Famous Method Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Astrophel and Stella: XV

by Sir Philip Sidney
 You that do search for every purling spring
Which from the ribs of old Parnassus flows,
And every flower, not sweet perhaps, which grows
Near thereabouts, into your poesy wring;
Ye that do dictionary's method bring
Into your rimes, running in rattling rows;
You that poor Petrarch's long-deceased woes
With new-born sighs and denizen'd wit do sing:
You take wrong ways; those far-fet helps be such
As do...Read more of this...

Evil minded

by Ehsan Sehgal
"To lie, cheat, pretend, flirt, deceive, fool, misguide, double-cross and all that kinds of actions are the method of the evil minded people."
Ehsan Sehgal...Read more of this...

Old Pardon the Son of Reprieve

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 You never heard tell of the story? 
Well, now, I can hardly believe! 
Never heard of the honour and glory 
Of Pardon, the son of Reprieve? 
But maybe you're only a Johnnie 
And don't know a horse from a hoe? 
Well, well, don't get angry, my sonny, 
But, really, a young un should know. 
They bred him out back...Read more of this...

Cartographies of Silence

by Adrienne Rich
 1.

A conversation begins
with a lie. and each 

speaker of the so-called common language feels
the ice-floe split, the drift apart 

as if powerless, as if up against
a force of nature 

A poem can being
with a lie. And be torn up. 

A conversation has other laws
recharges itself with its own 

false energy, Cannot be torn
up. Infiltrates our blood. Repeats itself. 

Inscribes...Read more of this...

To find a remedy, put up with pain,

by Omar Khayyam
To find a remedy, put up with pain,
Chafe not at woe, and healing thou wilt gain;
Though poor, be ever of a thankful mind,
'Tis the sure method riches to obtain....Read more of this...

Our New Horse

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 The boys had come back from the races 
All silent and down on their luck; 
They'd backed 'em, straight out and for places, 
But never a winner they's struck. 
They lost their good money on Slogan, 
And fell most uncommonly flat 
When Partner, the pride of the Bogan, 
Was beaten by Aristocrat. 
And one said, "I move that instanter...Read more of this...

83. The Cotter's Saturday Night

by Robert Burns
 MY lov’d, my honour’d, much respected friend!
 No mercenary bard his homage pays;
With honest pride, I scorn each selfish end,
 My dearest meed, a friend’s esteem and praise:
 To you I sing, in simple Scottish lays,
The lowly train in life’s sequester’d scene,
 The native feelings strong, the guileless ways,
What Aiken in a cottage would have been;
Ah! tho’ his worth...Read more of this...

A Panegyric To Sir Lewis Pemberton

by Robert Herrick
 Till I shall come again, let this suffice,
I send my salt, my sacrifice
To thee, thy lady, younglings, and as far
As to thy Genius and thy Lar;
To the worn threshold, porch, hall, parlour, kitchen,
The fat-fed smoking temple, which in
The wholesome savour of thy mighty chines,
Invites to supper him who dines:
Where laden spits, warp'd with large ribs of beef,
Not represent, but...Read more of this...

The Carnival

by Robert Creeley
 Whereas the man who hits
the gong dis-
proves it, in all its
simplicity --

Even so the attempt
makes for triumph, in
another man.

Likewise in love I
am not foolish or in-
competent. My method is not a

tenderness, but hope
defined....Read more of this...

Watching The Mayan Women

by Luisa Villani
 I hang the window inside out
 like a shirt drying in a breeze
and the arms that are missing come to me
 Yes, it's a song, one I don't quite comprehend
although I do understand the laundry.
 White ash and rain water, a method
my aunt taught me, but I'll never know
 how she learned it in Brooklyn. Her mind
has gone to...Read more of this...

Sonnet XLII: Some Men There Be

by Michael Drayton
 Some men there be which like my method well 
And much commend the strangeness of my vein; 
Some say I have a passing pleasing strain; 
Some say that im my humor I excel; 
Some, who not kindly relish my conceit, 
They say, as poets do, I use to feign, 
And in bare words paint out my passion's pain. 
Thus...Read more of this...

Sonnet II

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET II. Per far una leggiadra sua vendetta. HOW HE BECAME THE VICTIM OF LOVE.  For many a crime at once to make me smart,And a delicious vengeance to obtain,Love secretly took up his bow again,As one who acts the cunning coward's part;My courage had retired within my heart,There to...Read more of this...

Sonnet XV: You That Do Search

by Sir Philip Sidney
 You that do search for every purling spring, 
Which from the ribs of old Parnassus flows, 
And every flower, not sweet perhaps, which grows 
Near thereabouts, into your poesy wring; 

You that do dictionary's method bring 
Into your rimes, running in rattling rows; 
You that poor Petrarch's long-deceased woes, 
With new-born sighs and denizen'd wit do sing, 

You take...Read more of this...

Army Headquarters

by Rudyard Kipling
 Ahasuerus Jenkins of the "Operatic Own,"
Was dowered with a tenor voice of super-Santley tone.
His views on equitation were, perhaps, a trifle *****.
He had no seat worth mentioning, but oh! he had an ear.

He clubbed his wretched company a dozen times a day;
He used to quit his charger in a parabolic way;
His method of saluting was the joy of all...Read more of this...

Fit the Third ( Hunting of the Snark )

by Lewis Carroll
 The Baker's Tale 

They roused him with muffins--they roused him with ice--
They roused him with mustard and cress--
They roused him with jam and judicious advice--
They set him conundrums to guess. 
When at length he sat up and was able to speak,
His sad story he offered to tell;
And the Bellman cried "Silence! Not even a shriek!"
And excitedly tingled his bell....Read more of this...

Mesmerism

by Robert Browning
 I.

All I believed is true!
I am able yet
All I want, to get
By a method as strange as new:
Dare I trust the same to you?

II.

If at night, when doors are shut,
And the wood-worm picks,
And the death-watch ticks,
And the bar has a flag of smut,
And a cat's in the water-butt---

III.

And the socket floats and flares,
And the house-beams groan,
And a foot unknown
Is...Read more of this...

Garden Francies

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...

Fit the Fifth ( Hunting of the Snark )

by Lewis Carroll
 The Beaver's Lesson 

They sought it with thimbles, they sought it with care; 
They pursued it with forks and hope; 
They threatened its life with a railway-share; 
They charmed it with smiles and soap. 

Then the Butcher contrived an ingenious plan 
For making a separate sally; 
And fixed on a spot unfrequented by man, 
A dismal and desolate valley....Read more of this...

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