Famous Loaf Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Loaf poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous loaf poems. These examples illustrate what a famous loaf poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Robert William Service
Because my overcoat's in pawn,
I choose to take my glass
Within a little bistro on
The rue du Montparnasse;
The dusty bins with bottles shine,
The counter's lined with zinc,
And there I sit and drink my wine,
And think and think and think.
I think of hoary old Stamboul,
Of Moslem and of Greek,
Of Persian in coat of wool,
Of Kurd and Arab sheikh;
Of all the types...Read more of this...
by
Edna St. Vincent Millay
"Son," said my mother,
When I was knee-high,
"you've need of clothes to cover you,
and not a rag have I.
"There's nothing in the house
To make a boy breeches,
Nor shears to cut a cloth with,
Nor thread to take stitches.
"There's nothing in the house
But a loaf-end of rye,
And a harp with a woman's head
Nobody will buy,"
And she began to cry.
That was in the...Read more of this...
by
Conrad Aiken
The snow floats down upon us, mingled with rain . . .
It eddies around pale lilac lamps, and falls
Down golden-windowed walls.
We were all born of flesh, in a flare of pain,
We do not remember the red roots whence we rose,
But we know that we rose and walked, that after a while
We shall lie down again.
The snow floats down upon...Read more of this...
by
Philip Larkin
Walking around in the park
Should feel better than work:
The lake, the sunshine,
The grass to lie on,
Blurred playground noises
Beyond black-stockinged nurses -
Not a bad place to be.
Yet it doesn't suit me.
Being one of the men
You meet of an afternoon:
Palsied old step-takers,
Hare-eyed clerks with the jitters,
Waxed-fleshed out-patients
Still vague from accidents,
And characters in long coats
Deep in the litter-baskets -
All dodging the toad...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Sooner with half a loaf contented be,
And water from a broken crock, like me,
Than lord it over one poor fellow-man,
Or to another bow the vassal knee....Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Let him rejoice who has a loaf of bread,
A little nest wherein to lay his head,
Is slave to none, and no man slaves for him,—
In truth his lot is wondrous well bested....Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
God gave a loaf to every bird,
But just a crumb to me;
I dare not eat it, though I starve,--
My poignant luxury
To own it, touch it, prove the feat
That made the pellet mine,--
Too happy in my sparrow chance
For ampler coveting.
It might be famine all around,
I could not miss an ear,
Such plenty smiles upon my board,
My garner shows so fair.
I wonder how...Read more of this...
by
John Betjeman
Here among long-discarded cassocks,
Damp stools, and half-split open hassocks,
Here where the vicar never looks
I nibble through old service books.
Lean and alone I spend my days
Behind this Church of England baize.
I share my dark forgotten room
With two oil-lamps and half a broom.
The cleaner never bothers me,
So here I eat my frugal tea.
My bread is sawdust mixed with straw;
My jam is...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
An olive fire's a lovely thing;
Somehow it makes me think of Spring
As in my grate it over-spills
With dancing flames like daffodils.
They flirt and frolic, twist and twine,
The brassy fire-irons wink and shine. . . .
Leap gold, you flamelets! Laugh and sing:
An olive fire's a lovely thing.
An olive fire's a household shrine:
A crusty loaf, a jug of wine,
An apple and...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
In this world, he who commands a loaf of bread and
who can cover his body with any garment whatsoever,
he who is neither master nor servant, tell him to live
content, for he has a sweet existence....Read more of this...
by
Katherine Mansfield
The further the little girl leaped and ran,
The further she longed to be;
The white, white fields of jonquil flowers
Danced up as high as her knee
And flashed and sparkled before her eyes
Until she could hardly see.
So into the wood went she.
It was quiet in the wood,
It was solemn and grave;
A sound like a wave
Sighed in the tree-tops
And then sighed no...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
With a loaf of wheaten bread, two mens of wine and
meat in plenty, and seated in some desert spot with
some young beauty decked with cheeks tinted with the
tulip's blush, man hath a joy not given to any Sultan to
procure.
391...Read more of this...
by
Robert Browning
I. THE FLOWER'S NAME
Here's the garden she walked across,
Arm in my arm, such a short while since:
Hark, now I push its wicket, the moss
Hinders the hinges and makes them wince!
She must have reached this shrub ere she turned,
As back with that murmur the wicket swung;
For she laid the poor snail, my chance foot spurned,
To feed and forget it the...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
A Saucer holds a Cup
In sordid human Life
But in a Squirrel's estimate
A Saucer hold a Loaf.
A Table of a Tree
Demands the little King
And every Breeze that run along
His Dining Room do swing.
His Cutlery -- he keeps
Within his Russer Lips --
To see it flashing when he dines
Do Birmingham eclipse --
Convicted -- could we be
Of our Minutiae
The smallest Citizen that flies
Is...Read more of this...
by
Ted Hughes
Freezing dusk is closing
Like a slow trap of steel
On trees and roads and hills and all
That can no longer feel.
But the carp is in its depth
Like a planet in its heaven.
And the badger in its bedding
Like a loaf in the oven.
And the butterfly in its mummy
Like a viol in its case.
...Read more of this...
by
Les Murray
All the air conditioners now slacken
their hummed carrier wave. Once again
we've served our three months with remissions
in the steam and dry iron of this seaboard.
In jellied glare, through the nettle-rash season
we've watched the sky's fermenting laundry
portend downpours. Some came, and steamed away,
and we were clutched back into the rancid
saline midnights of orifice weather,
to damp grittiness and wiping off the...Read more of this...
by
Henry Van Dyke
I
When tulips bloom in Union Aquare,
And timid breaths of vernal air
Go wandering down the dusty town,
Like children lost in Vanity Fair;
When every long, unlovely row
Of westward houses stands aglow,
And leads the eyes to sunset skies
Beyond the hills where green trees grow;
Then wearly seems the street parade,
And weary books, and...Read more of this...
by
Carl Sandburg
TODAY I will let the old boat stand
Where the sweep of the harbor tide comes in
To the pulse of a far, deep-steady sway.
And I will rest and dream and sit on the deck
Watching the world go by
And take my pay for many hard days gone I remember.
I will choose what clouds I like
In the great white fleets that wander...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
God gave a Loaf to every Bird --
But just a Crumb -- to Me --
I dare not eat it -- tho' I starve --
My poignant luxury --
To own it -- touch it --
Prove the feat -- that made the Pellet mine --
Too happy -- for my Sparrow's chance --
For Ampler Coveting --
It might be Famine -- all around --
I...Read more of this...
by
Denise Duhamel
my mother pushed my sister out of the apartment door with an empty
suitcase because she kept threatening to run away my sister was sick of me
getting the best of everything the bathrobe with the pink stripes instead of
the red the soft middle piece of bread while she got the crust I was sick with
asthma and she...Read more of this...
by
Elizabeth Bishop
At six o'clock we were waiting for coffee,
waiting for coffee and the charitable crumb
that was going to be served from a certain balcony
—like kings of old, or like a miracle.
It was still dark. One foot of the sun
steadied itself on a long ripple in the river.
The first ferry of the day had just...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Deprived of other Banquet,
I entertained Myself --
At first -- a scant nutrition --
An insufficient Loaf --
But grown by slender addings
To so esteemed a size
'Tis sumptuous enough for me --
And almost to suffice
A Robin's famine able --
Red Pilgrim, He and I --
A Berry from our table
Reserve -- for charity --...Read more of this...
by
Marilyn Hacker
Spring wafts up the smell of bus exhaust, of bread
and fried potatoes, tips green on the branches,
repeats old news: arrogance, ignorance, war.
A cinder-block wall shared by two houses
is new rubble. On one side was a kitchen
sink and a cupboard, on the other was
a bed, a bookshelf, three framed photographs.
Glass is shattered across the photographs;
two half-circles of hardened pocket bread
sit...Read more of this...
by
Victor Hugo
("Je suis la Charité.")
{February, 1837.}
"Lo! I am Charity," she cries,
"Who waketh up before the day;
While yet asleep all nature lies,
God bids me rise and go my way."
How fair her glorious features shine,
Whereon the hand of God hath set
An angel's attributes divine,...Read more of this...
by
Philip Levine
Still sober, César Vallejo comes home and finds a black ribbon
around the apartment building covering the front door.
He puts down his cane, removes his greasy fedora, and begins
to untangle the mess. His neighbors line up behind him
wondering what's going on. A middle-aged woman carrying
a loaf of fresh bread asks him to step aside so...Read more of this...
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