Famous Excited Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Excited poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous excited poems. These examples illustrate what a famous excited poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Anne Kingsmill Finch
Observe this Piece, which to our Sight does bring
The fittest Posture for the Swedish King;
(Encompass'd, as we think, with Armies round,
Tho' not express'd within this narrow Bound)
Who, whilst his warlike and extended Hand
Directs the foremost Ranks to Charge or Stand,
Reverts his Face, lest That, so Fair and Young,
Should call in doubt the...Read more of this...
by
Delmore Schwartz
I am a poet of the Hudson River and the heights above it,
the lights, the stars, and the bridges
I am also by self-appointment the laureate of the Atlantic
-of the peoples' hearts, crossing it
to new America.
I am burdened with the truck and chimera, hope,
acquired in the sweating sick-excited passage
in steerage, strange and estranged
Hence...Read more of this...
by
Edwin Arlington Robinson
“Do I hear them? Yes, I hear the children singing—and what of it?
Have you come with eyes afire to find me now and ask me that?
If I were not their father and if you were not their mother,
We might believe they made a noise…. What are you—driving at!”
“Well, be glad that you can hear them,...Read more of this...
by
William Butler Yeats
Once more the storm is howling, and half hid
Under this cradle-hood and coverlid
My child sleeps on. There is no obstacle
But Gregory's wood and one bare hill
Whereby the haystack- and roof-levelling wind.
Bred on the Atlantic, can be stayed;
And for an hour I have walked and prayed
Because of the great gloom that is in my mind.
I have walked and prayed for...Read more of this...
by
Yehuda Amichai
And we shall not get excited. Because a translator
May not get excited. Calmly, we shall pass on
Words from man to son, from one tongue
To others' lips, un-
Knowingly, like a father who passes on
The features of his dead father's face
To his son, and he himself is like neither of them. Merely a mediator.
We shall remember the things we held in...Read more of this...
by
Henry Lawson
They were hanging men in Buckland who would not cheer King George –
The parson from his pulpit and the blacksmith from his forge;
They were hanging men and brothers, and the stoutest heart was down,
When a quiet man from Buckland rode at dusk to raise Charlestown.
Not a young man in his glory filled with patriotic fire,...Read more of this...
by
Billy Collins
The murkiness of the local garage is not so dense
that you cannot make out the calendar of pinup
drawings on the wall above a bench of tools.
Your ears are ringing with the sound of
the mechanic hammering on your exhaust pipe,
and as you look closer you notice that this month's
is not the one pushing the lawn mower, wearing
a straw hat and...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
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Read by the poet at The Public Ceremonial of The Naional Institute
of Arts and Letters at Carnegie Hall, New York, January 18th, 1941.
Great Muse, that from this hall absent for long
Hast never been,
Great Muse of Song,
Colossal Muse of mighty Melody,
Vocal Calliope,
With thine august and contrapuntal brow
And thy vast throat builded for Harmony,
For the strict monumental pure design,
And...Read more of this...
by
Bob Kaufman
Jazz radio on a midnight kick,
Round about Midnight.
Sitting on the bed,
With a jazz type chick
Round about Midnight,
Piano laughter, in my ears,
Round about Midnight.
Stirring up laughter, dying tears,
Round about Midnight.
Soft blue voices, muted grins,
Excited voices, Father's sins,
Round about Midnight.
Come on baby, take off your clothes,
Round about Midnight....Read more of this...
by
William Butler Yeats
Others because you did not keep
That deep-sworn vow have been friends of mine;
Yet always when I look death in the face,
When I clamber to the heights of sleep,
Or when I grow excited with wine,
Suddenly I meet your face....Read more of this...
by
Marriott Edgar
You've `eard `ow young Albert Ramsbottom
At the zoo up at Blackpool one year
With a stick with an `orse's `ead `andle
Gave a lion a poke in the ear?
The name of the lion was Wallace,
The poke in the ear made `im wild
And before you could say "Bob's yer uncle"
E'd upped and `e'd swallowed the child....Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
The poppies gleamed like bloody pools through cotton-woolly mist;
The Captain kept a-lookin' at the watch upon his wrist;
And there we smoked and squatted, as we watched the shrapnel flame;
'Twas wonnerful, I'm tellin' you, how fast them bullets came.
'Twas weary work the waiting, though; I tried to sleep a wink,
For waitin' means a-thinkin', and it doesn't do to think.
So I...Read more of this...
by
Kenneth Koch
(sign at a railroad crossing in Kenya)
In a poem, one line may hide another line,
As at a crossing, one train may hide another train.
That is, if you are waiting to cross
The tracks, wait to do it for one moment at
Least after the first train is gone. And so when you read
Wait until you have read the next line—
Then it...Read more of this...
by
Rg Gregory
prudence my love
each time you invite me to tea
i wonder do i have the appetite
for what i
hope you are requiring of me
prudence my love
are you really trying to say
over the sickly cream cakes
i can’t eat
that you desire me to stay
prudence my love
what can i read in the signs
your eyes and hands throw out
as we talk
i’m lost in your guide-lines
prudence...Read more of this...
by
John Berryman
The glories of the world struck me, made me aria, once.
-”What happen then, Mr Bones?
if be you cares to say.
-”Henry. Henry became interested in women's bodies,
his loins were & were the scene of stupendous achievement.
Stupor. Knees, dear. Pray.
All the knobs & softnesses of, my God,
the ducking & trouble it swarm on Henry,
at one time.
-”What happen then, Mr Bones?
you seems...Read more of this...
by
Denise Duhamel
They decide to exchange heads.
Barbie squeezes the small opening under her chin
over Ken's bulging neck socket. His wide jaw line jostles
atop his girlfriend's body, loosely,
like one of those novelty dogs
destined to gaze from the back windows of cars.
The two dolls chase each other around the orange Country Camper
unsure what they'll do when they're within touching distance.
Ken...Read more of this...
by
Allen Ginsberg
I walked on the banks of the tincan banana dock and sat down under the huge shade of a Southern Pacific locomotive to look for the sunset over the box house hills and cry.
Jack Kerouac sat beside me on a busted rusty iron pole, companion, we thought the same thoughts of the soul, bleak and blue and sad-eyed, surrounded by...Read more of this...
by
William Butler Yeats
I
What shall I do with this absurdity -
O heart, O troubled heart - this caricature,
Decrepit age that has been tied to me
As to a dog's tail?
Never had I more
Excited, passionate, fantastical
Imagination, nor an ear and eye
That more expected the impossible -
No, not in boyhood when with rod and fly,
Or the humbler worm, I climbed Ben Bulben's back
And had...Read more of this...
by
William Henry Davies
While joy gave clouds the light of stars,
That beamed wher'er they looked;
And calves and lambs had tottering knees,
Excited, while they sucked;
While every bird enjoyed his song,
Without one thought of harm or wrong--
I turned my head and saw the wind,
Not far from where I stood,
Dragging the corn by her golden hair,
Into...Read more of this...
by
Du Fu
Life not mutual see Act like Shen and Shang Today evening again which evening Share this candle light Young and vigorous able how long Temple hair each already grey Enquire old partly be ghosts Exclaim excited in intestines Didn't know twenty years Again at your hall Past part you not married Boys girls suddenly form a line...Read more of this...
by
Seamus Heaney
Her scarf a la Bardot,
In suede 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...Read more of this...
by
Anne Killigrew
NO sooner I pronounced Celindas name,
But Troops of wing'd Pow'rs did chant the fame:
Not those the Poets Bows and Arrows lend,
But such as on the Altar do attend.
Celinda nam'd, Flow'rs spring up from the Ground,
Excited meerly with the Charming Sound.
Celinda, the Courts Glory, and its fear,
The gaz'd at Wonder, where she does appear.
Celinda great...Read more of this...
by
Marriott Edgar
You've 'eard 'ow young Albert Ramsbottom,
In the Zoo up at Blackpool one year,
With a stick and 'orse's 'ead 'andle,
Gave a lion a poke in the ear.
The name of the lion was Wallace,
The poke in the ear made 'im wild;
And before you could say 'Bob's your Uncle,'
'E'd up and 'e'd swallered the child.
'E were sorry the moment 'e'd done it,
With...Read more of this...
by
Andrei Voznesensky
I hate you, rubber souls, you seem
to stretch to fit any regime.
They'll give a yawning smile, stretched wide,
and, like an octopus, they'll draw you tight.
A rubber man is an elusive rogue:
a fist gets sucked into the bog.
The rubber editor is scared of script,
the author is...Read more of this...
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