Famous Curtains Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Curtains poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous curtains poems. These examples illustrate what a famous curtains poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Thomas Hood
'Twas in the prime of summer-time
An evening calm and cool,
And four-and-twenty happy boys
Came bounding out of school:
There were some that ran and some that leapt,
Like troutlets in a pool.
Away they sped with gamesome minds,
And souls untouched by sin;
To a level mead they came, and there
They drave the wickets in:
Pleasantly shone...Read more of this...
by
Conrad Aiken
Wind blows. Snow falls. The great clock in its tower
Ticks with reverberant coil and tolls the hour:
At the deep sudden stroke the pigeons fly . . .
The fine snow flutes the cracks between the flagstones.
We close our coats, and hurry, and search the sky.
We are like music, each voice of it pursuing
A golden separate dream, remote, persistent,
Climbing to fire,...Read more of this...
by
Geoffrey Hill
When snow like sheep lay in the fold
And wind went begging at each door,
And the far hills were blue with cold,
And a cloud shroud lay on the moor,
She kept the siege. And every day
We watched her brooding over death
Like a strong bird above its prey.
The room filled with the kettle's breath.
Damp curtains glued against the pane
Sealed time away. Her...Read more of this...
by
Anne Sexton
When I was a child
there was an old woman in our neighborhood whom we called The Witch.
All day she peered from her second story
window
from behind the wrinkled curtains
and sometimes she would open the window
and yell: Get out of my life!
She had hair like kelp
and a voice like a boulder.
I think of her sometimes now
and wonder if I am becoming...Read more of this...
by
Walter Savage Landor
Whoever has no house now will never have one.
Whoever is alone will stay alone
Will sit, read, write long letters through the evening
And wander on the boulevards, up and down...
- from Autumn Day, Rainer Maria Rilke
Its stain is everywhere.
The sharpening air
of late afternoon
is now the colour of tea.
Once-glycerined green leaves
burned by a summer sun
are brittle and...Read more of this...
by
W S Merwin
Naturally it is night.
Under the overturned lute with its
One string I am going my way
Which has a strange sound.
This way the dust that way the dust.
I listen to both sides
But I keep right on.
I remember the leaves sitting in judgment
And then winter.
I remember the rain with its bundles of roads.
The rain taking all its roads.
Nowhere.
Young as I am old as...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Our lives are Swiss --
So still -- so Cool --
Till some odd afternoon
The Alps neglect their Curtains
And we look farther on!
Italy stands the other side!
While like a guard between --
The solemn Alps --
The siren Alps
Forever intervene!...Read more of this...
by
Rudyard Kipling
1903
After Boer War
Duly with knees that feign to quake--
Bent head and shaded brow,--
Yet once again, for my father's sake,
In Rimmon's House I bow.
The curtains part, the trumpet blares,
And the eunuchs howl aloud;
And the gilt, swag-bellied idol glares
Insolent over the crowd.
"This is Rimmon, Lord of the Earth--
"Fear Him and bow the knee!"
And I watch my...Read more of this...
by
William Blake
1. In terrors Los shrunk from his task:
His great hammer fell from his hand:
His fires beheld, and sickening,
Hid their strong limbs in smoke.
For with noises ruinous loud;
With hurtlings & clashings & groans
The Immortal endur'd his chains,
Tho' bound in a deadly sleep.
2. All the myriads of Eternity:
All the wisdom & joy of life:
Roll like a sea around him,...Read more of this...
by
Conrad Aiken
Well,—it was two days after my husband died—
Two days! And the earth still raw above him.
And I was sweeping the carpet in their hall.
In number four—the room with the red wall-paper—
Some chorus girls and men were singing that song
'They'll soon be lighting candles
Round a box with silver handles'—and hearing them sing it
I started to cry. Just then he came...Read more of this...
by
Lewis Carroll
"MY First - but don't suppose," he said,
"I'm setting you a riddle -
Is - if your Victim be in bed,
Don't touch the curtains at his head,
But take them in the middle,
"And wave them slowly in and out,
While drawing them asunder;
And in a minute's time, no doubt,
He'll raise his head and look about
With eyes of wrath and wonder.
"And...Read more of this...
by
Dylan Thomas
A process in the weather of the heart
Turns damp to dry; the golden shot
Storms in the freezing tomb.
A weather in the quarter of the veins
Turns night to day; blood in their suns
Lights up the living worm.
A process in the eye forwarns
The bones of blindness; and the womb
Drives in a death as life leaks out.
A darkness in the weather of...Read more of this...
by
Allama Muhammad Iqbal
One day a Spider was telling a Fly
'Everyday on this route you are passing by'
But not for once did my fortune trigger
That, towards my home you never got nearer
It matters not if from strangers you abstain
But away from friends you shouldn't remain
My home if you come
That shall be my honor!
That ladder in the front
Will reach you to your friend
When heard...Read more of this...
by
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
How strange it seems! These Hebrews in their graves,
Close by the street of this fair seaport town,
Silent beside the never-silent waves,
At rest in all this moving up and down!
The trees are white with dust, that o'er their sleep
Wave their broad curtains in the southwind's breath,
While underneath these leafy tents they keep
The long, mysterious Exodus of Death.
And these sepulchral stones,...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Morns like these -- we parted --
Noons like these -- she rose --
Fluttering first -- then firmer
To her fair repose.
Never did she lisp it --
It was not for me --
She -- was mute from transport --
I -- from agony --
Till -- the evening nearing
One the curtains drew --
Quick! A Sharper rustling!
And this linnet flew!...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
Her little head just topped the window-sill;
She even mounted on a stool, maybe;
She pressed against the pane, as children will,
And watched us playing, oh so wistfully!
And then I missed her for a month or more,
And idly thought: "She's gone away, no doubt,"
Until a hearse drew up beside the door . . .
I saw a tiny coffin carried out.
And after...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
Rg Gregory
(a) radical
ban all fires
and places where people congregate
to create comfort
put an end to sleep
good cooking
and the delectation of wine
tear lovers apart
piss on the sun and moon
degut all heavenly harmony
strike out across the bitter ice
and the poisonous marshes
make (if you dare) a better world
(b) expect poison from standing water
(iii)
lake erie
why not as a joke one night
pick up your...Read more of this...
by
John Betjeman
I walked into the night-club in the morning;
There was kummel on the handle of the door.
The ashtrays were unemptied.
The cleaning unattempted,
And a squashed tomato sandwich on the floor.
I pulled aside the thick magenta curtains
-So Regency, so Regency, my dear –
And a host of little spiders
Ran a race across the ciders
To a box of baby ‘pollies by the...Read more of this...
by
Archibald MacLeish
This poem is for my wife.
I have made it plainly and honestly:
The mark is on it
Like the burl on the knife.
I have not made it for praise.
She has no more need for praise
Than summer has
Or the bright days.
In all that becomes a woman
Her words and her ways are beautiful:
Love's lovely duty,
the well-swept room.
Wherever she is there is sun
And time...Read more of this...
by
Peter Orlovsky
Morning again, nothing has to be done,
maybe buy a piano or make fudge.
At least clean the room up for sure like my farther I've done flick
the ashes & butts over the bed side on the floor.
But frist of all wipe my glasses and drink the water
to clean the smelly mouth.
A nock on the...Read more of this...
by
Philip Larkin
'This was Mr Bleaney's room. He stayed
The whole time he was at the Bodies, till
They moved him.' Flowered curtains, thin and frayed,
Fall to within five inches of the sill,
Whose window shows a strip of building land,
Tussocky, littered. 'Mr Bleaney took
My bit of garden properly in hand.'
Bed, upright chair, sixty-watt bulb, no hook
Behind the door, no room for books or...Read more of this...
by
Sir Walter Raleigh
What is our life? A play of passion,
Our mirth the music of division,
Our mother's wombs the tiring-houses be,
Where we are dressed for this short comedy.
Heaven the judicious sharp spectator is,
That sits and marks still who doth act amiss.
Our graves that hide us from the setting sun
Are like drawn curtains when the play...Read more of this...
by
William Blake
Thou fair hair'd angel of the evening,
Now, while the sun rests on the mountains light,
Thy bright torch of love; Thy radiant crown
Put on, and smile upon our evening bed!
Smile on our loves; and when thou drawest the
Blue curtains, scatter thy silver dew
On every flower that shuts its sweet eyes
In timely sleep. Let thy west wind sleep on
The lake;...Read more of this...
by
Oscar Wilde
Christ, dost Thou live indeed? or are Thy bones
Still straitened in their rock-hewn sepulchre?
And was Thy Rising only dreamed by her
Whose love of Thee for all her sin atones?
For here the air is horrid with men's groans,
The priests who call upon Thy name are slain,
Dost Thou not hear the bitter wail of pain
From those whose children lie upon the...Read more of this...
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