Famous Cask Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Cask poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous cask poems. These examples illustrate what a famous cask poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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...n,
And the good logs of Algidus
Roar louder yet within;
LXIX
When the oldest cask is opened,
And the largest lamp is lit;
When the chestnuts glow in the embers,
And the kid turns on the spit;
When young and old in circle
Around the firebrands close;
When the girls are weaving baskets,
And the lads are shaping bows;
LXX
When the goodman mends his a...Read more of this...
by
Horace,
...vil
Without worry or delay
Would be just to call a meeting
Of the burghers, great and small,
And then open every wine cask
And proceed to drink it all.
“For,” they said, “when we have swallowed
Every drop that’s in the land,
There can be no more of drinking,
It is plain to understand.”
So they called a monster meeting,
And the burghers, small and great,
Drank and drank until they were too
Tipsy to perambulate.
But there still was wine in plenty,
So, in sooth, the on...Read more of this...
by
Butler, Ellis Parker
...he Gnat's supremacy is large as Thine --
Life -- is a different Thing --
So measure Wine --
Naked of Flask -- Naked of Cask --
Bare Rhine --
Which Ruby's mine?...Read more of this...
by
Dickinson, Emily
...WHEN the vine again is blowing,
Then the wine moves in the cask;
When the rose again is glowing,
Wherefore should I feel oppress'd?
Down my cheeks run tears all-burning,
If I do, or leave my task;
I but feel a speechless yearning,
That pervades my inmost breast.
But at length I see the reason,
When the question I would ask:
'Twas in such a beauteous season,
Doris glowed to make me blest!
1797....Read more of this...
by
von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang
...straw?
Yet clean away the mud and straw,
and a mirror might be revealed. Until the juice ferments a while in the cask,
it isn’t wine. If you wish your heart to be bright,
you must do a little work. My King addressed the soul of my flesh:
You return just as you left.
Where are the traces of my gifts? We know that alchemy transforms copper into gold.
This Sun doesn’t want a crown or robe from God’s grace.
He is a hat to a hundred bald men,
a covering for te...Read more of this...
by
Rumi, Jalal ad-Din Muhammad
...The spring wind comes from the east and quickly passes,
Leaving faint ripples in the wine of the golden bowl.
The flowers fall, flake after flake, myriads together.
You, pretty girl, wine-flushed,
Your rosy face is rosier still.
How long may the peach and plum trees flower
By the green-painted house?
The fleeting light deceives man,
Brings soon the stumbl...Read more of this...
by
Po, Li
...rinkers are famous for all time.
... Prince Chen paid at a banquet in the Palace of Perfection
Ten thousand coins for a cask of wine, with many a laugh and quip.
Why say, my host, that your money is gone?
Go and buy wine and we'll drink it together!
My flower-dappled horse,
My furs worth a thousand,
Hand them to the boy to exchange for good wine,
And we'll drown away the woes of ten thousand generation!...Read more of this...
by
Po, Li
...nkers are famous for all time.
... Prince Chen paid at a banquet in the Palace of Perfection
Ten thousand coins for a cask of wine, with many a laugh and quip.
Why say, my host, that your money is gone?
Go and buy wine and we'll drink it together!
My flower-dappled horse,
My furs worth a thousand,
Hand them to the boy to exchange for good wine,
And we'll drown away the woes of ten thousand generation!...Read more of this...
by
Bai, Li
...How cool and fair this cellar where
My throne a dusky cask is;
To do no thing but just to sing
And drown the time my task is.
The cooper he's
Resolved to please,
And, answering to my winking,
He fills me up
Cup after cup
For drinking, drinking, drinking.
Begrudge me not
This cosy spot
In which I am reclining--
Why, who would burst
With envious thirst,
When he can live by wining.
A roseate hue seems to imbue
Th...Read more of this...
by
Field, Eugene
...rkness wipes me out like chalk on a blackboard. . .
I don't know a thing.
For five days I lie in secret,
Tapped like a cask, the years draining into my pillow.
Even my best friend thinks I'm in the country.
Skin doesn't have roots, it peels away easy as paper.
When I grin, the stitches tauten. I grow backward. I'm twenty,
Broody and in long skirts on my first husband's sofa, my fingers
Buried in the lambswool of the dead poodle;
I hadn't a cat yet.
Now she's done for, the d...Read more of this...
by
Plath, Sylvia
...Come, Phyllis, I've a cask of wine
That fairly reeks with precious juices,
And in your tresses you shall twine
The loveliest flowers this vale produces.
My cottage wears a gracious smile,--
The altar, decked in floral glory,
Yearns for the lamb which bleats the while
As though it pined for honors gory.
Hither our neighbors nimbly fare,--
The boys agog, the maidens snickering;
A...Read more of this...
by
Field, Eugene
...nd last two varlets led a wain
Drawn by white oxen well bedight
With oaken boughs and lilies white;
Therein there lay a cask of wine
And baskets piled with bread full fine,
And flesh of hart and roe and hare;
And in the midst upon a chair
Done over with a cloth of gold
There sat a man exceeding old
With long white locks: and clad was he
No other than his company
Save that a golden crown he bore
Full fairly fashioned as of yore,
And with a sword was girt about
Such as few folk...Read more of this...
by
Morris, William
...ip destined to arrive in England on the
evening of June 29, 1824.
Trout Fishing in America's body was preserved in a cask
holding one hundred-eighty gallons of spirits: 0, a long way
from Idaho, a long way from Stanley Basin, Little Redfish
Lake, the Big Lost River and from Lake Josephus and the
Big Wood River.
THE MESSAGE
Last night a blue thing, the smoke itself, from our campfire
drifted down the valley, entering into the sound of the bell-
mare ...Read more of this...
by
Brautigan, Richard
...d quaint, --
Gentlest of skippers, rare sea-saint! --
Who, when the dreary calms prevailed,
And water-butt and bread-cask failed,
And cruel, hungry eyes pursued
His portly presence, mad for food,
With dark hints muttered under breath
Of casting lots for life or death,
Offered, if Heaven withheld supplies,
To be himself the sacrifice.
Then, suddenly, as if to save
The good man from his living grave,
A ripple on the water grew,
A school of porpoise flashed in view....Read more of this...
by
Whittier, John Greenleaf
...sailors descended the forehold carrying a light,
To see if all below was safe and right.
And they discovered a spirit cask and the contents oozing rapidly,
And the man with the light stooped to examine it immediately;
And in doing so he dropped fhe lamp while in a state of amaze,
And, oh horror! in a minute the forehold was in a blaze.
It was two o'clock in the morning when the accident took place,
And, alas! horror and fear was depicted in each face;
And the sailors trie...Read more of this...
by
McGonagall, William Topaz
...ast mate behind,
And scudded still before the wind.
Some succour yet they could afford;
And, such as storms allow,
The cask, the coop, the floated cord,
Delay'd not to bestow.
But he (they knew) nor ship, nor shore,
Whate'er they gave, should visit more.
Nor, cruel as it seem'd, could he
Their haste himself condemn,
Aware that flight, in such a sea,
Alone could rescue them;
Yet bitter felt it still to die
Deserted, and his friends so nigh.
He long survives, who lives an ho...Read more of this...
by
Cowper, William
...nner
To flap each broad wing like a banner,
And turn in the wind, and dance like flame!)
Had they broached a white-beer cask from Berlin
---Or if you incline to prescribe mere wine
Put to his lips, when they saw him pine,
A cup of our own Moldavia fine,
Cotnar for instance, green as May sorrel
And ropy with sweet,---we shall not quarrel.
IV.
So, at home, the sick tall yellow Duchess
Was left with the infant in her clutches,
She being the daughter of God knows who:
And now w...Read more of this...
by
Browning, Robert
...ing Maid
She brought to shame
For negligence, that was her own;
Turning the milk to water, clear,
And spilling from the cask, small-beer;
Pinching, like fairies, harmless lasses,
And shewing Imps, in looking-glasses;
Or, with heart-piercing groan,
Along the church-yard path, swift gliding,
Or, on a broomstick, witchlike, riding.
All listen'd trembling; For the Tale
Made cheeks of Oker, chalky pale;
The young a valiant doubt pretended;
The old believ'd, and all attended.
Now...Read more of this...
by
Robinson, Mary Darby
...now,
With us, in Lombardy, they bring
Provisions packed on mules, a string
With little bells that cheer their task,
And casks, and boughs on every cask
To keep the sun's heat from the wine;
These I let pass in jingling line,
And, close on them, dear noisy crew,
The peasants from the village too;
For at the very rear would troop
Their wives and sisters in a group
To help, I knew; when these had passed,
I threw my glove to strike the last,
Taking the chance: she did not start,
...Read more of this...
by
Browning, Robert
...fifteen feet long,
And into it thirteen of the crew quickly and cautiously did throng,
With two bags of biscuits and a cask of water out of the tank.
And for these precious mercies, God they did thank;
Who is the giver of all good things,
And to those that put their trust in him often succour brings
And such has been the case with these brave men at sea,
That sent Captain McMullan to save them and bring them to Dundee.
When once into the pinnace they improvised a sail in...Read more of this...
by
McGonagall, William Topaz
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