Famous Crater Poems by Famous Poets

These are examples of famous Crater poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous crater poems. These examples illustrate what a famous crater poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).

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The Haggis Of Private McPhee

by Robert William Service
 "Hae ye heard whit ma auld mither's postit tae me?
It fair maks me hamesick," says Private McPhee.
"And whit did she send ye?" says Private McPhun,
As he cockit his rifle and bleezed at a Hun.
"A haggis! A Haggis!" says Private McPhee;
"The brawest big haggis I ever did see.
And think! it's the morn when fond memory turns
Tae haggis and whuskey--the Birthday...Read more of this...

A Whispered Tale

by Siegfried Sassoon
 I’d heard fool-heroes brag of where they’d been, 
With stories of the glories that they’d seen. 
But you, good simple soldier, seasoned well 
In woods and posts and crater-lines of hell, 
Who dodge remembered ‘crumps’ with wry grimace,
Endured experience in your *****, kind face, 
Fatigues and vigils haunting nerve-strained eyes, 
And both your brothers killed to make you wise;...Read more of this...

To The Cannon "victor Hugo."

by Victor Hugo
 {Bought with the proceeds of Readings of "Les Châtiments" during 
 the Siege of Paris.} 
 
 {1872.} 


 Thou deadly crater, moulded by my muse, 
 Cast thou thy bronze into my bowed and wounded heart, 
 And let my soul its vengeance to thy bronze impart! 


 




...Read more of this...

Two Songs

by Adrienne Rich
 1.
Sex, as they harshly call it,
I fell into this morning
at ten o'clock, a drizzling hour
of traffic and wet newspapers.
I thought of him who yesterday
clearly didn't
turn me to a hot field
ready for plowing, 
and longing for that young man
pierced me to the roots
bathing every vein, etc.
All day he appears to me
touchingly desirable,
a prize one could wreck one's peace for.
I'd call...Read more of this...

The Booby-Trap

by Robert William Service
 I'm crawlin' out in the mangolds to bury wot's left o' Joe --
Joe, my pal, and a good un (God! 'ow it rains and rains).
I'm sick o' seein' him lyin' like a 'eap o' offal, and so
I'm crawlin' out in the beet-field to bury 'is last remains.

'E might 'a bin makin' munitions -- 'e 'adn't no need to go;
An'...Read more of this...

A Childs Nightmare

by Robert Graves
 Through long nursery nights he stood
By my bed unwearying,
Loomed gigantic, formless, *****,
Purring in my haunted ear
That same hideous nightmare thing,
Talking, as he lapped my blood,
In a voice cruel and flat,
Saying for ever, "Cat! ... Cat! ... Cat!..."

That one word was all he said,
That one word through all my sleep,
In monotonous mock despair.
Nonsense may be light as air,
But there's Nonsense...Read more of this...

The Eruption Of Vesuvius

by Victor Hugo
 ("Quand longtemps a grondé la bouche du Vésuve.") 
 
 {I. vii.} 


 When huge Vesuvius in its torment long, 
 Threatening has growled its cavernous jaws among, 
 When its hot lava, like the bubbling wine, 
 Foaming doth all its monstrous edge incarnadine, 
 Then is alarm in Naples. 
 
 With dismay, 
 Wanton and wild...Read more of this...

The Vantage Point

by Robert Frost
 If tired of trees I seek again mankind,
Well I know where to hie me--in the dawn,
To a slope where the cattle keep the lawn.
There amid lolling juniper reclined,
Myself unseen, I see in white defined
Far off the homes of men, and farther still,
The graves of men on an opposing hill,
Living or dead, whichever are to mind.

And if by noon I...Read more of this...

Nocturne

by Dorothy Parker
 Always I knew that it could not last
(Gathering clouds, and the snowflakes flying),
Now it is part of the golden past
(Darkening skies, and the night-wind sighing);
It is but cowardice to pretend.
Cover with ashes our love's cold crater-
Always I've known that it had to end
Sooner or later.

Always I knew it would come like this
(Pattering rain, and the grasses springing),
Sweeter to you...Read more of this...

Beautiful City

by Alfred Lord Tennyson
 Beautiful city

Beautiful city, the centre and crater of European confusion,
O you with your passionate shriek for the rights of an equal
humanity,
How often your Re-volution has proven but E-volution
Roll’d again back on itself in the tides of a civic insanity!...Read more of this...

The Pasha And The Dervish

by Victor Hugo
 ("Un jour Ali passait.") 
 
 {XIII, Nov. 8, 1828.} 


 Ali came riding by—the highest head 
 Bent to the dust, o'ercharged with dread, 
 Whilst "God be praised!" all cried; 
 But through the throng one dervish pressed, 
 Aged and bent, who dared arrest 
 The pasha in his pride. 
 
 "Ali Tepelini, light of...Read more of this...

Break of Day

by Siegfried Sassoon
 There seemed a smell of autumn in the air 
At the bleak end of night; he shivered there 
In a dank, musty dug-out where he lay, 
Legs wrapped in sand-bags,—lumps of chalk and clay 
Spattering his face. Dry-mouthed, he thought, ‘To-day
We start the damned attack; and, Lord knows why, 
Zero’s at nine; how bloody if I’m done in 
Under...Read more of this...

Crater Face

by Denise Duhamel
 is what we called her. The story was
that her father had thrown Drano at her
which was probably true, given the way she slouched
through fifth grade, afraid of the world, recess
especially. She had acne scars
before she had acne—poxs and dips
and bright red patches.
 I don't remember
any report in the papers. I don't remember
my father telling me her father had gone...Read more of this...

Kiss

by Ruth Padel
 He's gone. She can't believe it, can't go on. She's going to give up painting. So she paints Her final canvas, total-turn-off
Black. One long
Obsidian goodbye. A charcoal-burner's Smirnoff, The mirror of Loch Ness Reflecting the monster back to its own eye.
But something's wrong. Those mad Black-body particles don't sing Her story of despair, the steel and
Garnet spindle
Of the storm.
This...Read more of this...

There was an Old Person of Gretna

by Edward Lear
There was an Old Person of Gretna,Who rushed down the crater of Etna;When they said, "Is it hot?" he replied, "No, it's not!"That mendacious Old Person of Gretna. ...Read more of this...

The Quest

by Aleister Crowley
 High, hollowed in green
above the rocks of reason
lies the crater lake
whose ice the dreamer breaks
to find a summer season.

'He will plunge like a plummet down
far into hungry tides'
they cry, but as the sea
climbs to a lunar magnet
so the dreamer pursues
the lake where love resides....Read more of this...

Dictated Before The Rhone Glacier

by Victor Hugo
 ("Souvent quand mon esprit riche.") 
 
 {VII., May 18, 1828.} 


 When my mind, on the ocean of poesy hurled, 
 Floats on in repose round this wonderful world, 
 Oft the sacred fire from heaven— 
 Mysterious sun, that gives light to the soul— 
 Strikes mine with its ray, and above the pole 
 Its upward...Read more of this...

The Whistle Of Sandy McGraw

by Robert William Service
 You may talk o' your lutes and your dulcimers fine,
 Your harps and your tabors and cymbals and a',
But here in the trenches jist gie me for mine
 The wee penny whistle o' Sandy McGraw.
Oh, it's: "Sandy, ma lad, will you lilt us a tune?"
 And Sandy is willin' and trillin' like mad;
Sae silvery sweet that we a' throng...Read more of this...

The Cellist

by Galway Kinnell
 At intermission I find her backstage
still practicing the piece coming up next.
She calls it the "solo in high dreary."
Her bow niggles at the string like a hand
stroking skin it never wanted to touch.
Probably under her scorn she is sick
that she can't do better by it. As I am,
at the dreary in me, such as the disparity
between all the tenderness...Read more of this...

Volcanoes be in Sicily

by Emily Dickinson
 Volcanoes be in Sicily
And South America
I judge from my Geography --
Volcanos nearer here
A Lava step at any time
Am I inclined to climb --
A Crater I may contemplate
Vesuvius at Home....Read more of this...

Champagne 1914-15

by Alan Seeger
 In the glad revels, in the happy fetes, 
When cheeks are flushed, and glasses gilt and pearled 
With the sweet wine of France that concentrates 
The sunshine and the beauty of the world, 

Drink sometimes, you whose footsteps yet may tread 
The undisturbed, delightful paths of Earth, 
To those whose blood, in pious duty shed, 
Hallows the soil where...Read more of this...

Two Sonnets

by Edwin Arlington Robinson
 I

Just as I wonder at the twofold screen 
Of twisted innocence that you would plait 
For eyes that uncourageously await 
The coming of a kingdom that has been, 
So do I wonder what God’s love can mean
To you that all so strangely estimate 
The purpose and the consequent estate 
Of one short shuddering step to the Unseen. 

No, I...Read more of this...

Hymn

by Sidney Godolphin
 I know if I find you I will have to leave the earth
and go on out
 over the sea marshes and the brant in bays
and over the hills of tall hickory
and over the crater lakes and canyons
and on up through the spheres of diminishing air
past the blackset noctilucent clouds
 where one wants to stop and look
way past all the...Read more of this...

A Farewell to Agassiz

by Oliver Wendell Holmes
 How the mountains talked together,
Looking down upon the weather,
When they heard our friend had planned his
Little trip among the Andes
How they'll bare their snowy scalps
To the climber of the Alps
When the cry goes through their passes,
"Here comes the great Agassiz!"
"Yes, I'm tall," says Chimborazo,
"But I wait for him to say so,--
That's the only thing that lacks,-- he
Must see me,...Read more of this...

On A Wedding Anniversary

by Dylan Thomas
 The sky is torn across
This ragged anniversary of two
Who moved for three years in tune
Down the long walks of their vows.

Now their love lies a loss
And Love and his patients roar on a chain;
From every tune or crater
Carrying cloud, Death strikes their house.

Too late in the wrong rain
They come together whom their love parted:
The windows pour into their heart
And...Read more of this...

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