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Famous Droves Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Horace,
...s,
     And troops of sun-burned husbandmen
          With reaping-hooks and staves,

               XV

     And droves of mules and asses
          Laden with skins of wine,
     And endless flocks of goats and sheep,
          And endless herds of kine,
     And endless trains of wagons
          That creaked beneath the weight
     Of corn-sacks and of household goods,
          Choked every roaring gate.

               XVI

     Now, from the rock Tarpe...Read more of this...



by Burns, Robert
...al barons,
 Wha’s property’s paper—not land.


And there, frae the Niddisdale borders,
 The Maxwells will gather in droves,
Teugh Jockie, staunch Geordie, an’ Wellwood,
 That griens for the fishes and loaves;
And there will be Heron, the Major,
 Wha’ll ne’er be forgot in the Greys;
Our flatt’ry we’ll keep for some other,
 HIM, only it’s justice to praise.


And there will be maiden Kilkerran,
 And also Barskimming’s gude Knight,
And there will be roarin Birtwhistle,
 ...Read more of this...

by Burns, Robert
...aed hame at crowdie-time,
 An’ soon I made me ready;
For roads were clad, frae side to side,
 Wi’ mony a weary body
 In droves that day.


Here farmers gash, in ridin graith,
 Gaed hoddin by their cotters;
There swankies young, in braw braid-claith,
 Are springing owre the gutters.
The lasses, skelpin barefit, thrang,
 In silks an’ scarlets glitter;
Wi’ sweet-milk cheese, in mony a whang,
 An’ farls, bak’d wi’ butter,
 Fu’ crump that day.


When by the plate we se...Read more of this...

by Burns, Robert
...auty charms,
When wretches range, in famish’d swarms,
 The scented groves;
Or, hounded forth, dishonour arms
 In hungry droves!


Their gun’s a burden on their shouther;
They downa bide the stink o’ powther;
Their bauldest thought’s a hank’ring swither
 To stan’ or rin,
Till skelp—a shot—they’re aff, a’throw’ther,
 To save their skin.


But bring a Scotchman frae his hill,
Clap in his cheek a Highland gill,
Say, such is royal George’s will,
 An’ there’s the foe!
He has na...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...South, and Louisianian cane; 
Open, unseeded fallows, rich fields of clover and timothy, 
Kine and horses feeding, and droves of sheep and swine, 
And many a stately river flowing, and many a jocund brook,
And healthy uplands with their herby-perfumed breezes, 
And the good green grass—that delicate miracle, the ever-recurring grass. 

12
Toil on, Heroes! harvest the products! 
Not alone on those warlike fields, the Mother of All, 
With dilated form and lambent eyes, wat...Read more of this...



by Smart, Christopher
...nd chapitre, and niche,
The various histories enrich 
 Of God's record'd works. 

 XXXVI 
Sigma presents the social droves, 
With him that solitary roves, 
 And man of all the chief; 
Fair on whose face, and stately frame, 
Did God impress His hallow'd name, 
 For ocular belief. 

 XXXVII 
OMEGA! GREATEST and the BEST, 
Stands sacred to the day of rest, 
 For gratitude and thought; 
Which bless'd the world upon his pole, 
And gave the universe his goal, 
 And clos'd t...Read more of this...

by Ammons, A R
...er than 
spring's flowers, have no pollen, 
and also sometimes fly, as the wind 
schools them out or down in shoals 
or droves: though I 
have not been here long, I can 
look up at the sky at night and tell 
how things are likely to go for 
the next hundred million years: 
the universe will probably not find 
a way to vanish nor I 
in all that time reappear....Read more of this...

by Laurence Dunbar, Paul
...thee hear the voice and rise elate,
Leave home and kindred and thy spicy loaves,
To lead th' unlettered and despised droves
To manhood's home and thunder at the gate?
Far better the slow blaze of Learning's light,
The cool and quiet of her dearer fane,
Than this hot terror of a hopeless fight,
This cold endurance of the final pain,—
Since thou and those who with thee died for right
Have died, the Present teaches, but in vain!
...Read more of this...

by Emerson, Ralph Waldo
...Trees in groves,
Kine in droves,
In ocean sport the scaly herds,
Wedge-like cleave the air the birds,
To northern lakes fly wind-borne ducks,
Browse the mountain sheep in flocks,
Men consort in camp and town,
But the poet dwells alone.

God who gave to him the lyre,
Of all mortals the desire,
For all breathing men's behoof,
Straitly charged him, "Sit aloof;"
Annexed a warning, p...Read more of this...

by Service, Robert William
...to play.

I love to toy with pretty words
And syllable them into rhyme;
To make them sing like sunny birds
In happy droves with silver chime,
In dulcet groves in summer time.

I pray, with hair more white than grey,
And second childhood coming on,
That yet with wonderment I may
See life as in its lucent dawn,
And be by beauty so beguiled
 I'll sing as sings a child....Read more of this...

by Petrarch, Francesco
...iname>Macgregor.  Count the ocean's finny droves;Count the twinkling host of stars.Round the night's pale orb that moves;Count the groves' wing'd choristers;[Pg 209]Count each verdant blade that grows;Counted the...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...and summer! you are in the dreams, and in me!
Autumn and winter are in the dreams—the farmer goes with his thrift, 
The droves and crops increase, and the barns are well-fill’d. 

16
Elements merge in the night—ships make tacks in the dreams, 
The sailor sails—the exile returns home, 
The fugitive returns unharm’d—the immigrant is back beyond months and years,
The poor Irishman lives in the simple house of his childhood, with the well-known
 neighbors and
 faces, 
They wa...Read more of this...

by Paterson, Andrew Barton
...wn a sheep to lose; 
Old Billy Gladstone managed it, 
And you can bet your shoes 
He'd scores of supers under him, 
And droves of jackaroos. 

Old Billy had an eagle eye, 
And kept his wits about -- 
If any chaps got trespassing 
He quickly cleared 'em out; 
And coves that used to "work a cross", 
They hated him, no doubt. 

But still he managed it in style, 
Until the times got dry, 
And Billy gave the supers word 
To see and mind their eye -- 
"If any paddocks gets ...Read more of this...

by Seeger, Alan
...ere behind sunset hills a stately city lies.

Here, among trees whose overhanging shade
Strews petals on the little droves below,
Pattering townward in the morning weighed
With greens from many an upland garden-row,
Runs an old wall; long centuries have frayed
Its scalloped edge, and passers to and fro
Heard never from beyond its crumbling height
Sweet laughter ring at noon or plaintive song at night.

But here where little lizards bask and blink
The tendrils of the t...Read more of this...

by Dryden, John
...s formal, grave, and slack; 
His nimble wit outran the heavy pack. 
Yet still he found hs fortune at a stay, 
Whole droves of blockheads choking up his way; 
They took, but not rewarded, his advice; 
Villain and wit exact a double price. 
Power was his aim; but thrown from that pretence, 
The wretch turned loyal in his own defence, 
And malice reconciled him to his Prince. 
Him in the anguish of his soul he served, 
Rewarded faster still than he deserved. 
Beh...Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...hom I dwell!


"O God-like isolation which art mine,
I can but count thee perfect gain,
What time I watch the darkening droves of swine
That range on yonder plain.


"In filthy sloughs they roll a prurient skin,
They graze and wallow, breed and sleep;
And oft some brainless devil enters in,
And drives them to the deep."


Then of the moral instinct would she prate
And of the rising from the dead,
As hers by right of full accomplish'd Fate;
And at the last she said:


...Read more of this...

by Kipling, Rudyard
...re,
We snuff against their thresholds,
 We nuzzle at their door;
By day with stamping squadrons,
 By night in whinnying droves,
Creep up the wise White Horses,
 To call them from their loves.

And come they for your calling?
 No wit of man may save.
They hear the loosed White Horses
 Above their fathers' grave;
And, kin of those we crippled,
 And, sons of those we slew,
Spur down the wild white riders
 To school the herds anew.

What service have ye paid them,
 Oh...Read more of this...

by Carman, Bliss
...lifting weed;
With the long sea-draft behind them, through luring coral groves
The shiny water-people go by in painted droves.

Under her old pink gateways, where Time a moment turns,
Where hang the orange lanterns and the red hibiscus burns,
Live the harmless merry lizards, quicksilver in the sun,
Or still as any image with their shadow on a stone.

Through the lemon-trees at leisure a tiny olive bird
Moves all day long and utters his wise assuring word;
While up in...Read more of this...

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