Famous Congress Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Congress poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous congress poems. These examples illustrate what a famous congress poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Delmore Schwartz
The riches of the poet are equal to his poetry
His power is his left hand
It is idle weak and precious
His poverty is his wealth, a wealth which may destroy him
like Midas Because it is that laziness which is a form of impatience
And this he may be destroyed by the gold of the light
which never...Read more of this...
by
Julia Ward Howe
Arise then...women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts!
Whether your baptism be of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
"We will not have questions answered by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage,
For caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have...Read more of this...
by
Allen Ginsberg
I
What new element before us unborn in nature? Is there
a new thing under the Sun?
At last inquisitive Whitman a modern epic, detonative,
Scientific theme
First penned unmindful by Doctor Seaborg with poison-
ous hand, named for Death's planet through the
sea beyond Uranus
whose chthonic ore fathers this magma-teared Lord of
Hades, Sire of avenging Furies, billionaire Hell-
...Read more of this...
by
Derek Walcott
The last leaves fell like notes from a piano
and left their ovals echoing in the ear;
with gawky music stands, the winter forest
looks like an empty orchestra, its lines
ruled on these scattered manuscripts of snow.
The inlaid copper laurel of an oak
shines though the brown-bricked glass above your head
as bright as whisky, while the wintry breath
of lines from Mandelstam, which you...Read more of this...
by
Elizabeth Bishop
Moving from left to left, the light
is heavy on the Dome, and coarse.
One small lunette turns it aside
and blankly stares off to the side
like a big white old wall-eyed horse.
On the east steps the Air Force Band
in uniforms of Air Force blue
is playing hard and loud, but--*****--
the music doesn't quite come through.
It comes in snatches, dim then keen,
then mute,...Read more of this...
by
Lisel Mueller
The laughter of women sets fire
to the Halls of Injustice
and the false evidence burns
to a beautiful white lightness
It rattles the Chambers of Congress
and forces the windows wide open
so the fatuous speeches can fly out
The laughter of women wipes the mist
from the spectacles of the old;
it infects them with a happy flu
and they laugh as if they were young again
Prisoners...Read more of this...
by
Oliver Wendell Holmes
YES, write, if you want to, there's nothing like trying;
Who knows what a treasure your casket may hold?
I'll show you that rhyming's as easy as lying,
If you'll listen to me while the art I unfold.
Here's a book full of words; one can choose as he fancies,
As a painter his tint, as a workman his tool;
Just think! all the poems...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
WHEN Guilford good our pilot stood
An’ did our hellim thraw, man,
Ae night, at tea, began a plea,
Within America, man:
Then up they gat the maskin-pat,
And in the sea did jaw, man;
An’ did nae less, in full congress,
Than quite refuse our law, man.
Then thro’ the lakes Montgomery takes,
I wat he was na slaw, man;
Down Lowrie’s Burn...Read more of this...
by
Ellis Parker Butler
1775
Said Congress to George Washington:
“To set this country free,
You’ll have to whip the Britishers
And chase them o’er the sea.”
“Oh, very well,” said Washington,
“I’ll do the best I can.
I’ll slam and bang those Britishers
And whip them to a man.”
1777
Said Congress to George Washington:
“The people all complain;
Why don’t you fight? You but retreat
And then retreat...Read more of this...
by
Oliver Wendell Holmes
HAS there any old fellow got mixed with the boys?
If there has, take him out, without making a noise.
Hang the Almanac's cheat and the Catalogue's spite!
Old Time is a liar! We're twenty to-night!
We're twenty! We're twenty! Who says we are more?
He's tipsy,-- young jackanapes!-- show him the door!
"Gray temples at twenty?"-- Yes ! white if we please;
Where the snow-flakes...Read more of this...
by
Vachel Lindsay
I. SPEAK NOW FOR PEACE
Lady of Light, and our best woman, and queen,
Stand now for peace, (though anger breaks your heart),
Though naught but smoke and flame and drowning is seen.
Lady of Light, speak, though you speak alone,
Though your voice may seem as a dove's in this howling flood,
It is heard to-night by every senate and throne.
Though the widening battle...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
TO get betimes in Boston town, I rose this morning early;
Here’s a good place at the corner—I must stand and see the show.
Clear the way there, Jonathan!
Way for the President’s marshal! Way for the government cannon!
Way for the Federal foot and dragoons—and the apparitions copiously tumbling.
I love to look on the stars and stripes—I hope...Read more of this...
by
Theodore Roethke
Nothing would sleep in that cellar, dank as a ditch,
Bulbs broke out of boxes hunting for chinks in the dark,
Shoots dangled and drooped,
Lolling obscenely from mildewed crates,
Hung down long yellow evil necks, like tropical snakes.
And what a congress of stinks!
Roots ripe as old bait,
Pulpy stems, rank, silo-rich,
Leaf-mold, manure, lime, piled against slippery planks.
Nothing would give up life:
Even the dirt...Read more of this...
by
Sidney Lanier
How tall among her sisters, and how fair, --
How grave beyond her youth, yet debonair
As dawn, 'mid wrinkled Matres of old lands
Our youngest Alma Mater modest stands!
In four brief cycles round the punctual sun
Has she, old Learning's latest daughter, won
This grace, this stature, and this fruitful fame.
Howbeit she was born
Unnoised as any stealing summer morn.
From far the sages saw,...Read more of this...
by
Carl Sandburg
NEW neighbors came to the corner house at Congress and Green streets.
The look of their clean white curtains was the same as the rim of a nun’s bonnet.
One way was an oyster pail factory, one way they made candy, one way paper boxes, strawboard cartons.
The warehouse trucks shook the dust of the ways loose and the wheels whirled dust—there...Read more of this...
by
Edgar Lee Masters
Edgar Lee Masters - Hamilton Greene
I was the only child of Frances Harris of Virginia
And Thomas Greene of Kentucky,
Of valiant and honorable blood both.
To them I owe all that I became,
Judge, member of Congress, leader in the State.
From my mother I inherited
Vivacity, fancy, language;
From my father will, judgment, logic.
All honor to them
For what service I was to the...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
NOW list to my morning’s romanza—I tell the signs of the Answerer;
To the cities and farms I sing, as they spread in the sunshine before me.
A young man comes to me bearing a message from his brother;
How shall the young man know the whether and when of his brother?
Tell him to send me the signs.
And...Read more of this...
by
Philip Freneau
Though skilled in Latin and in Greek,
And earning fifty cents a week,
Such knowledge, and the income, too,
Should teach you better what to do:
The meanest drudges, kept in pay,
Can pocket fifty cents a day.
Why stay in such a tasteless land,
Where all must on a level stand,
(Excepting people, at their ease,
Who choose the level where they please:)
See Irving gone to Britain's...Read more of this...
by
Rudyard Kipling
So here's your Empire. No more wine, then?
Good.
We'll clear the Aides and khitmatgars away.
(You'll know that fat old fellow with the knife --
He keeps the Name Book, talks in English too,
And almost thinks himself the Government.)
O Youth, Youth, Youth! Forgive me, you're so young.
Forty from sixty -- twenty years of work
And power to back the working. Ay def mi!
You...Read more of this...
by
Edgar Albert Guest
My father knows the proper way
The nation should be run;
He tells us children every day
Just what should now be done.
He knows the way to fix the trusts,
He has a simple plan;
But if the furnace needs repairs,
We have to hire a man.
My father, in a day or two
Could land big thieves in jail;
There's nothing that he cannot do,
He knows...Read more of this...
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