Famous Juan Poems by Famous Poets

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

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The Little Old Lady in Lavender Silk

by Dorothy Parker
 I was seventy-seven, come August,
I shall shortly be losing my bloom;
I've experienced zephyr and raw gust
And (symbolical) flood and simoom.

When you come to this time of abatement,
To this passing from Summer to Fall,
It is manners to issue a statement
As to what you got out of it all.

So I'll say, though reflection unnerves me
And pronouncements I dodge as I can,
That...Read more of this...

To Juan at the Winter Solstice

by Robert Graves
 There is one story and one story only
That will prove worth your telling,
Whether as learned bard or gifted child;
To it all lines or lesser gauds belong
That startle with their shining
Such common stories as they stray into.

Is it of trees you tell, their months and virtues,
Or strange beasts that beset you,
Of birds that croak at you the Triple will?
Or of...Read more of this...

Night Words

by Philip Levine
 after Juan Ramon 


A child wakens in a cold apartment. 
The windows are frosted. Outside he hears 
words rising from the streets, words he cannot 
understand, and then the semis gear down 
for the traffic light on Houston. He sleeps 
again and dreams of another city 
on a high hill above a wide river 
bathed in sunlight, and the...Read more of this...

Lucius Atherton

by Edgar Lee Masters
 When my moustache curled,
And my hair was black,
And I wore tight trousers
And a diamond stud,
I was an excellent knave of hearts and took many a trick.
But when the gray hairs began to appear--
Lo! a new generation of girls
Laughed at me, not fearing me,
And I had no more exciting adventures
Wherein I was all but shot for a heartless devil,
But only...Read more of this...

Cornflowers

by Victor Hugo
 ("Tandis que l'étoile inodore.") 
 
 {XXXII.} 


 While bright but scentless azure stars 
 Be-gem the golden corn, 
 And spangle with their skyey tint 
 The furrows not yet shorn; 
 While still the pure white tufts of May 
 Ape each a snowy ball,— 
 Away, ye merry maids, and haste 
 To gather ere they...Read more of this...

Common Cold

by Ogden Nash
 Go hang yourself, you old M.D.! 
You shall not sneer at me. 
Pick up your hat and stethoscope, 
Go wash your mouth with laundry soap; 
I contemplate a joy exquisite 
I'm not paying you for your visit. 
I did not call you to be told 
My malady is a common cold. 

By pounding brow and swollen lip; 
By fever's...Read more of this...

Don Juan

by George (Lord) Byron
 http://www.gutenberg.org/files/21700/21700-h/21700-h.htm...Read more of this...

Don Juan In Hades

by Charles Baudelaire
 WHEN Juan sought the subterranean flood, 
And paid his obolus on the Stygian shore, 
Charon, the proud and sombre beggar, stood 
With one strong, vengeful hand on either oar. 

With open robes and bodies agonised, 
Lost women writhed beneath that darkling sky; 
There were sounds as of victims sacrificed: 
Behind him all the dark was one long cry. 

And...Read more of this...

Job Interview

by William Matthews
 Think you, if Laura had been Petrarch's wife
 He would have written sonnets all his life?
 DON JUAN, III, 63-4

"Where do you see yourself five years from now?"
the eldest male member (or is "male member"
a redundancy?) of the committee
asked me. "Not here," I thought. A good thing I
speak fluent Fog. I craved that job like some
unappeasable, taunting woman.
What did...Read more of this...

Juan In Middle Age

by Vernon Scannell
 The appetite which leads him to her bed 
Is not unlike the lust of boys for cake 
Except he knows that after he has fed 
He'll suffer more than simple belly-ache. 

He'll groan to think what others have to pay 
As price for his obsessive need to know 
That he's a champion still, though slightly grey, 
And both his...Read more of this...

Don Juan

by A S J Tessimond
 Under the lips and limbs, the embraces, faces,
Under the sharp circumference, the brightness,
Under the fence of shadows,
Is something I am seeking;
Under the faces a face,
Under the new an old or a not-yet-come-to;
Under the voices a peace.

Am I a darkness all your flames must light?
A mirror all your eyes must look into -
That dares not yet reflect the neutral sky,
The...Read more of this...

An Ode in Time of Hesitation

by William Vaughn Moody
 After seeing at Boston the statue of Robert Gould Shaw, killed while storming Fort Wagner, July 18, 1863, at the head of the first enlisted ***** regiment, the Fifty-fourth Massachusetts.


I 

Before the solemn bronze Saint Gaudens made 
To thrill the heedless passer's heart with awe, 
And set here in the city's talk and trade 
To the good memory of...Read more of this...

Village Don Juan

by Robert William Service
 Lord, I'm grey, my face is run,
But by old Harry, I've had my fun;
And all about, I seem to see
Lads and lassies that look like me;
Ice-blue eyes on every hand,
Handsomest youngsters in the land.

"Old Stud Horse" they say of me,
But back of my beard I laugh with glee.
Far and wide have I sown my seed,
Yet by the gods I've...Read more of this...

Proud Music of The Storm

by Walt Whitman
 1
PROUD music of the storm! 
Blast that careers so free, whistling across the prairies! 
Strong hum of forest tree-tops! Wind of the mountains! 
Personified dim shapes! you hidden orchestras! 
You serenades of phantoms, with instruments alert,
Blending, with Nature’s rhythmus, all the tongues of nations; 
You chords left us by vast composers! you choruses! 
You formless, free, religious dances! you...Read more of this...

The Roll Of The De Silva Race

by Victor Hugo
 ("Celui-ci, des Silvas, c'est l'aîné.") 
 
 {HERNANI, Act III.} 


 In that reverend face 
 Behold the father of De Silva's race, 
 Silvius; in Rome he filled the consul's place 
 Three times (your patience for such honored names). 
 This second was Grand Master of St. James 
 And Calatrava; his strong limbs sustained 
 Armor...Read more of this...

The Ballad of Fishers Boarding-House

by Rudyard Kipling
 'T was Fultah Fisher's boarding-house,
 Where sailor-men reside,
And there were men of all the ports
 From Mississip to Clyde,
And regally they spat and smoked,
 And fearsomely they lied.

They lied about the purple Sea
 That gave them scanty bread,
They lied about the Earth beneath,
 The Heavens overhead,
For they had looked too often on
 Black rum when that was red.

They told...Read more of this...

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