Famous Parents Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Parents poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous parents poems. These examples illustrate what a famous parents poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
William Topaz McGonagall
Annie Marshall was a foundling, and lived in Downderry,
And was trained up by a coast-guardsman, kind-hearted and merry
And he loved Annie Marshall as dear as his life,
And he resolved to make her his own loving wife.
The night was tempestuous, most terrific, and pitch dark,
When Matthew Pengelly rescued Annie Marshall from an ill-fated barque,
But her parents were engulfed in...Read more of this...
by
Marriott Edgar
Henry the Seventh of England
Wasn't out of the Royal top drawer,
The only connection of which he could boast,
He were King's nephew's brother-in-law.
It were after the Wars of the Roses
That he came to the front, as it were,
When on strength of his having slain Richard the Third
He put himself up as his heir.
T'were a bit of a blow to...Read more of this...
by
David Lehman
When my father
Said mein Fehler
I thought it meant
"I'm a failure"
which was my error
which is what
mein Fehler means
in German which
is what my parents
spoke at home...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
THERE was a child went forth every day;
And the first object he look’d upon, that object he became;
And that object became part of him for the day, or a certain part of the day, or for many
years, or
stretching cycles of years.
The early lilacs became part of this child,
And grass, and white and red...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
NOT alone those camps of white, O soldiers,
When, as order’d forward, after a long march,
Footsore and weary, soon as the light lessen’d, we halted for the night;
Some of us so fatigued, carrying the gun and knapsack, dropping asleep in our tracks;
Others pitching the little tents, and the fires lit up began to sparkle;
Outposts of pickets...Read more of this...
by
William Matthews
The lump of coal my parents teased
I'd find in my Christmas stocking
turned out each year to be an orange,
for I was their sunshine.
Now I have one C. gave me,
a dense node of sleeping fire.
I keep it where I read and write.
"You're on chummy terms with dread,"
it reminds me. "You kiss ambivalence
on both cheeks. But if you close your
heart to...Read more of this...
by
Mary Darby Robinson
Swift, o'er the wild and dreary waste
A NUT-BROWN GIRL was seen to haste;
Wide waving was her unbound hair,
And sun-scorch'd was her bosom bare;
For Summer's noon had shed its beams
While she lay wrapp'd in fev'rish dreams;
While, on the wither'd hedge-row's side,
By turns she slept, by turns she cried,
"Ah ! where lies hid the balsam sweet,
"To heal the wounds of MARGUERITE?"
Dark...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
HOW cruel are the parents
Who riches only prize,
And to the wealthy booby
Poor Woman sacrifice!
Meanwhile, the hapless Daughter
Has but a choice of strife;
To shun a tyrant Father’s hate—
Become a wretched Wife.
The ravening hawk pursuing,
The trembling dove thus flies,
To shun impelling ruin,
Awhile her pinions tries;
Till, of escape despairing,
No shelter or retreat,
She trusts the ruthless...Read more of this...
by
A S J Tessimond
We being so hidden from those who
Have quietly borne and fed us,
How can we answer civilly
Their innocent invitations?
How can we say "we see you
As but-for-God's-grace-ourselves, as
Our caricatures (we yours), with
Time's telescope between us"?
How can we say "you presumed on
The accident of kinship,
Assumed our friendship coatlike,
Not as a badge one fights for"?
How say "and you remembered
The sins of our outlived...Read more of this...
by
Shel Silverstein
Last night, while I lay thinking here,
some Whatifs crawled inside my ear
and pranced and partied all night long
and sang their same old Whatif song:
Whatif I'm dumb in school?
Whatif they've closed the swimming pool?
Whatif I get beat up?
Whatif there's poison in my cup?
Whatif I start to cry?
Whatif I get sick and die?
Whatif I flunk that test?
Whatif green hair grows on...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
O THOU dread Power, who reign’st above,
I know thou wilt me hear,
When for this scene of peace and love,
I make this prayer sincere.
The hoary Sire—the mortal stroke,
Long, long be pleas’d to spare;
To bless this little filial flock,
And show what good men are.
She, who her lovely offspring eyes
With tender hopes and fears,
O bless her with...Read more of this...
by
Jane Austen
See they come, post haste from Thanet,
Lovely couple, side by side;
They've left behind them Richard Kennet
With the Parents of the Bride!
Canterbury they have passed through;
Next succeeded Stamford-bridge;
Chilham village they came fast through;
Now they've mounted yonder ridge.
Down the hill they're swift proceeding,
Now they skirt the Park around;
Lo! The Cattle sweetly feeding
Scamper, startled at the sound!
Run, my Brothers,...Read more of this...
by
Carolyn Kizer
for Maxine Kumin
Where did these enormous children come from,
More ladylike than we have ever been?
Some of ours look older than we feel.
How did they appear in their long dresses
More ladylike than we have ever been?
But they moan about their aging more than we do,
In their fragile heels and long black dresses.
They say they admire our youthful spontaneity.
They moan about...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
From out her shabby rain-coat pocket
The little Jew girl in the train
Produced a dinted silver locket
With pasted in it portraits twain.
"These are my parents, sir" she said;
"Or were, for now I fear they're dead.
"I know to Belsen they were sent;
I never heard of them again.
So many were like that - they went,
Our woeful quest was all in vain.
I was...Read more of this...
by
Anne Kingsmill Finch
Silvia, let's from the Crowd retire;
For, What to you and me
(Who but each other do desire)
Is all that here we see?
Apart we'll live, tho' not alone;
For, who alone can call
Those, who in Desarts live with One,
If in that One they've All?
The World a vast Meander is,
Where Hearts confus'dly stray;
Where...Read more of this...
by
Rg Gregory
so here we are at last at the ten-boy
never to be the single-figure-aged-again boy
and all the trailing clouds that cling to the not-big child
can be blown away - you're up in your own sky now
clear-blue on some days (if on others windy and wild)
now you'll have to see yourself as the tall-boy
the take-it-on-the-chin and care-for-all boy
and looking at what's...Read more of this...
by
Anne Kingsmill Finch
Farewell, lov'd Youth! since 'twas the Will of Heaven
So soon to take, what had so late been giv'n;
And thus our Expectations to destroy,
Raising a Grief, where we had form'd a Joy;
Who once believ'd, it was the Fates Design
In Him to double an Illustrious Line,
And in a second Channel spread that Race
Where ev'ry...Read more of this...
by
Phillis Wheatley
While deep you mourn beneath the cypress-shade
The hand of Death, and your dear daughter laid
In dust, whose absence gives your tears to flow,
And racks your bosom with incessant woe,
Let Recollection take a tender part,
Assuage the raging tortures of your heart,
Still the wild tempest of tumultuous grief,
And pour the heav'nly nectar of relief:
Suspend the sigh, dear Sir, and check the groan,
Divinely...Read more of this...
by
Catherine Anderson
I was in love with anatomy
the symmetry of my body
poised for flight,
the heights it would take
over parents, lovers, a keen
riding over truth and detail.
I thought growing up would be
this rising from everything
old and earthly,
not these faltering steps out the door
every day, then back again....Read more of this...
by
Anonymous
Before we close our eyes to-night,Oh, let us each these questions ask!Have we endeavored to do right,Nor thought our duty a hard task?Have we been gentle, lowly, meek,And the small voice of conscience heard?When passion tempted us to speak,Have we repressed the angry word?Have we with cheerful zeal obeyedWhat our kind parents bade us do?And not by word or action...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
Only a Leather Medal, hanging there on the wall,
Dingy and frayed and faded, dusty and worn and old;
Yet of my humble treasures I value it most of all,
And I wouldn't part with that medal if you gave me its weight in gold.
Read the inscription: For Valour - presented to Millie MacGee.
Ah! how in mem'ry it takes me back to...Read more of this...
by
Rg Gregory
(i) introduction
his home in ruins
his parents gone
frederick seeks
to reclaim his throne
to the golden mountain
he sets his path
the enchantress listening
schemes with wrath
four desperate trials
which she takes from store
to silence frederick
for ever...Read more of this...
by
Ogden Nash
Being a father
Is quite a bother.
You are as free as air
With time to spare,
You're a fiscal rocket
With change in your pocket,
And then one morn
A child is born.
Your life has been runcible,
Irresponsible,
Like an arrow or javelin
You've been constantly travelin'.
But mostly, I daresay,
Without a chaise percée,
To which by comparison
Nothing's embarison.
But all children matures,
Maybe even yours.
You improve them mentally
And straighten them dentally,
They...Read more of this...
by
William Strode
Lett her parents then confesse
That they beleeve her happinesse,
Which now they question. Thinke as you
Lent her the world, Heaven lent her you:
And is it just then to complayne
When each hath but his owne againe?
Then thinke what both your glories are
In her preferment: for tis farre
Nobler to gett a Saint, and beare
A childe to Heaven than an Heyre
To a large...Read more of this...
by
Robert Bly
As I drive my parents home through the snow
their frailty hesitates on the edge of a mountainside.
I call over the cliff
only snow answers.
They talk quietly
of hauling water of eating an orange
of a grandchild's photograph left behind last night.
When they open the door of their house they disappear.
And the oak when it falls in the forest who hears...Read more of this...
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