Famous Hearty Poems by Famous Poets

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

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62. Epistle to William Simson

by Robert Burns
 I GAT your letter, winsome Willie;
Wi’ gratefu’ heart I thank you brawlie;
Tho’ I maun say’t, I wad be silly,
 And unco vain,
Should I believe, my coaxin billie
 Your flatterin strain.


But I’se believe ye kindly meant it:
I sud be laith to think ye hinted
Ironic satire, sidelins sklented
 On my poor Musie;
Tho’ in sic phraisin terms ye’ve penn’d it,
 I scarce...Read more of this...

Marching Song

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 Bring the comb and play upon it! 
Marching, here we come! 
Willie cocks his highland bonnet, 
Johnnie beats the drum. 

Mary Jane commands the party, 
Peter leads the rear; 
Feet in time, alert and hearty, 
Each a Grenadier! 

All in the most martial manner 
Marching double-quick; 
While the napkin, like a banner, 
Waves upon the stick! 

Here's enough of...Read more of this...

The Widow

by Robert William Service
 I don't think men of eighty odd
 Should let a surgeon operate;
Better to pray for peace with God,
 And reconcile oneself to Fate:
At four-score years we really should
 Be quite prepared to go for good.

That's what I told my husband but
 He had a hearty lust for life,
And so he let a surgeon cut
 Into his innards with a...Read more of this...

Photograph of My Father in His Twenty-Second Year

by Raymond Carver
 October. Here in this dank, unfamiliar kitchen 
I study my father's embarrassed young man's face. 
Sheepish grin, he holds in one hand a string 
of spiny yellow perch, in the other 
a bottle of Carlsbad Beer. 

In jeans and denim shirt, he leans 
against the front fender of a 1934 Ford. 
He would like to pose bluff and hearty...Read more of this...

The Execution of James Graham Marquis of Montrose

by William Topaz McGonagall
 'Twas in the year of 1650, and on the twenty-first of May,
The city of Edinburgh was put into a state of dismay
By the noise of drums and trumpets, which on the air arose,
That the great sound attracted the notice of Montrose. 

Who enquired at the Captain of the guard the cause of it,
Then the officer told him, as he...Read more of this...

To A Louse

by Robert Burns
 ON SEEING ONE ON A LADY'S BONNET AT CHURCH

Ha! whare ye gaun, ye crowlin ferlie!
Your impudence protects you sairly:
I canna say but ye strunt rarely
Owre gauze and lace;
Tho' faith, I fear ye dine but sparely
On sic a place.

Ye ugly, creepin, blastit wonner,
Detested, shunned by saunt an' sinner,
How daur ye set your fit upon her,
Sae fine a lady!
Gae somewhere else...Read more of this...

Nicholas Nye

by Walter de la Mare
 Thistle and darnell and dock grew there, 
And a bush, in the corner, of may, 
On the orchard wall I used to sprawl 
In the blazing heat of the day; 

Half asleep and half awake, 
While the birds went twittering by, 
And nobody there my lone to share 
But Nicholas Nye. 

Nicholas Nye was lean and gray, 
Lame of...Read more of this...

Phantasmagoria CANTO VI ( Dyscomfyture )

by Lewis Carroll
 As one who strives a hill to climb,
Who never climbed before:
Who finds it, in a little time,
Grow every moment less sublime,
And votes the thing a bore: 

Yet, having once begun to try,
Dares not desert his quest,
But, climbing, ever keeps his eye
On one small hut against the sky
Wherein he hopes to rest: 

Who climbs till nerve and force are spent,
With...Read more of this...

The Gamblers

by Vachel Lindsay
 Life's a jail where men have common lot. 
Gaunt the one who has, and who has not. 
All our treasures neither less nor more, 
Bread alone comes thro' the guarded door. 
Cards are foolish in this jail, I think, 
Yet they play for shoes, for drabs and drink. 
She, my lawless, sharp-tongued gypsy maid 
Will not scorn with me...Read more of this...

The Glove and The Lions

by James Henry Leigh Hunt
 King Francis was a hearty king, and loved a royal sport,
And one day as his lions fought, sat looking on the court;
The nobles filled the benches, and the ladies in their pride,
And 'mongst them sat the Count de Lorge, with one for whom he sighed:
And truly 'twas a gallant thing to see that crowning show,
Valour and love, and a...Read more of this...

548. The Dean of Faculty: A new Ballad

by Robert Burns
 DIRE was the hate at old Harlaw,
 That Scot to Scot did carry;
And dire the discord Langside saw
 For beauteous, hapless Mary:
But Scot to Scot ne’er met so hot,
 Or were more in fury seen, Sir,
Than ’twixt Hal and Bob for the famous job,
 Who should be the Faculty’s Dean, Sir.


This Hal for genius, wit and lore,
 Among the...Read more of this...

Lines in Praise of the Lyric Club Banquet

by William Topaz McGonagall
 Which was Held in the Queens Hotel, Perth, on the Evening of 5th September 1894


'Twas in the year of 1894, and on the 5th of September,
Which for a long time I will remember,
And the gentlemen I entertained in the city of Perth,
Which is one of the grandest cities upon the earth. 

At the Banquet there were gentlemen of high...Read more of this...

No Thank You John

by Christina Rossetti
 I never said I loved you, John:
Why will you tease me day by day,
And wax a weariness to think upon
With always "do" and "pray"?

You Know I never loved you, John;
No fault of mine made me your toast:
Why will you haunt me with a face as wan
As shows an hour-old ghost?

I dare say Meg or Moll would take
Pity upon you,...Read more of this...

The Battle of El-Teb

by William Topaz McGonagall
 Ye sons of Great Britain, I think no shame
To write in praise of brave General Graham!
Whose name will be handed down to posterity without any stigma,
Because, at the battle of El-Teb, he defeated Osman Digna.

With an army about five thousand strong,
To El-Teb, in the year 1884, he marched along,
And bivouacked there for the night;
While around their fires they only...Read more of this...

The All Right Un

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 He came from "further out", 
That land of fear and drought 
And dust and gravel. 
He got a touch of sun, 
And rested at the run 
Until his cure was done, 
And he could travel. 
When spring had decked the plain, 
He flitted off again 
As flit the swallows. 
And from that western land, 
When many months were spanned,...Read more of this...

The Ballad Of How Macpherson Held The Floor

by Robert William Service
 Said President MacConnachie to Treasurer MacCall:
"We ought to have a piper for our next Saint Andrew's Ball.
Yon squakin' saxophone gives me the syncopated gripes.
I'm sick of jazz, I want to hear the skirling of the pipes."
"Alas! it's true," said Tam MacCall. "The young folk of to-day
Are fox-trot mad and dinna ken a reel from Strathspey.
Now, what we want's a...Read more of this...

Is My Team Ploughing

by A E Housman
 "Is my team ploughing, 
That I was used to drive 
And hear the harness jingle 
When I was man alive?" 

Ay, the horses trample, 
The harness jingles now; 
No change though you lie under 
The land you used to plough. 

"Is football playing 
Along the river shore, 
With lads to chase the leather, 
Now I stand up no more?"...Read more of this...

A Health to Mark Twain

by Henry Van Dyke
 At his Birthday Feast

With memories old and wishes new
We crown our cups again,
And here's to you, and here's to you
With love that ne'er shall wane!
And may you keep, at sixty-seven,
The joy of earth, the hope of heaven,
And fame well-earned, and friendship true,
And peace that comforts every pain,
And faith that fights the battle through,
And all your heart's unbounded wealth,
And all...Read more of this...

The Cow

by Victor Hugo
 ("Devant la blanche ferme.") 
 
 {XV., May, 1837.} 


 Before the farm where, o'er the porch, festoon 
 Wild creepers red, and gaffer sits at noon, 
 Whilst strutting fowl display their varied crests, 
 And the old watchdog slumberously rests, 
 They half-attentive to the clarion of their king, 
 Resplendent in the sunshine op'ning wing— 
...Read more of this...

Gates and Doors

by Joyce Kilmer
 (For Richardson Little Wright)

There was a gentle hostler
(And blessed be his name!)
He opened up the stable
The night Our Lady came.
Our Lady and Saint Joseph,
He gave them food and bed,
And Jesus Christ has given him
A glory round his head.
So let the gate swing open
However poor the yard,
Lest weary people visit you
And find their passage barred;
Unlatch the door at midnight
And let...Read more of this...

The Roaring Days

by Henry Lawson
 The night too quickly passes 
And we are growing old, 
So let us fill our glasses 
And toast the Days of Gold; 
When finds of wondrous treasure 
Set all the South ablaze, 
And you and I were faithful mates 
All through the roaring days! 

Then stately ships came sailing 
From every harbour's mouth, 
And sought the land of promise...Read more of this...

Elizabeth Leaves A Letter For Dr. Frankenstein

by Jennifer Reeser
 Whether the clouds had abandoned Geneva that evening
no one can say now, but what I remember are roses
bruised at their edges, and china cups yellowed with age.
“I am too sick of interior vapors,” I told you,
“Find us a corner of sunlight, and hammer it down...
Tell me again I’m so lovely the insects won’t bite.”
Do you remember it, Victor? A...Read more of this...

Columbian Ode

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Four hundred years ago a tangled waste
Lay sleeping on the west Atlantic's side;
Their devious ways the Old World's millions traced
Content, and loved, and labored, dared and died,
While students still believed the charts they conned,
And revelled in their thriftless ignorance,
Nor dreamed of other lands that lay beyond
Old Ocean's dense, indefinite expanse.
But deep within her heart old Nature knew
That she had once...Read more of this...

The Capture of Lucknow

by William Topaz McGonagall
 'Twas near the Begum Kothie the battle began,
Where innocent blood as plentiful as water ran;
The Begum Kothie was a place of honour given to the 93rd,
Which heroically to a man they soon did begird. 

And the 4th Punjaub Rifles were their companions in glory,
And are worthy of their names enrolled in story,
Because they performed prodigious wonders in the fight,
By...Read more of this...

To Think of Time

by Walt Whitman
 1
TO think of time—of all that retrospection! 
To think of to-day, and the ages continued henceforward! 

Have you guess’d you yourself would not continue? 
Have you dreaded these earth-beetles? 
Have you fear’d the future would be nothing to you?

Is to-day nothing? Is the beginningless past nothing? 
If the future is nothing, they are just as surely nothing. 

To think...Read more of this...

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