Famous Bruce Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Bruce poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous bruce poems. These examples illustrate what a famous bruce poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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...rish immortal in rhyme,
Come—one bottle more—and have at the sublime!
“Thy line, that have struggled for freedom with Bruce,
Shall heroes and patriots ever produce:
So thine be the laurel, and mine be the bay;
The field thou hast won, by yon bright god of day!”...Read more of this...
by
Burns, Robert
...How glorious Wallace stood, how hapless fell?
Where are the Muses fled that could produce
A drama worthy o’ the name o’ Bruce?
How here, even here, he first unsheath’d the sword
’Gainst mighty England and her guilty Lord;
And after mony a bloody, deathless doing,
Wrench’d his dear country from the jaws of Ruin!
O for a Shakespeare, or an Otway scene,
To draw the lovely, hapless Scottish Queen!
Vain all th’ omnipotence of female charms
’Gainst headlong, ruthless, mad Rebellion...Read more of this...
by
Burns, Robert
...n a nation!
O would, or I had seen the day
That Treason thus could sell us,
My auld grey head had lien in clay,
Wi’ Bruce and loyal Wallace!
But pith and power, till my last hour,
I’ll mak this declaration;
We’re bought and sold for English gold—
Such a parcel of rogues in a nation!...Read more of this...
by
Burns, Robert
...SCOTS, wha hae wi’ WALLACE bled,
Scots, wham BRUCE has aften led,
Welcome to your gory bed,
Or to Victorie!
Now’s the day, and now’s the hour;
See the front o’ battle lour;
See approach proud EDWARD’S power—
Chains and Slaverie!
Wha will be a traitor knave?
Wha can fill a coward’s grave?
Wha sae base as be a Slave?
Let him turn and flee!
Wha, for Scotland’s King and Law,
Freedom’s sword will s...Read more of this...
by
Burns, Robert
...ng the rocks and streams
To sport that night;
Amang the bonie winding banks,
Where Doon rins, wimplin, clear;
Where Bruce 4 ance rul’d the martial ranks,
An’ shook his Carrick spear;
Some merry, friendly, countra-folks
Together did convene,
To burn their nits, an’ pou their stocks,
An’ haud their Halloween
Fu’ blythe that night.
The lasses feat, an’ cleanly neat,
Mair braw than when they’re fine;
Their faces blythe, fu’ sweetly kythe,
Hearts leal, an’ warm, an’ ki...Read more of this...
by
Burns, Robert
...King Robert the Bruce's deadly enemy, John of Lorn,
Joined the English with eight hundred Highlanders one morn,
All strong, hardy, and active fearless mountaineers,
But Bruce's men attacked them with swords and spears.
And while they were engaged, a new enemy burst upon them,
Like a torrent of water rushing down a rocky glen:
It was John of Lorn and his Highlanders that c...Read more of this...
by
McGonagall, William Topaz
...es in a nation!
O, would or I had seen the day
That treason thus could sell us,
My auld grey head had lien in clay
Wi' Bruce and loyal Wallace!
But pith and power, till my last hour,
I'll mak this declaration:
We're bought and sold for English gold—
Such a parcel of rogues in a nation!...Read more of this...
by
Burns, Robert
...to get out
of the shadow
not of those forefathers but of this father
and saw for the first time
down in its valley, Bruce Pond, giving off
its little steam in the afternoon,
pond where Clarence Akley came on Sunday mornings to cut
down
the cedars around the shore, I'd sometimes hear the slow
spondees
of his work, he's gone,
where Milton Norway came up behind me while I was
fishing and
stood awhile before I knew he was there, he's the one who
put the
cedar sh...Read more of this...
by
Kinnell, Galway
...lyhocks,
And there are Ali Baba's rocks.
But yonder, see! apart and high,
Frozen Siberia lies; where I,
With Robert Bruce William Tell,
Was bound by an enchanter's spell....Read more of this...
by
Stevenson, Robert Louis
...Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the ...Read more of this...
by
Henley, William Ernest
...s of Misers from his pen should flow;
Humorists and hypocrites it should produce,
Whole Raymond families, and tribes of Bruce.
Now Empress Fame had publisht the renown,
Of Shadwell's coronation through the town.
Rous'd by report of fame, the nations meet,
From near Bun-Hill, and distant Watling-street.
No Persian carpets spread th'imperial way,
But scatter'd limbs of mangled poets lay:
From dusty shops neglected authors come,
Martyrs of pies, and reliques of the bum.
Much H...Read more of this...
by
Dryden, John
...We were a tribe, a family, a people.
Wallace and Bruce guard now a painted field,
And all may read the folio of our fable,
Peruse the sword, the sceptre and the shield.
A simple sky roofed in that rustic day,
The busy corn-fields and the haunted holms,
The green road winding up the ferny brae.
But Knox and Melville clapped their preaching palms
And bundled all the harvesters away,
Hoodicrow Peden in the bl...Read more of this...
by
Muir, Edwin
...ket
Seems to be knocking
Upon a hundred leagues of floor
With her light heels, and mocking
Percy and Douglas dead,
And Bruce on his burial bed,
Where he lies white as may
With wars and leprosy,
And all the kings before
This land was kingless,
And all the singers before
This land was songless,
This land that with its dead and living waits the Judgement Day.
But they, the powerless dead,
Listening can hear no more
Than a hard tapping on the floor
A little overhead
Of common he...Read more of this...
by
Muir, Edwin
...Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled,
Scots, wham Bruce has aften led,
Welcome to your gory bed,
Or to victory!
Now's the day, and now's the hour;
See the front o' battle lour,
See approach proud Edward's power—
Chains and slavery!
Wha will be a traitor-knave?
Wha can fill a coward's grave?
Wha sae base as be a slave?
Let him turn and flee!
Wha for Scotland's king and law
Freedom's sword will strongly d...Read more of this...
by
Burns, Robert
...Sir Robert the Bruce at Bannockburn
Beat the English in every wheel and turn,
And made them fly in great dismay
From off the field without delay.
The English were a hundred thousand strong,
And King Edward passed through the Lowlands all along.
Determined to conquer Scotland, it was his desire,
And then to restore it to his own empire.
King Edward brought numerous wagg...Read more of this...
by
McGonagall, William Topaz
...right as their due of leading the van,
And because they wouldn't be allowed, with anger their hearts did burn,
Because Bruce conferred that honour upon the Macdonalds at the Battle of Bannockburn.
And galled beyond endurance by the fire of the English that day,
Which caused the Highlanders to cry aloud to be led forward without delay,
Until at last the brave Clan Macintosh rushed forward without dismay,
While with grape-shot from a side battery hundreds were swept away.
...Read more of this...
by
McGonagall, William Topaz
...cauldron, boiling.
Enter the three witches.
1ST WITCH: Thrice hath the Federal Jackass brayed.
2ND WITCH: Once the Bruce-Smith War-horse neighed.
3RD WITCH: So Georgie comes, 'tis time, 'tis time,
Around the cauldron to chant our rhyme.
1ST WITCH: In the cauldron boil and bake
Fillet of a tariff snake,
Home-made flannels -- mostly cotton,
Apples full of moths, and rotten,
Lamb that perished in the drought,
Starving stock from "furthest out",
Drops of sweat fro...Read more of this...
by
Paterson, Andrew Barton
...To view the frontiers of Menteith.
All backward came with news of truce;
Still lay each martial Graeme and Bruce,
In Rednock courts no horsemen wait,
No banner waved on Cardross gate,
On Duchray's towers no beacon shone,
Nor scared the herons from Loch Con;
All seemed at peace.—Now wot ye wily
The Chieftain with such anxious eye,
Ere to the muster he repair,
This western frontier scanned with care?—
In Benvenu...Read more of this...
by
Scott, Sir Walter
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