Famous Deaf Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Deaf poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous deaf poems. These examples illustrate what a famous deaf poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Emily Dickinson
The Birds reported from the South --
A News express to Me --
A spicy Charge, My little Posts --
But I am deaf -- Today --
The Flowers -- appealed -- a timid Throng --
I reinforced the Door --
Go blossom for the Bees -- I said --
And trouble Me -- no More --
The Summer Grace, for Notice strove --
Remote -- Her best...Read more of this...
by
Sir Philip Sidney
Come Sleep! O Sleep, the certain knot of peace,
The baiting-place of wit, the balm of woe,
The poor man's wealth, the prisoner's release,
Th' indifferent judge between the high and low.
With shield of proof shield me from out the prease
Of those fierce darts despair at me doth throw:
O make in me those civil wars to cease;
I will good tribute pay, if...Read more of this...
by
Allen Ginsberg
When I die
I don't care what happens to my body
throw ashes in the air, scatter 'em in East River
bury an urn in Elizabeth New Jersey, B'nai Israel Cemetery
But l want a big funeral
St. Patrick's Cathedral, St. Mark's Church, the largest synagogue in
Manhattan
First, there's family, brother, nephews, spry aged Edith stepmother
96, Aunt Honey from old Newark,
Doctor...Read more of this...
by
Ann Taylor
Poor Martha is old, and her hair is turn'd grey,
And her hearing has left her for many a year;
Ten to one if she knows what it is that you say,
Though she puts her poor wither'd hand close to her ear.
I've seen naughty children run after her fast,
And cry, "Martha, run, there's a bullock so...Read more of this...
by
Thomas Hood
Along the Woodford road there comes a noise
Of wheels, and Mr. Rounding's neat post-chaise
Struggles along, drawn by a pair of bays,
With Reverend Mr. Crow and six small boys,
Who ever and anon declare their joys
With trumping horns and juvenile huzzas,
At going home to spend their Christmas days,
And changing learning's pains for pleasure's toys....Read more of this...
by
Carl Sandburg
Over the dead line we have called to you
To come across with a word to us,
Some beaten whisper of what happens
Where you are over the dead line
Deaf to our calls and voiceless.
The flickering shadows have not answered
Nor your lips sent a signal
Whether love talks and roses grow
And the sun breaks at morning
Splattering the sea with crimson....Read more of this...
by
Paul Eluard
Do we reach the sea with clocks
In our pockets, with the noise of the sea
In the sea, or are we the carriers
Of a purer and more silent water?
The water rubbing against our hands sharpens knives.
The warriors have found their weapons in the waves
And the sound of their blows is like
The rocks that...Read more of this...
by
Georgia Douglas Johnson
...Read more of this...
by
William Butler Yeats
Never give all the heart, for love
Will hardly seem worth thinking of
To passionate women if it seem
Certain, and they never dream
That it fades out from kiss to kiss;
For everything that's lovely is
But a brief, dreamy. Kind delight.
O never give the heart outright,
For they, for all smooth lips can say,
Have given their hearts up to the play.
And who could play...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
To tribulations of mankind
Dame Nature is indifferent;
To human sorrow she is blind,
And deaf to human discontent.
Mid fear and fratricidal fray,
Mid woe and tyranny of toil,
She goes her unregarding way
Of sky and sun and soil.
In leaf and blade, in bud and bloom
Exultantly her gladness glows,
And careless of Man's dreary doom
Around the palm she wreathes the rose;
Creating beauty everywhere,
With...Read more of this...
by
Thomas Hardy
By Corporal Tullidge. See "The Trumpet-Major"
In Memory of S. C. (Pensioner). Died 184-
WE trenched, we trumpeted and drummed,
And from our mortars tons of iron hummed
Ath'art the ditch, the month we bombed
The Town o' Valencie?n.
'Twas in the June o' Ninety-dree
(The Duke o' Yark our then Commander be?n)
The German Legion, Guards, and we
Laid siege to Valencie?n.
This was the first time in...Read more of this...
by
John Berryman
O journeyer, deaf in the mould, insane
with violent travel & death: consider me
in my cast, your first son.
Would you were I by now another one,
witted, legged? I see you before me plain
(I am skilled: I hear, I see)-”
your honour was troubled: when you wondered-”'No'.
I hear. I think I hear. Now full craze down
across our continent
all storms since you gave...Read more of this...
by
James Joyce
Have you heard of one Humpty Dumpty
How he fell with a roll and a rumble
And curled up like Lord Olofa Crumple
By the butt of the Magazine Wall,
(Chorus) Of the Magazine Wall,
Hump, helmet and all?
He was one time our King of the Castle
Now he's kicked about like a rotten old parsnip.
And from Green street he'll be sent by...Read more of this...
by
Carl Sandburg
I
I AM the undertow
Washing tides of power
Battering the pillars
Under your things of high law.
II
I am a sleepless
Slowfaring eater,
Maker of rust and rot
In your bastioned fastenings,
Caissons deep.
III
I am the Law
Older than you
And your builders proud.
I am deaf
In all days
Whether you
Say "Yes" or "No".
I am the crumbler:
To-morrow....Read more of this...
by
Victor Hugo
("Nous emmenions en esclavage.")
{VIII., March, 1828.}
We're bearing fivescore Christian dogs
To serve the cruel drivers:
Some are fair beauties gently born,
And some rough coral-divers.
We hardy skimmers of the sea
Are lucky in each sally,
And, eighty strong, we send along
The dreaded Pirate Galley.
...Read more of this...
by
Andrew Marvell
Soul
O Who shall, from this Dungeon, raise
A Soul inslav'd so many wayes?
With bolts of Bones, that fetter'd stands
In Feet ; and manacled in Hands.
Here blinded with an Eye ; and there
Deaf with the drumming of an Ear.
A Soul hung up, as 'twere, in Chains
Of Nerves, and Arteries, and Veins.
Tortur'd, besides each other part,1
In a vain Head, and double Heart.
Body
O...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
WHEN, in disgrace with Fortune and men's eyes,
I all alone beweep my outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And look upon myself, and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possest,
Desiring this man's art and that man's scope,
With what I...Read more of this...
by
John Betjeman
The kind old face, the egg-shaped head,
The tie, discreetly loud,
The loosely fitting shooting clothes,
A closely fitting shroud.
He liked old city dining rooms,
Potatoes in their skin,
But now his mouth is wide to let
The London clay come in.
He took me on long silent walks
In country lanes when young.
He knew the names of ev'ry bird
But not the song it sung.
And when he...Read more of this...
by
Phillis Wheatley
SAMUEL, Chap. xvii.
YE martial pow'rs, and all ye tuneful nine,
Inspire my song, and aid my high design.
The dreadful scenes and toils of war I write,
The ardent warriors, and the fields of fight:
You best remember, and you best can sing
The acts of heroes to the vocal string:
Resume the lays with which your sacred lyre,
Did then the poet and the sage...Read more of this...
by
Katherine Mansfield
That deaf old man
With his hand to his ear--
His hand to hi head stood out like a shell,
Horny and hollow. He said, "I can't hear,"
He muttered, "Don't shout,
I can hear very well!"
He mumbled, "I can't catch a word;
I can't follow."
Then Jack with a voice like a Protestant bell
Roared--"Particulars! Farmhouse! At 10 quid a year!"
"I dunno wot place you are...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Go to! Cast dust on those deaf skies, who spurn
Thy orisons and bootless prayers, and learn
To quaff the cup, and hover round the fair;
Of all who go, did ever one return?...Read more of this...
by
Alexander Pope
I know the thing that's most uncommon;
(Envy be silent and attend!)
I know a Reasonable Woman,
Handsome and witty, yet a Friend.
Not warp'd by Passion, aw'd by Rumour,
Not grave thro' Pride, or gay thro' Folly,
An equal Mixture of good Humour,
And sensible soft Melancholy.
`Has she no Faults then (Envy says) Sir?'
Yes she has one, I must aver:
When all the World comspires to...Read more of this...
by
Badger Clark
There's an old pard of mine that sits by his door
And watches the evenin' skies.
He's sat there a thousand of evenin's before
And I reckon he will till he dies.
El pobre! I reckon he will till he dies,
And hear through the dim, quiet...Read more of this...
by
Vachel Lindsay
The whole world on a raft! A King is here,
The record of his grandeur but a smear.
Is it his deacon-beard, or old bald pate
That makes the band upon his whims to wait?
Loot and mud-honey have his soul defiled.
Quack, pig, and priest, he drives camp-meetings wild
Until they shower their pennies like spring rain
That he may preach upon the Spanish main.
What...Read more of this...
by
Paul Eluard
I. Soon
Of all the springtimes of the world
This one is the ugliest
Of all of my ways of being
To be trusting is the best
Grass pushes up snow
Like the stone of a tomb
But I sleep within the storm
And awaken eyes bright
Slowness, brief time ends
Where all streets must pass
Through my innermost...Read more of this...
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