Get Your Premium Membership

Famous Embankment Poems by Famous Poets

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

See also:

by Reeser, Jennifer
...wheat. My eyes are burning.
An eighteen-wheeler whip has somehow managed
to drive his truck straight up a grass embankment
which rises to an overpass ahead.
It lingers there, a sacrament of chrome,
as I make peace at length with pink crape myrtles,
white baby's breath in bloom, whose counterparts
have two months past surrendered back at home.
How long were they bent down, exhausted, jealous
for what could not be theirs, before they fell?
And did the lilies of ...Read more of this...



by Milligan, Spike
...e nearest station where I can catch a train?'.
He caught the bus to Finchley and then to Mincing lane,
And over the Embankment, where he got lost, again.

The police they put him in a cell, but it was far too small,
So they tied him to a lampost and he slept against the wall.
But as the policemen lay sleeping by the twinkling light of dawn,
The lampost and the wall were there, but the elephant was gone!

So if you see an elephant, in a Jumbo Jet,
You can be sure t...Read more of this...

by Doty, Mark
...t,
 arc of trestle, dull-witted
 industrial tanks

and scaffoldings, ancient now,
 visited by no one)
 on the concrete

embankment just
 above the river,
 a sudden density

and concentration
 of trash, so much
 I couldn't pick out

any one thing
 from our rising track
 as it arced onto the bridge

over the fantastic
 accumulation of jetsam
 and contraband

strewn under
 the uncompromising
 vault of heaven.

An unbelievable mess,
 so heaped and scattered
 it seemed the cor...Read more of this...

by McGonagall, William Topaz
...e that survived the mighty deluge,
That fled to the mountains, and tops of trees, for refuge. 

The river burst its embankments suddenly at dead of night,
And the rushing torrent swept all before it left and right;
All over the province of Honan, which for its fertility,
Is commonly called by historians, the garden of China. 

The river was at its fullest when the embankment gave way,
And when the people heard it, oh! horror and dismay;
'Twas then fathers and mothers ...Read more of this...

by Bonnefoy, Yves
...wn there,
Dawn rent from time to time by forks of lightning.
I watched the advent of the world
In the bushes of the embankment; and all at once
That other fire below a field
Of stones and vines. The wind, the rain
Blew its smoke back against the ground,
But a red flame flared up,
Taking by the handful the base of the sky.
How long were you burning, wine grower’s fire,
Who wanted you there, and for whom on this earth?

And then it was day; and the sun
Cast its thou...Read more of this...



by McGonagall, William Topaz
...
By the bursting of a dam in Pennsylvania State,
And were burned, and drowned by the flood-- oh! pity their fate! 

The embankment of the dam was considered rather weak,
And by the swelled body of water the embankment did break,
And burst o'er the valley like a leaping river,
Which caused the spectators with fear to shiver. 

And on rushed the mighty flood, like a roaring big wave,
Whilst the drowning people tried hard their lives to save;
But eight thousand were drowned,...Read more of this...

by Heaney, Seamus
...flats for the walk, 
She came with me one evening
For air and friendly talk.
We crossed the quiet river, 
Took the embankment walk.

Traffic holding its breath, 
Sky a tense diaphragm: 
Dusk hung like a backcloth
That shook where a swan swam, 
Tremulous as a hawk
Hanging deadly, calm.

A vacuum of need
Collapsed each hunting heart
But tremulously we held
As hawk and prey apart, 
Preserved classic decorum, 
Deployed our talk with art.

Our Juvenilia
Had taught...Read more of this...

Dont forget to view our wonderful member Embankment poems.


Book: Reflection on the Important Things