Famous Leather Poems by Famous Poets

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

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A Ballad of Hell

...ry fan,
And at her glowing missal knelt.

Then rose, 'And am I mad?' she said:
She broke her fan, her belt untied;
With leather girt herself instead,
And stuck a dagger at her side.

She waited, shuddering in her room,
Till sleep had fallen on all the house.
She never flinched; she faced her doom:
They two must sin to keep their vows.

Then out into the night she went,
And, stooping, crept by hedge and tree;
Her rose-bush flung a snare of scent,
And caught a happy memory.

Sh...Read more of this...
by Davidson, John


Adventure

...Out of the wood my White Knight came:
His eyes were bright with a bitter flame,
As I clung to his stirrup leather;
For I was only a dreaming lad,
Yet oh, what a wonderful faith I had!
And the song in my heart was never so glad,
As we took to the trail together.

"Friends and lovers, good-bye," I said;
Never once did I turn my head,
Though wickedly wild the weather
min were the rover's rags and scars,
And the rover's bed beneath the stars,
But never the shadow of...Read more of this...
by Service, Robert William

Angels Of The Love Affair

...air?
That hole I crawl into with a box of Kleenex,
that hole where the fire woman is tied to her chair,
that hole where leather men are wringing their necks,
where the sea has turned into a pond of urine.
There is no place to wash and no marine beings to stir in.

In this hole your mother is crying out each day.
Your father is eating cake and digging her grave.
In this hole your baby is strangling. Your mouth is clay.
Your eyes are made of glass. They break. You are not brave...Read more of this...
by Sexton, Anne

Carol of Occupations

...brewery, brewing, the malt, the vats, every thing that is done by brewers, also by
 wine-makers,
 also vinegar-makers, 
Leather-dressing, coach-making, boiler-making, rope-twisting, distilling, sign-painting,
 lime-burning, cotton-picking—electro-plating, electrotyping, stereotyping, 
Stave-machines, planing-machines, reaping-machines, ploughing-machines,
 thrashing-machines,
 steam
 wagons, 
The cart of the carman, the omnibus, the ponderous dray; 
Pyrotechny, letting off co...Read more of this...
by Whitman, Walt

Casey At The Bat

...ng pitcher ground the ball into his hip, 
defiance flashed in Casey's eye, a sneer curled Casey's lip. 

And now the leather-covered sphere came hurtling through the air, 
and Casey stood a-watching it in haughty grandeur there. 

Close by the sturdy batsman the ball unheeded sped -- 
"That ain't my style," said Casey. 

"Strike one!" the umpire said. 
From the benches, black with people, there went up a muffled roar, 
like the beating of the storm waves on a stern...Read more of this...
by Thayer, Ernest Lawrence


Dear Reader

...dark silent figure standing 
in the doorway of these words.

Pope welcomes you into the glow of his study,
takes down a leather-bound Ovid to show you.
Tennyson lifts the latch to a moated garden,
and with Yeats you lean against a broken pear tree,
the day hooded by low clouds.

But now you are here with me,
composed in the open field of this page,
no room or manicured garden to enclose us,
no Zeitgeist marching in the background,
no heavy ethos thrown over us like a cloak.

...Read more of this...
by Collins, Billy

Eviradnus

...eir clamps secure; 
 The dirks stand out upon the saddle-bow; 
 Even unto the horses' feet do flow 
 Caparisons,—the leather all well clasped, 
 The gorget and the spurs with bronze tongues hasped, 
 The shining long sword from the saddle hung, 
 The battle-axe across the back was flung. 
 Under the arm a trusty dagger rests, 
 Each spiked knee-piece its murderous power attests. 
 Feet press the stirrups—hands on bridle shown 
 Proclaim all ready, with the visors do...Read more of this...
by Hugo, Victor

Gioconda And Si-Ya-U

...n whose fist-size head
 mountain-like winds descend,
at this very minute you're probably busy
building towers of thick, leather-bound books
to get answers to the questions you asked of the stars.
READ
SI-YA-U
 READ...
And when your eyes find in the lines what they desire,
 when your eyes tire,
rest your tired head
 like a black-and-yellow Japanese chrysanthemum
 on the books..
 SLEEP
 SI-YA-U
 SLEEP...


18 April

I've begun to forget
the names of those Renaissance masters.
I...Read more of this...
by Hikmet, Nazim

Hurry Up Please Its Time

...d it rains steadily 
in the pond like white puppy eyes. 
The pond is waiting for its skin. 
the pond is waiting for its leather. 
The pond is waiting for December and its Novocain. 

It begins: 

Interrogator: 
What can you say of your last seven days? 

Anne: 
They were tired. 

Interrogator: 
One day is enough to perfect a man. 

Anne: 
I watered and fed the plant. 

* 

My undertaker waits for me. 
he is probably twenty-three now, 
learning his trade. 
He'll stitch up the ...Read more of this...
by Sexton, Anne

I Ask You

...that I need,
not even a job that would allow me to row to work,
or a coffee-colored Aston Martin DB4
with cracked green leather seats.

No, it's all here,
the clear ovals of a glass of water,
a small crate of oranges, a book on Stalin,
not to mention the odd snarling fish
in a frame on the wall,
and the way these three candles--
each a different height--
are singing in perfect harmony.

So forgive me
if I lower my head now and listen
to the short bass candle as he takes a sol...Read more of this...
by Collins, Billy

My Mothers Body

...ll not fit you mother. 

I will not be the bride you can dress, 
the obedient dutiful daughter you would chew, 
a dog's leather bone to sharpen your teeth. 

You strike me sometimes just to hear the sound. 
Loneliness turns your fingers into hooks 
barbed and drawing blood with their caress. 

My twin, my sister, my lost love, 
I carry you in me like an embryo 
as once you carried me. 


4. 

What is it we turn from, what is it we fear? 
Did I truly think you could put me bac...Read more of this...
by Piercy, Marge

Pickthorn Manor

...he shallows
Which rippled to her feet. Then straight away She 
peered down stream among the budding sallows.
A youth in leather breeches and a shirt Of finest broidered 
lawn lay out upon
An overhanging bole and deftly swayed A 
well-hooked fish which shone
In the pale lemon sunshine like a spurt
Of silver, bowed and damascened, and girt
With crimson spots and moons which waned and 
played.

VIII
The fish hung circled for a moment, ringed And 
bright; then flung itself out, a...Read more of this...
by Lowell, Amy

Prairie

...g wagons of rutabaga to market.
They are mine, the old zigzag rail fences, the new barb wire.. . .
The cornhuskers wear leather on their hands.
There is no let-up to the wind.
Blue bandannas are knotted at the ruddy chins.

Falltime and winter apples take on the smolder of the five-o’clock November sunset: falltime, leaves, bonfires, stubble, the old things go, and the earth is grizzled.
The land and the people hold memories, even among the anthills and the angleworms, among ...Read more of this...
by Sandburg, Carl

September Song

...ssed over at the proper time.

As estimated, you died. Things marched,
sufficient, to that end.
Just so much Zyklon and leather, patented
terror, so many routine cries.

(I have made
an elegy for myself it
is true)

September fattens on vines. Roses
flake from the wall. The smoke
of harmless fires drifts to my eyes.

This is plenty. This is more than enough....Read more of this...
by Hill, Geoffrey

Spelling

...her thighs tied
together by the enemy
so she could not give birth.

Ancestress: the burning witch,
her mouth covered by leather
to strangle words.

A word after a word
after a word is power.

 *

At the point where language falls away
from the hot bones, at the point
where the rock breaks open and darkness
flows out of it like blood, at
the melting point of granite
when the bones know
they are hollow & the word
splits & doubles & speaks
the truth & the body
itself becomes a m...Read more of this...
by Atwood, Margaret

Sword Blades and Poppy Seed

...ear
Your mind of such imaginings.
Sit down. I will tell you of these things."
He pushed me into a great chair
Of russet leather, poked a flare
Of tumbling flame, with the old long sword,
Up the chimney; but said no word.
Slowly he walked to a distant shelf,
And brought back a crock of finest delf.
He rested a moment a blue-veined hand
Upon the cover, then cut a band
Of paper, pasted neatly round,
Opened and poured. A sliding sound
Came from beneath his old white hands,
And I ...Read more of this...
by Lowell, Amy

The Ballad Of A Bachelor

...ollar, and I'll toss it fair;

If heads come up, I'll wed Marie;
If tails, fair Kate my bride shall be."

Then from his leather pocket-book
A dollar bright and new he took;

He kissed one side for fair Marie,
The other side for Kate kissed he.

Then in a manner free and fair
He tossed the dollar in the air.

"Ye fates," he cried, "pray let this be
A lucky throw indeed for me!"

The dollar rose, the dollar fell;
He watched its whirling transit well,

And off some twenty yards ...Read more of this...
by Butler, Ellis Parker

The Flight Of The Duchess

...mfort when he died
At next year's end, in a velvet suit,
With a gilt glove on his hand, his foot
In a silken shoe for a leather boot,
Petticoated like a herald,
In a chamher next to an ante-room,
Where he breathed the breath of page and groom,
What he called stink, and they, perfume:
---They should have set him on red Berold
Mad with pride, like fire to manage!
They should have got his cheek fresh tannage
Such a day as to-day in the merry sunshine!
Had they stuck on his fist ...Read more of this...
by Browning, Robert

The Lady of Shalott

...de his armour rung, 
Beside remote Shalott. 90 

All in the blue unclouded weather 
Thick-jewell'd shone the saddle-leather, 
The helmet and the helmet-feather 
Burn'd like one burning flame together, 
As he rode down to Camelot. 95 
As often thro' the purple night, 
Below the starry clusters bright, 
Some bearded meteor, trailing light, 
Moves over still Shalott. 

His broad clear brow in sunlight glow'd; 100 
On burnish'd hooves his war-horse trode; 
From und...Read more of this...
by Tennyson, Alfred Lord

The Millers Tale

...s the newe perjenete* tree; *young pear-tree
And softer than the wool is of a wether.
And by her girdle hung a purse of leather,
Tassel'd with silk, and *pearled with latoun*. *set with brass pearls*
In all this world to seeken up and down
There is no man so wise, that coude thenche* *fancy, think of
So gay a popelot*, or such a wench. *puppet 
Full brighter was the shining of her hue,
Than in the Tower the noble* forged new. *a gold coin 
But of her song, it was as lou...Read more of this...
by Chaucer, Geoffrey

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