Famous Excuse Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Excuse poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous excuse poems. These examples illustrate what a famous excuse poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Maria Mazziotti Gillan
It was not until later
that I knew, recognized the moment
for what it was, my life before it,
a gray landscape, shapeless and misty;
my life after, flowering full and leafy
as the cherry trees that only today
have torn into bloom.
Imagine: my cousin at 19, tall,
slender. She worked in New York City.
For my thirteenth birthday she took me
to New York. We ate at...Read more of this...
by
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
THOU dost complain of woman for changing from one to another?
Censure her not: for she seeks one who will constant remain.
1789.*...Read more of this...
by
Ben Jonson
Let it not your wonder move,
Less your laughter, that I love.
Though I now write fifty years,
I have had, and have, my peers;
Poets, though divine, are men,
Some have lov'd as old again.
And it is not always face,
Clothes, or fortune, gives the grace;
Or the feature, or the youth.
But the language and the truth,
With the ardour and the passion,
Gives the lover weight...Read more of this...
by
Francesco Petrarch
SONNET XXXI. Io temo sì de' begli occhi l' assalto. HE EXCUSES HIMSELF FOR HAVING SO LONG DELAYED TO VISIT HER. So much I fear to encounter her bright eye.Alway in which my death and Love reside,That, as a child the rod, its glance I fly,Though long the time has been since...Read more of this...
by
Rudyard Kipling
("Saint Proxed's ever was the Church for peace")
If down here I chance to die,
Solemnly I beg you take
All that is left of "I"
To the Hills for old sake's sake,
Pack me very thoroughly
In the ice that used to slake
Pegs I drank when I was dry --
This observe for old sake's sake.
To the railway station hie,
There...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
When forty winters shall beseige thy brow,
And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field,
Thy youth's proud livery, so gazed on now,
Will be a tatter'd weed, of small worth held:
Then being ask'd where all thy beauty lies,
Where all the treasure of thy lusty days,
To say, within thine own deep-sunken eyes,
Were an all-eating shame and thriftless praise.
How much more praise deserved...Read more of this...
by
Oliver Wendell Holmes
HAS there any old fellow got mixed with the boys?
If there has, take him out, without making a noise.
Hang the Almanac's cheat and the Catalogue's spite!
Old Time is a liar! We're twenty to-night!
We're twenty! We're twenty! Who says we are more?
He's tipsy,-- young jackanapes!-- show him the door!
"Gray temples at twenty?"-- Yes ! white if we please;
Where the snow-flakes...Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
I 've been watchin' of 'em, parson,
An' I 'm sorry fur to say
'At my mind is not contented
With the loose an' keerless way
'At the young folks treat the music;
'T ain't the proper sort o' choir.
Then I don't believe in Christuns
A-singin' hymns for hire.
But I never would 'a' murmured
An' the matter might 'a' gone
Ef it was n't fur the antics
'At I've...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
O Sacred Muse, my lyre excuse! -
My verse is vagrant singing;
Rhyme I invoke for simple folk
Of penny-wise upbringing:
For Grannies grey to paste away
Within an album cover;
For maids in class to primly pass,
And lads to linger over.
I take the clay of every day
And mould it in my fashion;
I seek to trace the commonplace
With humor and compassion.
Of earth am I, and...Read more of this...
by
William Topaz McGonagall
Fellow Citizens of Dundee.
I now must bid farewell to ye.
For I am going to London far away.
But when I will return again I cannot say.
Farewell! Farewell! to the bonnie banks o' the Silvery Tay.
Also the beautiful Hill o' Balgay.
And the ill fated Bridge o' the Silvery Tay.
Which I will remember when I am far away.
Farewell! to my...Read more of this...
by
Ben Jonson
Let it not your wonder move,
Less your laughter, that I love.
Though I now write fifty years,
I have had, and have, my peers.
Poets, though divine, are men;
Some have loved as old again.
And it is not always face,
Clothes, or fortune gives the grace,
Or the feature, or the youth;
But the language and the truth,...Read more of this...
by
Thomas Carew
'Tis true, dear Ben, thy just chastising hand
Hath fix'd upon the sotted age a brand
To their swoll'n pride and empty scribbling due;
It can nor judge, nor write, and yet 'tis true
Thy comic muse, from the exalted line
Touch'd by thy Alchemist, doth since decline
From that her zenith, and foretells a red
And blushing evening,...Read more of this...
by
Regina Derieva
Everyone, after all, was killed:
he who was crucified,
he who died without skin,
he who died without a head,
he who was drowned,
he who was thrown down
from the wall of the Temple,
which shortly after that
ceased to exist.
Everyone, after all, was tormented;
he who was put at the mercy
of lions and Neros,
he who was roasted on the bonfire,
he whose eyes were gouged out.
Everything was...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
"The North has got him." --Yukonism.
I tried to refine that neighbor of mine, honest to God, I did.
I grieved for his fate, and early and late I watched over him like a kid.
I gave him excuse, I bore his abuse in every way that I could;
I swore to prevail; I camped on his trail; I plotted and planned for...Read more of this...
by
Robert Frost
The well was dry beside the door,
And so we went with pail and can
Across the fields behind the house
To seek the brook if still it ran;
Not loth to have excuse to go,
Because the autumn eve was fair
(Though chill), because the fields were ours,
And by the brook our woods were there.
We ran as if to meet the moon
That slowly dawned...Read more of this...
by
Ralph Waldo Emerson
On being asked, Whence is the flower?
In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes,
I found the fresh Rhodora in the woods,
Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook,
To please the desert and the sluggish brook.
The purple petals, fallen in the pool,
Made the black water with their beauty gay;
Here might the red-bird come his plumes...Read more of this...
by
Marvin Bell
In a wilderness, in some orchestral swing
through trees, with a wind playing all the high notes,
and the prospect of a string bass inside the wood,
I, or someone like me, had a kind of vision.
As the person on the ground moved, bursting halos
topped first one tree, then another and another,
till the work of sight was forced to go lower
into a...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
"The spirits do not like the light,"
The medium said, and turned the switch;
The little lady on my right
Clutched at my hand with nervous twitch.
(She seemed to be a pretty *****.)
The moustached women on my left,
With spirits on hr heavy breath,
Lasciviously leaned her heft
On me as one who languisheth.
The sordid room was still as death.
"A shape I see," the medium...Read more of this...
by
Rudyard Kipling
The overfaithful sword returns the user
His heart's desire at price of his heart's blood.
The clamour of the arrogant accuser
Wastes that one hour we needed to make good.
This was foretold of old at our outgoing;
This we accepted who have squandered, knowing,
The strength and glory of our reputations,
At the day's need, as it were dross, to guard
The tender and new-dedicate foundations
Against...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
Thus can my love excuse the slow offence
Of my dull bearer, when from thee I speed:
From where thou art, why should I haste me thence?
Till I return, of posting is no need.
O, what excuse will my poor beast then find
When swift extremity can seem but slow?
Then should I spur, though mounted on the wind;
In wingèd speed no motion shall...Read more of this...
by
John Greenleaf Whittier
Maud Muller on a summer's day
Raked the meadow sweet with hay.
Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth
Of simple beauty and rustic health.
Singing, she wrought, and her merry gleee
The mock-bird echoed from his tree.
But when she glanced to the far-off town
White from its hill-slope looking down,
The sweet song died, and a vague...Read more of this...
by
Elizabeth Bishop
Love's the boy stood on the burning deck
trying to recite "The boy stood on
the burning deck." Love's the son
stood stammering elocution
while the poor ship in flames went down.
Love's the obstinate boy, the ship,
even the swimming sailors, who
would like a schoolroom platform, too,
or an excuse to stay
on deck. And love's the burning boy....Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
WHEN dear Clarinda, 1 matchless fair,
First struck Sylvander’s raptur’d view,
He gaz’d, he listened to despair,
Alas! ’twas all he dared to do.
Love, from Clarinda’s heavenly eyes,
Transfixed his bosom thro’ and thro’;
But still in Friendships’ guarded guise,
For more the demon fear’d to do.
That heart, already more than lost,
The imp beleaguer’d all perdue;
For frowning Honour kept his...Read more of this...
by
Anne Kingsmill Finch
Sooner I'd praise a Cloud which Light beguiles,
Than thy rash Hand which robs this Face of Smiles;
And does that sweet and pleasing Air control,
Which to us paints the fair CLEONE's Soul.
'Tis vain to boast of Rules or labour'd Art;
I miss the Look that captivates my Heart,
Attracts my Love, and tender Thoughts inspires;
Nor...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
RUSTICITY’S ungainly form
May cloud the highest mind;
But when the heart is nobly warm,
The good excuse will find.
Propriety’s cold, cautious rules
Warm fervour may o’erlook:
But spare poor sensibility
Th’ ungentle, harsh rebuke....Read more of this...
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