Famous Meal Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Meal poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous meal poems. These examples illustrate what a famous meal poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Holmes, Oliver Wendell
...
So perhaps, after all, it's as well to he quiet
If you've nothing you think is worth saying in prose,
As to furnish a meal of their cannibal diet
To the critics, by publishing, as you propose.
But it's all of no use, and I'm sorry I've written,--
I shall see your thin volume some day on my shelf;
For the rhyming tarantula surely has bitten,
And music must cure you, so pipe it yourself....Read more of this...
by
Tebb, Barry
...lost that day
And Lucifer lay low
And six children grew
In Rough Lea by the
Poplar’s side and when I
Shared their meal; it was
A feast of love and Auntie
Betty smiled as I sat
Beside her on the bench
“There’s always room for
One more inside” and I went along
For the ride.
17
Ride-a-cock horse to
Roundhay Park where
The tram terminus still
Stands, a bay with poles
Of steel too tall and
Strong to shift, between
The cobbles, tram lines
Lay buried,...Read more of this...
by
Keats, John
...bs o'er polar seas?
Or will he touch me with his searing hand,
And leave a black memorial on the sand?
Or tear me piece-meal with a bony saw,
And keep me as a chosen food to draw
His magian fish through hated fire and flame?
O misery of hell! resistless, tame,
Am I to be burnt up? No, I will shout,
Until the gods through heaven's blue look out!--
O Tartarus! but some few days agone
Her soft arms were entwining me, and on
Her voice I hung like fruit among green leaves:
Her lip...Read more of this...
by
Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...The late and early roses from his wall,
Or conies from the down, and now and then,
With some pretext of fineness in the meal
To save the offence of charitable, flour
From his tall mill that whistled on the waste.
But Philip did not fathom Annie's mind:
Scarce could the woman when he came upon her,
Out of full heart and boundless gratitude
Light on a broken word to thank him with.
But Philip was her children's all-in-all;
From distant corners of the street they ran
T...Read more of this...
by
Hugo, Victor
...led his place
Before assuming princely pomp and power
To sup one night in Corbus' olden tower.
From this weird meal he passed to the degree
Of Prince and Margrave; nor could ever he
Be thought brave knight, or she—if woman claim
The rank—be reckoned of unblemished fame
Till they had breathed the air of ages gone,
The funeral odors, in the nest alone
Of its dead masters. Ancient was the race;
To trace the upward stem of proud Lusace
Gives one a...Read more of this...
by
Field, Edward
...ong" on the violin
while tears come into our dear monster s eyes
as he thinks of the stones of the mob the pleasures of meal-time,
the magic new words he has learned
and above all of the friend he has found.
It is just as well that he is unaware --
being simple enough to believe only in the present --
that the mob will find him and pursue him
for the rest of his short unnatural life,
until trapped at the whirlpool's edge
he plunges to his death....Read more of this...
by
Homer,
...o Thoricus, and these the women landed on the shore in full throng and the men likewise, and they began to make ready a meal by the stern-cables of the ship. But my heart craved not pleasant food, and I fled secretly across the dark country and escaped my masters, that they should not take me unpurchased across the sea, there to win a price for me. And so I wandered and am come here: and I know not at all what land this is or what people are in it. But may all tho...Read more of this...
by
Nash, Ogden
...e,
Which is when people spend their time and yours apologizing for everything they own.
You go to their house for a meal,
And they apologize because the anchovies aren't caviar or the partridge is veal;
They apologize privately for the crudeness of the other guests,
And they apologize publicly for their wife's housekeeping or their husband's jests;
If they give you a book by Dickens they apologize because it isn't by Scott,
And if they take you to the theater, they apolog...Read more of this...
by
Marvell, Andrew
...ow if China clay
Can, without breaking, venomed juice convey,
Or how a mortal poison she may draw
Out of the cordial meal of the cacao.
Witness, ye stars of night, and thou the pale
Moon, that o'ercame with the sick steam didst fail;
Ye neighboring elms, that your green leaves did shed,
And fawns that from the womb abortive fled;
Not unprovoked, she tries forbidden arts,
But in her soft breast love's hid cancer smarts,
While she resoloves, at once, Sidney's disg...Read more of this...
by
Moore, Marianne
...ians
of another person's happiness."
He says, "These mummies
must be handled carefully --
`the crumbs from a lion's meal,
a couple of shins and the bit of an ear';
turn to the letter M
and you will find
that `a wife is a coffin,'
that severe object
with the pleasing geometry
stipulating space and not people,
refusing to be buried
and uniquely disappointing,
revengefully wrought in the attitude
of an adoring child
to a distinguished parent."
She says, "This butterfly,
...Read more of this...
by
Brautigan, Richard
...eggs and cooking oil.
My friend told me that she was a very fine cook. That
she could really cook up a good meal, fancy dishes, too, on
that single hot plate, next to the peach tree.
They had a good world going for them. He had such a soft
voice and manner that he worked as a private nurse for rich
mental patients. He made good money when he worked, but
sometimes he was sick himself. He was kind of run down.
She was still working for the...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...d all overcome heroes!
And the numberless unknown heroes, equal to the greatest heroes known.
19
This is the meal equally set—this is the meat for natural hunger;
It is for the wicked just the same as the righteous—I make appointments
with all;
I will not have a single person slighted or left away;
The kept-woman, sponger, thief, are hereby invited;
The heavy-lipp’d slave is invited—the venerealee is invited:
There shall be no difference between them and...Read more of this...
by
Wordsworth, William
...ghed, And knew not why. My happy father died When sad distress reduced the childrens' meal: Thrice happy! that from him the grave did hide The empty loom, cold hearth, and silent wheel, And tears that flowed for ills which patience could not heal. 'Twas a hard change, an evil time was come; We had no hope, and no relief could gain. But soon, with...Read more of this...
by
Scott, Sir Walter
...Muttered their soldier matins try,
And then awaked their fire, to steal,
As short and rude, their soldier meal.
That o'er, the Gael around him threw
His graceful plaid of varied hue,
And, true to promise, led the way,
By thicket green and mountain gray.
A wildering path!—they winded now
Along the precipice's brow,
Commanding the rich scenes beneath,
The windings of the Forth and Teith,
And all the vales betwe...Read more of this...
by
Chaucer, Geoffrey
...e
Throughout the sea of Greece, unto the strait
Of Maroc*, as it was her a venture: *Morocco; Gibraltar
On many a sorry meal now may she bait,
After her death full often may she wait*, *expect
Ere that the wilde waves will her drive
Unto the place *there as* she shall arrive. *where
Men mighten aske, why she was not slain?
Eke at the feast who might her body save?
And I answer to that demand again,
Who saved Daniel in the horrible cave,
Where every wight, save he, master...Read more of this...
by
Dryden, John
...y rise
First to dislike and after to dispise;
Then, Cyclop-like, in human flesh to deal,
Chop up a minister at every meal;
Perhaps not wholly to melt down the king,
But clip his regal rights within the ring;
From thence to asssume the power of peace and war
And ease him by degrees of public care.
Yet, to consult his dignity and fame,
He should have leave to exercise the name,
And hold the cards while Commons played the game.
For what can power give more tha...Read more of this...
by
Kipling, Rudyard
...such craft as mine.
There is never a Law on the Cocos Keys to hold a white man in,
But we do not steal the niggers' meal, for that is a ******'s sin.
Must he have his Law as a quid to chaw, or laid in brass on his wheel?
Does he steal with tears when he buccaneers? 'Fore Gad, then, why does he steal?"
The skipper bit on a deep-sea word, and the word it was not sweet,
For he could see the Captains Three had signalled to the Fleet.
But three and two, in white and bl...Read more of this...
by
Lowell, Amy
...ch should bring the lustihood
Of human life to his lady's veins.
When all was ready, all which pertains
To a simple meal was there, with eyes
Lit by the joy of his great emprise,
He reverently bade her come,
And forsake for him her distant home.
He put meat on her plate and filled her glass,
And waited what should come to pass.
The Shadow lay quietly on the wall.
From the street outside came a watchman's call
"A cloudy night. Rain beginning to fall."
A...Read more of this...
by
Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns)
...low on whom assurance sits
As a silk hat on a Bradford millionaire.
The time is now propitious, as he guesses,
The meal is ended, she is bored and tired,
Endeavours to engage her in caresses
Which still are unreproved, if undesired.
Flushed and decided, he assaults at once;
Exploring hands encounter no defence;
His vanity requires no response,
And makes a welcome of indifference.
(And I Tiresias have foresuffered all
Enacted on this same divan or bed;
I who have...Read more of this...
by
Wordsworth, William
...d grass in the green field. My Sister! ('tis a wish of mine) Now that our morning meal is done, Make haste, your morning task resign; Come forth and feel the sun. Edward will come with you, and pray, Put on with speed your woodland dress, And bring no book, for this one day We'll give to idleness. No joyless forms shall...Read more of this...
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