Famous Match Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Match poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous match poems. These examples illustrate what a famous match poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Paterson, Andrew Barton
...the fray;
And if the grasshoppers come our way
You turn your duck into the lucerne patch,
And I'd be ready to make a match
That the grasshoppers eat his feathers off!"
"He came to visit us by and by,
And it just so happened one day in spring
A kind of cloud came over the sky --
A wall of grasshoppers nine miles high,
And nine miles thick, and nine hundred wide,
Flyin' in regiments, side by side,
And eatin' up every living thing.
"All day long, like a shower ...Read more of this...
by
Mayakovsky, Vladimir
...an
into the centuries,
if you can, a last scream: I¡¯m on fire!
2
Glorify me!
For me the great are no match.
Upon every achievement
I stamp nihil
I never want
to read anything.
Books?
What are books!
Formerly I believed
books were made like this:
a poet came,
lightly opened his lips,
and the inspired fool burst into song ¨C
if you please!
But it seems,
before they can launch into a song,
poets must tramp for days wit...Read more of this...
by
Smart, Christopher
...ions to control,
Finds meat and med'cine to the soul,
Which for translation pants.
LXV
For ADORATION, beyond match,
The scholar bullfinch aims to catch
The soft flute's iv'ry touch;
And, careless on the hazel spray,
The daring redbreast keeps at bay
The damsel's greedy clutch.
LXVI
For ADORATION in the skies,
The Lord's philosopher espies
The Dog, the Ram, and Rose;
The planet's ring, Orion's sword;
Nor is his greatness less ador'd
In the vile...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...
I will see if the fishes and birds are to be enough for themselves, and I am not to be
enough
for myself.
20
I match my spirit against yours, you orbs, growths, mountains, brutes,
Copious as you are, I absorb you all in myself, and become the master myself.
America isolated, yet embodying all, what is it finally except myself?
These States—what are they except myself?
I know now why the earth is gross, tantalizing, wicked—it is for my sake,
I take you to be...Read more of this...
by
Aldington, Richard
...gods of bitter dullness,
Cruel local gods
Who scared my childhood.
II
I've seen people put
A chrysalis in a match-box,
"To see," they told me, "what sort of moth would come."
But when it broke its shell
It slipped and stumbled and fell about its prison
And tried to climb to the light
For space to dry its wings.
That's how I was.
Somebody found my chrysalis
And shut it in a match-box.
My shrivelled wings were beaten,
Shed their colours in...Read more of this...
by
Byron, George (Lord)
..., and better days,
Nor mark of vulgar toil that hand betrays,
So femininely white it might bespeak
Another sex, when match'd with that smooth cheek,
But for his garb, and something in his gaze,
More wild and high than woman's eye betrays;
A latent fierceness that far more became
His fiery climate than his tender frame:
True, in his words it broke not from his breast,
But from his aspect might be more than guess'd.
Kaled his name, though rumour said he bore
Anot...Read more of this...
by
Marvell, Andrew
...dim,
Sketching in shady smoke prodigious tools?
'Twill serve this race of drunkards, pimps and fools.
But if to match our crimes thy skill presumes,
As th' Indians, draw our luxury in plumes.
Or if to score out our compendious fame,
With Hooke, then, through the microscope take aim,
Where, like the new Comptroller, all men laugh
To see a tall louse brandish the white staff.
Else shalt thou oft thy guiltless pencil curse,
Stamp on thy palette, not perhap...Read more of this...
by
Angelou, Maya
...round the fear. When the
Air disappears,
Your mind pops, exploding fiercely, briefly,
Like the head of a kitchen match. Shattered.
It is your juice
That runs down their legs. Staining their shoes.
When the earth rights itself again,
And taste tries to return to the tongue,
Your body has slammed shut. Forever.
No keys exist.
Then the window draws full upon
Your mind. There, just beyond
The sway of curtains, men walk.
Knowi...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...und of words, thir sense the air
Dissolves unjointed e're it reach my ear.
Chor: Hee speaks, let us draw nigh. Matchless in might,
The glory late of Israel, now the grief;
We come thy friends and neighbours not unknown
From Eshtaol and Zora's fruitful Vale
To visit or bewail thee, or if better,
Counsel or Consolation we may bring,
Salve to thy Sores, apt words have power to swage
The tumors of a troubl'd mind,
And are as Balm to fester'd wounds.
Sam: Your comin...Read more of this...
by
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
...!
Do you think, O blue-eyed banditti,
Because you have scaled the wall,
Such an old mustache as I am
Is not a match for you all!
I have you fast in my fortress,
And will not let you depart,
But put you down into the dungeon
In the round-tower of my heart.
And there will I keep you forever,
Yes, forever and a day,
Till the walls shall crumble to ruin,
And moulder in dust away! ...Read more of this...
by
Wordsworth, William
...aithful bark, Or hang on tiptoe at the lifted latch; The gloomy lantern, and the dim blue match, The black disguise, the warning whistle shrill, And ear still busy on its nightly watch, Were not for me, brought up in nothing ill; Besides, on griefs so fresh my thoughts were brooding still. What could I do, unaided and unblest? Poor Father! gone was e...Read more of this...
by
Browning, Robert
..., sparklingly, sunlit,
Our green Moldavia, the streaky syrup,
Cotnar as old as the time of the Druids---
Friendship may match with that monarch of fluids;
Each supples a dry brain, fills you its ins-and-outs,
Gives your life's hour-glass a shake when the thin sand doubts
Whether to run on or stop short, and guarantees
Age is not all made of stark sloth and arrant ease.
I have seen my little lady once more,
Jacynth, the Gipsy, Berold, and the rest of it,
For to me spoke th...Read more of this...
by
Bridges, Robert Seymour
...st turn'd
Nor come the heavenly sun and bathing blue
To my life's need more splendid and unearn'd
Than hath thy gift outmatch'd desire and due.
10
Winter was not unkind because uncouth;
His prison'd time made me a closer guest,
And gave thy graciousness a warmer zest,
Biting all else with keen and angry tooth
And bravelier the triumphant blood of youth
Mantling thy cheek its happy home possest,
And sterner sport by day put strength to test,
And custom's feast at night g...Read more of this...
by
Scott, Sir Walter
...fs attention bowed;
For still the burden of thy minstrelsy
Was Knighthood's dauntless deed, and Beauty's matchless eye.
O, wake once more! how rude soe'er the hand
That ventures o'er thy magic maze to stray;
O, wake once more! though scarce my skill command
Some feeble echoing of thine earlier lay:
Though harsh and faint, and soon to die away,
And all unworthy of thy nobler strain,
Yet if one heart throb high...Read more of this...
by
Chaucer, Geoffrey
...but a lite*: *little
And I shall such a feast and revel make,
That, as I trow, I shall the Soudan quite.* *requite, match
For though his wife be christen'd ne'er so white,
She shall have need to wash away the red,
Though she a fount of water with her led."
O Soudaness*, root of iniquity, *Sultaness
Virago thou, Semiramis the second!
O serpent under femininity,
Like to the serpent deep in hell y-bound!
O feigned woman, all that may confound
Virtue and innocence, throu...Read more of this...
by
Chaucer, Geoffrey
...well begun.
Now telleth ye, Sir Monk, if that ye conne*, *know
Somewhat, to quiten* with the Knighte's tale." *match
The Miller that fordrunken was all pale,
So that unnethes* upon his horse he sat, *with difficulty
He would avalen* neither hood nor hat, *uncover
Nor abide* no man for his courtesy, *give way to
But in Pilate's voice he gan to cry,
And swore by armes, and by blood, and bones,
"I can a noble tale for the nones* *occasion,
With which I will now quite...Read more of this...
by
Lowell, Amy
...of pearl,
And little wires all awhirl
With the light of the candle. He took the watch
And wound its hands about to match
The time, then glanced up to take the hour
From the hanging clock.
Good, Merciful Power!
How came that shadow on the wall,
No woman was in the room! His tall
Chiffonier stood gaunt behind
His chair. His old cloak, rabbit-lined,
Hung from a peg. The door was closed.
Just for a moment he must have dozed.
He looked again, and saw it p...Read more of this...
by
Montgomery, Lucy Maud
...failed to do.
I had not scaled such weary heights
But that I held thy scorn in fear,
And never keenest lure might match
The subtle goading of thy sneer.
Thine anger struck from me a fire
That purged all dull content away,
Our mortal strife to me has been
Unflagging spur from day to day.
And thus, while all the world may laud
The gifts of love and loyalty,
I lay my meed of gratitude
Before thy feet, mine enemy!...Read more of this...
by
Brautigan, Richard
...r a
ride.
The sun was like a huge fifty-cent piece that someone had
poured kerosene on and then had lit with a match and said,
"Here, hold this while I go get a newspaper, " and put the
coin in my hand, but never came back.
I had walked for miles and miles until I came to the rock
under the tree and sat down. Every time a car would come
by, about once every ten minutes, I would get up and stick
out my thumb as if it were a bunch of bananas and then sit...Read more of this...
by
Swift, Jonathan
...such a case they talk in tropes,
And by their fears express their hopes:
Some great misfortune to portend,
No enemy can match a friend.
With all the kindness they profess,
The merit of a lucky guess
(When daily how-d'ye's come of course,
And servants answer, Worse and worse!)
Would please 'em better than to tell
That "God be praised, the Dean is well."
Then he who prophecied the best
Approves his foresight to the rest:
"You know I always feared the worst,
And often to...Read more of this...
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