Famous Intrusion Poems by Famous Poets

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

See also:

Intrusion

by Denise Levertov
 After I had cut off my hands
and grown new ones

something my former hands had longed for
came and asked to be rocked.

After my plucked out eyes
had withered, and new ones grown

something my former eyes had wept for
came asking to be pitied....Read more of this...

Lately our poets

by Walter Savage Landor
 Lately our poets loiter'd in green lanes,
Content to catch the ballads of the plains;
I fancied I had strength enough to climb
A loftier station at no distant time,
And might securely from intrusion doze
Upon the flowers thro' which Ilissus flows.
In those pale olive grounds all voices cease,
And from afar dust fills the paths of Greece.
My sluber broken and my doublet torn,
I...Read more of this...

Tom Mays Death

by Andrew Marvell
 As one put drunk into the Packet-boat,
Tom May was hurry'd hence and did not know't.
But was amaz'd on the Elysian side,
And with an Eye uncertain, gazing wide,
Could not determine in what place he was,
For whence in Stevens ally Trees or Grass.
Nor where the Popes head, nor the Mitre lay,
Signs by which still he found and lost his way.
At last...Read more of this...

Ode for the Keats Centenary

by Duncan Campbell Scott
 The Muse is stern unto her favoured sons,
Giving to some the keys of all the joy
Of the green earth, but holding even that joy
Back from their life;
Bidding them feed on hope,
A plant of bitter growth,
Deep-rooted in the past;
Truth, 'tis a doubtful art
To make Hope sweeten
Time as it flows;
For no man knows
Until the very last,
Whether it be a sovereign herb...Read more of this...

Carmel Point

by Robinson Jeffers
 The extraordinary patience of things! 
This beautiful place defaced with a crop of surburban houses-
How beautiful when we first beheld it,
Unbroken field of poppy and lupin walled with clean cliffs;
No intrusion but two or three horses pasturing,
Or a few milch cows rubbing their flanks on the outcrop rockheads-
Now the spoiler has come: does it care?
Not faintly. It has all...Read more of this...

89. The Ordination

by Robert Burns
 KILMARNOCK wabsters, fidge an’ claw,
 An’ pour your creeshie nations;
An’ ye wha leather rax an’ draw,
 Of a’ denominations;
Swith to the Ligh Kirk, ane an’ a’
 An’ there tak up your stations;
Then aff to Begbie’s in a raw,
 An’ pour divine libations
 For joy this day.


Curst Common-sense, that imp o’ hell,
 Cam in wi’ Maggie Lauder; 1
But Oliphant 2...Read more of this...

Your pardon first I crave

by Mercy Otis Warren
Your pardon first I crave for this intrusion. 
The topic's such it looks like a delusion; 
And next your candour, for I swear and vow, 
Such an attempt I never made till now. 
But constant laughing at the Desp'rate fate, 
The bastard sons of Mars endur'd of late, 
Induc'd me thus to minute down the notion,
Which put my risibles in...Read more of this...

We knew not that we were to live --

by Emily Dickinson
 We knew not that we were to live --
Nor when -- we are to die --
Our ignorance -- our cuirass is --
We wear Mortality
As lightly as an Option Gown
Till asked to take it off --
By his intrusion, God is known --
It is the same with Life --...Read more of this...

Stepping Backward

by Adrienne Rich
 Good-by to you whom I shall see tomorrow,
Next year and when I'm fifty; still good-by.
This is the leave we never really take.
If you were dead or gone to live in China
The event might draw your stature in my mind.
I should be forced to look upon you whole
The way we look upon the things we lose.
We see each other daily...Read more of this...

Gamajun the Prophetic Bird

by Aleksandr Blok
 On waters, spread without end, 
Dressed with the sunset so purple, 
It sings and prophesies for land, 
Unable to lift the smashed wings' couple... 
The charge of Tartars' hordes it claims, 
And bloody set of executions, 
Earthquake, and hunger and the flames, 
The death of justice, crime’s intrusion... 
And caught with fear, cold and smooth, 
The fair face flames...Read more of this...

Death In The Lounge Bar

by Vernon Scannell
 The bar he went inside was not 
A place he often visited; 
He welcomed anonymity; 
No one to switch inquisitive 
Receivers on, no one could see, 
Or wanted to, exactly what 
He was, or had been, or would be; 
A quiet brown place, a place to drink 
And let thought simmer like good stock, 
No mirrors to distract, no...Read more of this...

A Real Motorcycle

by Erin Moure
 Unspeakable. The word that fills up the
poem, that the head
tries to excise.
At 6 a.m., the wet lion. Its sewn plush face
on the porch rail in the rain.
Heavy rains later, & maybe a thunderstorm.
12 or 13 degrees.

Inside: an iris, candle, poster of the
many-breasted Artemis in a stone hat
from Anatolia

A little pedal steel guitar

A photograph of her at a table by...Read more of this...

Dont forget to view our wonderful member Intrusion 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