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Famous Kensington Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Book: Radiant Verses: A Journey Through Inspiring Poetry
...made
 For the long and painful deathbed coming to me?"

She puts her fingers in his, as, loving and silly
 At long-past Kensington dances she used to do
"It's cheaper to take the tube to Piccadilly
 And then we can catch a nineteen or twenty-two"....Read more of this...
by Betjeman, John



...ruined tout -- 
A hungry creature, evil-eyed, 
Who poured this story out. 
"You see," he said, "there came a swell 
To Kensington today, 
And, if I picked the winners well, 
A crown at least he's pay. 

"I picked three winners straight, I did; 
I filled his purse with pelf, 
And then he gave me half-a-quid 
To back one for myself. 

"A half-a-quid to me he cast -- 
I wanted it indeed; 
So help me Bob, for two days past 
I haven't had a feed. 

"But still I thought my luck wa...Read more of this...
by Paterson, Andrew Barton
...In this lone, open glade I lie,
Screen'd by deep boughs on either hand;
And at its end, to stay the eye,
Those black-crown'd, red-boled pine-trees stand!

Birds here make song, each bird has his,
Across the girdling city's hum.
How green under the boughs it is!
How thick the tremulous sheep-cries come!

Sometimes a child will cross the glade
To take his nu...Read more of this...
by Arnold, Matthew
...SES, Rowses! Penny a bunch!" they tell you-- 
Slattern girls in Trafalgar, eager to sell you. 
Roses, roses, red in the Kensington sun, 
Holland Road, High Street, Bayswater, see you and smell you-- 
Roses of London town, red till the summer is done. 


Roses, roses, locust and lilac, perfuming 
West End, East End, wondrously budding and blooming 
Out of the black earth, rubbed in a million hands, 
Foot-trod, sweat-sour over and under, entombing 
Highways of darkness, deep gu...Read more of this...
by Cather, Willa
...on, for they were 
 incurably given to rove.
They were very well know in Cornwall Gardens, in Launceston 
 Place and in Kensington Square--
They had really a little more reputation than a couple of 
 cats can very well bear.

If the area window was found ajar
And the basement looked like a field of war,
If a tile or two came loose on the roof,
Which presently ceased to be waterproof,
If the drawers were pulled out from the bedroom chests,
And you couldn't find one of your win...Read more of this...
by Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns)



...En robe de parade.
 Samain

Like a skien of loose silk blown against a wall
She walks by the railing of a path in Kensington Gardens,
And she is dying piece-meal
 of a sort of emotional anaemia.

And round about there is a rabble
Of the filthy, sturdy, unkillable infants of the very poor.
They shall inherit the earth.

In her is the end of breeding.
Her boredom is exquisite and excessive.
She would like some one to speak to her,
And is almost afraid that I
 will commit ...Read more of this...
by Gluck, Louise
...through the haze.
Sainted Diana! can that be
 The Moon of Other Days?

Ah! shade of little Kitty Smith,
 Sweet Saint of Kensington!
Say, was it ever thus at Home
 The Moon of August shone,
When arm in arm we wandered long
 Through Putney's evening haze,
And Hammersmith was Heaven beneath
 The moon of Other Days?

But Wandle's stream is Sutlej now,
 And Putney's evening haze
The dust that half a hundered kine
 Before my window raise.
Unkempt, unclean, athwart the mist
 The see...Read more of this...
by Kipling, Rudyard
...r!

Only two African kopjes,
 Only the vultures above,
Only baboons--at the bottom,
 Only some buck on the move;
Only a Kensington draper
 Only pretending to scout . . .
.Only bad news for the paper,
 Only another knock-out.


 Then mock not the African kopje, 
 And rub not your flank on its side,
 The silent and simmering kopje,
 The kopje beloved by the guide.
 You can never be, etc.


Only two African kopjes,
 Only the dust of their wheels,
Only a bolted commando,
 Only ou...Read more of this...
by Kipling, Rudyard
...and that passion?



And what have I to show?

A few pamphlets, a small ‘Selected’, a single good review.

Sat in South Kensington on the way to the Institut I wrote this,

Too frightened even to phone you....Read more of this...
by Tebb, Barry

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Book: Reflection on the Important Things