers and the wounded filled the chains, 
And the paint-work all was spatter dashed with other peoples brains, 
She was boarded, she was looted, she was scuttled till she sank. 
And the pale survivors left us by the medium of the plank. 

O! then it was (while standing by the taffrail on the poop) 
We could hear the drowning folk lament the absent chicken coop; 
Then, having washed the blood away, we'd little else to do 
Than to dance a quiet hornpipe as the old salts taught us to. 

O! the fiddle on the fo'c'sle, and the slapping naked soles, 
And the genial "Down the middle, Jake, and curtsey when she rolls!" 
With the silver seas around us and the pale moon overhead, 
And the look-out not a-looking and his pipe-bowl glowing red. 

Ah! the pig-tailed, quidding pirates and the pretty pranks we played, 
All have since been put a stop to by the naughty Board of Trade; 
The schooners and the merry crews are laid away to rest, 
A little south the sunset in the islands of the Blest.
Written by Ogden Nash | Create an image from this poem

The Boy Who Laughed At Santa Claus

 In Baltimore there lived a boy.
He wasn't anybody's joy.
Although his name was Jabez Dawes,
His character was full of flaws.


In school he never led his classes,
He hid old ladies' reading glasses,
His mouth was open when he chewed,
And elbows to the table glued.
He stole the milk of hungry kittens,
And walked through doors marked NO ADMITTANCE.
He said he acted thus because
There wasn't any Santa Claus.


Another trick that tickled Jabez
Was crying 'Boo' at little babies.
He brushed his teeth, they said in town,
Sideways instead of up and down.
Yet people pardoned every sin,
And viewed his antics with a grin,
Till they were told by Jabez Dawes,
'There isn't any Santa Claus!'


Deploring how he did behave,
His parents swiftly sought their grave.
They hurried through the portals pearly,
And Jabez left the funeral early.


Like whooping cough, from child to child,
He sped to spread the rumor wild:
'Sure as my name is Jabez Dawes
There isn't any Santa Claus!'
Slunk like a weasel of a marten
Through nursery and kindergarten,
Whispering low to every tot,
'There isn't any, no there's not!'


The children wept all Christmas eve
And Jabez chortled up his sleeve.
No infant dared hang up his stocking
For fear of Jabez' ribald mocking.


He sprawled on his untidy bed,
Fresh malice dancing in his head,
When presently with scalp-a-tingling,
Jabez heard a distant jingling;
He heard the crunch of sleigh and hoof
Crisply alighting on the roof.
What good to rise and bar the door?
A shower of soot was on the floor.


What was beheld by Jabez Dawes?
The fireplace full of Santa Claus!
Then Jabez fell upon his knees
With cries of 'Don't,' and 'Pretty Please.'
He howled, 'I don't know where you read it,
But anyhow, I never said it!'
'Jabez' replied the angry saint,
'It isn't I, it's you that ain't.
Although there is a Santa Claus,
There isn't any Jabez Dawes!'


Said Jabez then with impudent vim,
'Oh, yes there is, and I am him!
Your magic don't scare me, it doesn't'
And suddenly he found he wasn't!
From grimy feet to grimy locks,
Jabez became a Jack-in-the-box,
An ugly toy with springs unsprung,
Forever sticking out his tongue.


The neighbors heard his mournful squeal;
They searched for him, but not with zeal.
No trace was found of Jabez Dawes,
Which led to thunderous applause,
And people drank a loving cup
And went and hung their stockings up.


All you who sneer at Santa Claus,
Beware the fate of Jabez Dawes,
The saucy boy who mocked the saint.
Donner and Blitzen licked off his paint.
Written by Gwendolyn Brooks | Create an image from this poem

The Lovers of the Poor

 arrive. The Ladies from the Ladies' Betterment
League
Arrive in the afternoon, the late light slanting
In diluted gold bars across the boulevard brag
Of proud, seamed faces with mercy and murder hinting
Here, there, interrupting, all deep and debonair,
The pink paint on the innocence of fear;
Walk in a gingerly manner up the hall. 
Cutting with knives served by their softest care,
Served by their love, so barbarously fair.
Whose mothers taught: You'd better not be cruel!
You had better not throw stones upon the wrens!
Herein they kiss and coddle and assault
Anew and dearly in the innocence
With which they baffle nature. Who are full,
Sleek, tender-clad, fit, fiftyish, a-glow, all
Sweetly abortive, hinting at fat fruit,
Judge it high time that fiftyish fingers felt
Beneath the lovelier planes of enterprise.
To resurrect. To moisten with milky chill.
To be a random hitching post or plush.
To be, for wet eyes, random and handy hem.
Their guild is giving money to the poor.
The worthy poor. The very very worthy
And beautiful poor. Perhaps just not too swarthy?
Perhaps just not too dirty nor too dim
Nor--passionate. In truth, what they could wish
Is--something less than derelict or dull.
Not staunch enough to stab, though, gaze for gaze!
God shield them sharply from the beggar-bold!
The noxious needy ones whose battle's bald
Nonetheless for being voiceless, hits one down.
But it's all so bad! and entirely too much for them.
The stench; the urine, cabbage, and dead beans,
Dead porridges of assorted dusty grains,
The old smoke, heavy diapers, and, they're told,
Something called chitterlings. The darkness. Drawn
Darkness, or dirty light. The soil that stirs.
The soil that looks the soil of centuries.
And for that matter the general oldness. Old
Wood. Old marble. Old tile. Old old old.
Note homekind Oldness! Not Lake Forest, Glencoe.
Nothing is sturdy, nothing is majestic,
There is no quiet drama, no rubbed glaze, no
Unkillable infirmity of such
A tasteful turn as lately they have left,
Glencoe, Lake Forest, and to which their cars
Must presently restore them. When they're done
With dullards and distortions of this fistic
Patience of the poor and put-upon.
They've never seen such a make-do-ness as
Newspaper rugs before! In this, this "flat,"
Their hostess is gathering up the oozed, the rich
Rugs of the morning (tattered! the bespattered . . . ),
Readies to spread clean rugs for afternoon.
Here is a scene for you. The Ladies look,
In horror, behind a substantial citizeness
Whose trains clank out across her swollen heart.
Who, arms akimbo, almost fills a door.
All tumbling children, quilts dragged to the floor
And tortured thereover, potato peelings, soft-
Eyed kitten, hunched-up, haggard, to-be-hurt.
Their League is allotting largesse to the Lost.
But to put their clean, their pretty money, to put
Their money collected from delicate rose-fingers
Tipped with their hundred flawless rose-nails seems . . . 
They own Spode, Lowestoft, candelabra,
Mantels, and hostess gowns, and sunburst clocks,
Turtle soup, Chippendale, red satin "hangings,"
Aubussons and Hattie Carnegie. They Winter
In Palm Beach; cross the Water in June; attend,
When suitable, the nice Art Institute;
Buy the right books in the best bindings; saunter
On Michigan, Easter mornings, in sun or wind.
Oh Squalor! This sick four-story hulk, this fibre
With fissures everywhere! Why, what are bringings
Of loathe-love largesse? What shall peril hungers
So old old, what shall flatter the desolate?
Tin can, blocked fire escape and chitterling
And swaggering seeking youth and the puzzled wreckage
Of the middle passage, and urine and stale shames
And, again, the porridges of the underslung
And children children children. Heavens! That
Was a rat, surely, off there, in the shadows? Long
And long-tailed? Gray? The Ladies from the Ladies'
Betterment League agree it will be better
To achieve the outer air that rights and steadies,
To hie to a house that does not holler, to ring
Bells elsetime, better presently to cater
To no more Possibilities, to get
Away. Perhaps the money can be posted.
Perhaps they two may choose another Slum!
Some serious sooty half-unhappy home!--
Where loathe-lover likelier may be invested.
Keeping their scented bodies in the center
Of the hall as they walk down the hysterical hall,
They allow their lovely skirts to graze no wall,
Are off at what they manage of a canter,
And, resuming all the clues of what they were,
Try to avoid inhaling the laden air.
Written by Andrew Barton Paterson | Create an image from this poem

A Ballad of Ducks

 The railway rattled and roared and swung 
With jolting and bumping trucks. 
The sun, like a billiard red ball, hung 
In the Western sky: and the tireless tongue 
Of the wild-eyed man in the corner told 
This terrible tale of the days of old, 
And the party that ought to have kept the ducks. 
"Well, it ain't all joy bein' on the land 
With an overdraft that'd knock you flat; 
And the rabbits have pretty well took command; 
But the hardest thing for a man to stand 
Is the feller who says 'Well I told you so! 
You should ha' done this way, don't you know!' -- 
I could lay a bait for a man like that. 

"The grasshoppers struck us in ninety-one 
And what they leave -- well, it ain't de luxe. 
But a growlin' fault-findin' son of a gun 
Who'd lent some money to stock our run -- 
I said they'd eaten what grass we had -- 
Says he, 'Your management's very bad; 
You had a right to have kept some ducks!' 

"To have kept some ducks! And the place was white! 
Wherever you went you had to tread 
On grasshoppers guzzlin' day and night; 
And then with a swoosh they rose in flight, 
If you didn't look out for yourself they'd fly 
Like bullets into your open eye 
And knock it out of the back of your head. 

"There isn't a turkey or goose or swan, 
Or a duck that quacks, or a hen that clucks, 
Can make a difference on a run 
When a grasshopper plague has once begun; 
'If you'd finance us,' I says, 'I'd buy 
Ten thousand emus and have a try; 
The job,' I says, 'is too big for ducks! 

"'You must fetch a duck when you come to stay; 
A great big duck -- a Muscovy toff -- 
Ready and fit,' I says, 'for the fray; 
And if the grasshoppers come our way 
You turn your duck into the lucerne patch, 
And I'd be ready to make a match 
That the grasshoppers eat his feathers off!" 

"He came to visit us by and by, 
And it just so happened one day in spring 
A kind of cloud came over the sky -- 
A wall of grasshoppers nine miles high, 
And nine miles thick, and nine hundred wide, 
Flyin' in regiments, side by side, 
And eatin' up every living thing. 

"All day long, like a shower of rain, 
You'd hear 'em smackin' against the wall, 
Tap, tap, tap, on the window pane, 
And they'd rise and jump at the house again 
Till their crippled carcasses piled outside. 
But what did it matter if thousands died -- 
A million wouldn't be missed at all. 

"We were drinkin' grasshoppers -- so to speak -- 
Till we skimmed their carcasses off the spring; 
And they fell so thick in the station creek 
They choked the waterholes all the week. 
There was scarcely room for a trout to rise, 
And they'd only take artificial flies -- 
They got so sick of the real thing. 

"An Arctic snowstorm was beat to rags 
When the hoppers rose for their morning flight 
With the flapping noise like a million flags: 
And the kitchen chimney was stuffed with bags 
For they'd fall right into the fire, and fry 
Till the cook sat down and began to cry -- 
And never a duck or fowl in sight. 

"We strolled across to the railroad track -- 
Under a cover beneath some trucks, 
I sees a feather and hears a quack; 
I stoops and I pulls the tarpaulin back -- 
Every duck in the place was there, 
No good to them was the open air. 
'Mister,' I says, 'There's your blanky ducks!'"

Book: Radiant Verses: A Journey Through Inspiring Poetry