Famous Hunter Poems by Famous Poets

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

See also:

The Law of the Jungle

by Rudyard Kipling
 (From The Jungle Book)




Now this is the Law of the Jungle -- as old and as true as the sky;
And the Wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the Wolf that shall break it must die.
As the creeper that girdles the tree-trunk the Law runneth forward and back --
For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and...Read more of this...

Man the Man-Hunter

by Carl Sandburg
 I SAW Man, the man-hunter,
Hunting with a torch in one hand
And a kerosene can in the other,
Hunting with guns, ropes, shackles.

 I listened
 And the high cry rang,
The high cry of Man, the man-hunter:
We’ll get you yet, you sbxyzch!

 I listened later.
 The high cry rang:
Kill him! kill him! the sbxyzch!

In the morning the sun saw
Two butts of something,...Read more of this...

Needs must the tavern-hunter bathe in wine,

by Omar Khayyam
Needs must the tavern-hunter bathe in wine,
For none can make a tarnished name to shine;
Go! bring me wine, for none can now restore
Its pristine sheen to this soiled veil of mine....Read more of this...

The Hunter Of Reigate

by Mother Goose
A man went a-hunting at Reigate,
And wished to leap over a high gate.
  Says the owner, "Go round,
  With your gun and your hound,
For you never shall leap over my gate."...Read more of this...

177. Elegy on the Death of Sir James Hunter Blair

by Robert Burns
 THE LAMP of day, with-ill presaging glare,
 Dim, cloudy, sank beneath the western wave;
Th’ inconstant blast howl’d thro’ the dark’ning air,
 And hollow whistled in the rocky cave.


Lone as I wander’d by each cliff and dell,
 Once the lov’d haunts of Scotia’s royal train; 1
Or mus’d where limpid streams, once hallow’d well, 2
 Or mould’ring ruins mark the sacred...Read more of this...

Noises

by Fenny Sterenborg
 I woke up this morning
with the city's noises
fusing into my dream
A pride of lions
roaring in anger
The traffic, it must have been

A hunter shouting something
but I probably heard a street vendor
For a moment, total silence
then a shot rings out in the wild
Perhaps a car's broken exhaust
or the toy pistol from a child

The noises slowly become familiar
as I slip out of...Read more of this...

Writing To Onegin

by Ruth Padel
 (After Pushkin) 
Look at the bare wood hand-waxed floor and long 
White dressing-gown, the good child's writing-desk 
And passionate cold feet
Summoning music of the night - tumbrils, gongs
And gamelans - with one neat pen, one candle
Puttering its life out hour by hour. 
Is "Tell Him I love him" never a good idea? You can't wish this
Unlived - this world...Read more of this...

The Hunter

by Ellis Parker Butler
 A full-fledged gun cannot endure
The trifling of an amateur;
Poor marksmanship its temper spoils
And this is why the gun recoils.

A self-respecting gun I’m sure
Delights to jar the amateur
And thinks that it is no disgrace
To kick his shoulder out of place.

Moral

When you go out to hunt, my son
Prepare to circumvent your gun
And on your shoulder firmly bind
A pillow of the largest...Read more of this...

Hold Hard These Ancient Minutes In The Cuckoos Month

by Dylan Thomas
 Hold hard, these ancient minutes in the cuckoo's month,
Under the lank, fourth folly on Glamorgan's hill,
As the green blooms ride upward, to the drive of time;
Time, in a folly's rider, like a county man
Over the vault of ridings with his hound at heel,
Drives forth my men, my children, from the hanging south.

Country, your sport is summer, and December's pools
By...Read more of this...

The Alpine Hunter

by Friedrich von Schiller
 Wilt thou not the lambkins guard?
Oh, how soft and meek they look,
Feeding on the grassy sward,
Sporting round the silvery brook!
"Mother, mother, let me go
On yon heights to chase the roe!"

Wilt thou not the flock compel
With the horn's inspiring notes?
Sweet the echo of yon bell,
As across the wood it floats!
"Mother, mother, let me go
On yon heights to hunt the roe!"

Wilt...Read more of this...

The Song of Hiawatha: X

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
 X. Hiawatha's Wooing

"As unto the bow the cord is,
So unto the man is woman,
Though she bends him, she obeys him,
Though she draws him, yet she follows,
Useless each without the other!"

Thus the youthful Hiawatha
Said within himself and pondered,
Much perplexed by various feelings,
Listless, longing, hoping, fearing,
Dreaming still of Minnehaha,
Of the lovely Laughing Water,
In the land of the Dacotahs.

"Wed a maiden of...Read more of this...

The Robing of the King

by George William Russell
 ON the bird of air blue-breasted glint the rays of gold,
And its shadowy fleece above us waves the forest old,
Far through rumorous leagues of midnight stirred by breezes warm.
See the old ascetic yonder, ah, poor withered form,
Where he crouches wrinkled over by unnumbered years
Through the leaves the flakes of moon-fire fall like phantom tears.
At the dawn a kingly hunter...Read more of this...

The Wounded Bird

by Katherine Mansfield
 In the wide bed
Under the freen embroidered quilt
With flowers and leaves always in soft motion
She is like a wounded bird resting on a pool.

The hunter threw his dart
And hit her breast,--
Hit her but did not kill.
"O my wings, lift me--lift me!
I am not dreadfully hurt!"
Down she dropped and was still.

Kind people come to the edge of the pool with...Read more of this...

Hiawathas Wedding-Feast

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
 You shall hear how Pau-Puk-Keewis, 
How the handsome Yenadizze 
Danced at Hiawatha's wedding; 
How the gentle Chibiabos, 
He the sweetest of musicians, 
Sang his songs of love and longing; 
How Iagoo, the great boaster, 
He the marvellous story-teller, 
Told his tales of strange adventure, 
That the feast might be more joyous, 
That the time might pass more gayly, 
And...Read more of this...

Australia Today 1916

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 They came from the lower levels 
Deep down in the Brilliant mine; 
From the wastes where the whirlwind revels, 
Whirling the leaves of pine. 
On the western plains, where the Darling flows, 
And the dust storms wheel and shift, 
The teamster loosened his yokes and bows, 
And turned his team adrift. 

On the western stations, far and wide, 
There's...Read more of this...

Cromwells Return

by Andrew Marvell
 An Horatian Ode upon Cromwell's Return From Ireland

The forward youth that would appear 
Must now forsake his muses dear, 
Nor in the shadows sing, 
His numbers languishing. 
'Tis time to leave the books in dust, 
And oil the unus?d armour's rust: 
Removing from the wall 
The corslet of the hall. 
So restless Cromwell could not cease 
In the inglorious...Read more of this...

The Female of the Species

by Rudyard Kipling
 1911

When the Himalayan peasant meets the he-bear in his pride,
He shouts to scare the monster, who will often turn aside.
But the she-bear thus accosted rends the peasant tooth and nail.
For the female of the species is more deadly than the male.

When Nag the basking cobra hears the careless foot of man,
He will sometimes wriggle sideways and avoid it if...Read more of this...

The Song of the Little Hunter

by Rudyard Kipling
 Ere Mor the Peacock flutters, ere the Monkey People cry,
 Ere Chil the Kite swoops down a furlong sheer,
Through the Jungle very softly flits a shadow and a sigh--
 He is Fear, O Little Hunter, he is Fear! 
Very softly down the glade runs a waiting, watching shade,
 And the whisper spreads and widens far and near.
And the sweat...Read more of this...

The Return of Frankenstein

by Edward Field
 He didn't die in the whirlpool by the mill
where he had fallen in after a wild chase
by all the people of the town.

Somehow he clung to an overhanging rock
until the villagers went away.

And when he came out, he was changed forever,
that soft heart of his had hardened
and he really was a monster now.

He was out to pay them back,
to...Read more of this...

141. Tam Samson's Elegy

by Robert Burns
 HAS auld Kilmarnock seen the deil?
Or great Mackinlay 1 thrawn his heel?
Or Robertson 2 again grown weel,
 To preach an’ read?
“Na’ waur than a’! cries ilka chiel,
 “Tam Samson’s dead!”


Kilmarnock lang may grunt an’ grane,
An’ sigh, an’ sab, an’ greet her lane,
An’ cleed her bairns, man, wife, an’ wean,
 In mourning weed;
To Death she’s dearly pay’d the kane—
 Tam...Read more of this...

Travels With John Hunter

by Les Murray
 We who travel between worlds 
lose our muscle and bone. 
I was wheeling a barrow of earth 
when agony bayoneted me. 

I could not sit, or lie down, 
or stand, in Casualty. 
Stomach-calming clay caked my lips, 
I turned yellow as the moon 

and slid inside a CAT-scan wheel 
in a hospital where I met no one 
so much...Read more of this...

The Famine

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
 Oh the long and dreary Winter!
Oh the cold and cruel Winter!
Ever thicker, thicker, thicker
Froze the ice on lake and river,
Ever deeper, deeper, deeper
Fell the snow o'er all the landscape,
Fell the covering snow, and drifted
Through the forest, round the village.
Hardly from his buried wigwam
Could the hunter force a passage;
With his mittens and his snow-shoes
Vainly walked he through the forest,
Sought for...Read more of this...

Typographical

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 The Editor wrote his political screed 
In ink that was fainter and fainter; 
He rose to the call of his country's need, 
And in spiderish characters wrote with speed, 
A column on "Cutting the Painter". 
The "reader" sat in his high-backed chair, 
For literals he was a hunter; 
But he stared aghast at the column long 
Of the editorial...Read more of this...

The Hunter

by Ogden Nash
 The hunter crouches in his blind
'Neath camouflage of every kind
And conjures up a quacking noise
To lend allure to his decoys
This grown-up man, with pluck and luck
is hoping to outwit a duck...Read more of this...

The Raft

by Vachel Lindsay
 The whole world on a raft! A King is here,
The record of his grandeur but a smear.
Is it his deacon-beard, or old bald pate
That makes the band upon his whims to wait?
Loot and mud-honey have his soul defiled.
Quack, pig, and priest, he drives camp-meetings wild
Until they shower their pennies like spring rain
That he may preach upon the Spanish main.
What...Read more of this...

Dont forget to view our wonderful member Hunter poems.

Get a Premium Membership
Turn off ads, get more exposure for your poetry, and get more features with a Premium Membership.
Book: Diverse Voices: The Poetry of Human Rights and the Pursuit of Peace