Famous Piper Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Piper poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous piper poems. These examples illustrate what a famous piper poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Robert Louis Stevenson
AGAIN I hear you piping, for I know the tune so well, -
You rouse the heart to wander and be free,
Tho' where you learned your music, not the God of song can tell,
For you pipe the open highway and the sea.
O piper, lightly footing, lightly piping on your way,
Tho' your music thrills and pierces far and near,
I tell you...Read more of this...
by
Edmund Spenser
OCTOBER: Ægloga DecimaPIERCE & CUDDIE
Cuddie, for shame hold up thy heavye head,
And let us cast with what delight to chace,
And weary thys long lingring Phoebus race.
Whilome thou wont the shepheards laddes to leade,
In rymes, in ridles, and in bydding base:
Now they in thee, and thou in sleepe art dead.
CUDDY
Piers, I have pyped erst so long with payne,
That all mine...Read more of this...
by
D. H. Lawrence
At evening, sitting on this terrace,
When the sun from the west, beyond Pisa, beyond the mountains of Carrara
Departs, and the world is taken by surprise ...
When the tired flower of Florence is in gloom beneath the glowing
Brown hills surrounding ...
When under the arches of the Ponte Vecchio
A green light enters against stream, flush...Read more of this...
by
Mother Goose
There was a piper had a cow,
And he had naught to give her;
He pulled out his pipes and played her a tune,
And bade the cow consider.
The cow considered very well,
And gave the piper a penny,
And bade him play the other tune,
"Corn rigs are bonny."...Read more of this...
by
Omer Tarin
Elves lived here, once,
where today the blanched shells lie
of snails
who have outlived their selves;
I would, if I could,
bring back elves
but I feel they would, too, like snails,
who have outlived their time,
lose themselves where once they lived.
(from A Sad Piper, 1994) ...Read more of this...
by
William Blake
PIPING down the valleys wild
Piping songs of pleasant glee
On a cloud I saw a child
And he laughing said to me:
'Pipe a song about a Lamb!' 5
So I piped with merry cheer.
'Piper pipe that song again;'
So I piped: he wept to hear.
'Drop thy pipe thy happy pipe;
Sing thy songs...Read more of this...
by
Omer Tarin
I
One quarter of a century has elapsed
the diurnal movement of a life-cycle
rotating on its own axis
turned inwards and away from
hung by a nail upon the casement
II
Two of the nine lives have drifted
sinking somewhere near the embankment
while out prowling the empty streets at night
digging in this corner and that
poking here and there
in the trashcans lining the alley
III
Three horsemen have...Read more of this...
by
William Blake
Piping down the valleys wild,
Piping songs of pleasant glee,
On a cloud I saw a child,
And he laughing said to me:
'Pipe a song about a lamb!'
So I piped with merry cheer.
'Piper, pipe that song again.'
So I piped: he wept to hear.
'Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe;
Sing thy songs of happy cheer.'
So I sung the same again,
While he wept with joy...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
Blind Peter Piper used to play
All up and down the city;
I'd often meet him on my way,
And throw a coin for pity.
But all amid his sparkling tones
His ear was quick as any
To catch upon the cobble-stones
The jingle of my penny.
And as upon a day that shone
He piped a merry measure:
"How well you play!" I chanced to say;
Poor Peter glowed...Read more of this...
by
Mother Goose
Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers;
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers,
Where's the peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked?...Read more of this...
by
Omer Tarin
Of my own salt, these hills are made
I am made of them
grey stone
red dust
black wash--
from the jagged edge I look down
the land stares up at me
it is as me, stark and thorny,
it prickles as I do,
it is of my own salt.
(c) Omer Tarin, 'A Sad Piper' 1994...Read more of this...
by
William Blake
Piping down the valleys wild
Piping songs of pleasant glee
On a cloud I saw a child.
And he laughing said to me.
Pipe a song about a Lamb:
So I piped with merry chear,
Piper, pipe that song again--
So I piped, he wept to hear.
Drop thy pipe thy happy pipe
Sing thy songs of happy chear,
So I sung the same again
While he wept with joy...Read more of this...
by
Mark Van Doren
How far is it to peace, the piper sighed,
The solitary, sweating as he paused.
Asphalt the noon; the ravens, terrified,
Fled carrion thunder that percussion caused.
The envelope of earth was powder loud;
The taut wings shivered, driven at the sun.
The piper put his pipe away and bowed.
Not here, he said. I hunt the love-cool one,
The dancer with the clipped hair. Where is...Read more of this...
by
Anne Sexton
Who's she, that one in your arms?
She's the one I carried my bones to
and built a house that was just a cot
and built a life that was over an hour
and built a castle where no one lives
and built, in the end, a song
to go with the ceremony.
Why have you brought her here?
Why do you knock on my door
with your...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
A Tale
"Of Brownyis and of Bogilis full is this Buke."
—Gawin Douglas.
When chapman billies leave the street,
And drouthy neebors neebors meet,
As market-days are wearing late,
An' folk begin to tak' the gate;
While we sit bousing at the nappy,
An' getting fou and unco happy,
We think na on the lang Scots miles,
The mosses, waters, slaps, and stiles,
That lie between us and our...Read more of this...
by
Robert Graves
Cherries of the night are riper
Than the cherries pluckt at noon
Gather to your fairy piper
When he pipes his magic tune:
Merry, merry,
Take a cherry;
Mine are sounder,
Mine are rounder,
Mine are sweeter
For the eater
Under the moon.
And you’ll be fairies soon.
In the cherry pluckt at night,...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
WHEN chapman billies leave the street,
And drouthy neibors, neibors, meet;
As market days are wearing late,
And folk begin to tak the gate,
While we sit bousing at the nappy,
An’ getting fou and unco happy,
We think na on the lang Scots miles,
The mosses, waters, slaps and stiles,
That lie between us and our hame,
Where sits our sulky, sullen dame,
Gathering her brows like gathering...Read more of this...
by
Seamus Heaney
The piper coming from far away is you
With a whitewash brush for a sporran
Wobbling round you, a kitchen chair
Upside down on your shoulder, your right arm
Pretending to tuck the bag beneath your elbow,
Your pop-eyes and big cheeks nearly bursting
With laughter, but keeping the drone going on
Interminably, between catches of breath.
*
The whitewash brush. An old blanched skirted thing
On the back...Read more of this...
by
T Wignesan
for J. C. Alldridge
Flagellant!
Flexor of the Temple's
Flexuous moulded walls
The high reliefs sallying through your
Flaunting fingers
Wrap the holy-comer with your
Invocatory maul
While word of vedic prayer
Seeps from some steepening Brahmin wall
O stretched bowel of your potted paunch
In perspiration's puffing piped paean
Rivet the eyes of man and god
Outside the walls of priestly palaver
Monotonic bell and OM
OM and monotonic bell
OM OMM OM...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
IN comin by the brig o’ Dye,
At Darlet we a blink did tarry;
As day was dawnin in the sky,
We drank a health to bonie Mary.
Chorus.—Theniel Menzies’ bonie Mary,
Theniel Menzies’ bonie Mary,
Charlie Grigor tint his plaidie,
Kissin’ Theniel’s bonie Mary.
Her een sae bright, her brow sae white,
Her haffet locks as brown’s a berry;
And aye they dimpl’t...Read more of this...
by
G K Chesterton
You whom the kings saluted; who refused not
The one great pleasure of ignoble days,
Fame without name and glory without gossip,
Whom no biographer befouls with praise.
Who said of you "Defeated"? In the darkness
The dug-out where the limelight never comes,
Nor the big drum of Barnum's show can shatter
That vibrant stillness after all the drums.
Though the time comes when every Yankee circus
Can...Read more of this...
by
Sylvia Plath
'Perspective betrays with its dichotomy:
train tracks always meet, not here, but only
in the impossible mind's eye;
horizons beat a retreat as we embark
on sophist seas to overtake that mark
where wave pretends to drench real sky.'
'Well then, if we agree, it is not odd
that one man's devil is another's god
or that the solar spectrum is
a multitude of...Read more of this...
by
William Butler Yeats
O'Driscoll drove with a song
The wild duck and the drake
From the tall and the tufted reeds
Of the drear Hart Lake.
And he saw how the reeds grew dark
At the coming of night-tide,
And dreamed of the long dim hair
Of Bridget his bride.
He heard while he sang and dreamed
A piper piping away,
And never was piping so sad,
And never was piping so gay.
And...Read more of this...
by
Omer Tarin
Had I seen the ghosts of this place
They would dance their victory dance;
Glorious vale
Cup, chalice,
Basin;
The glacial streams
Empty into that lake
Quiet, ever so silent,
Rippling lyre, reflection;
Snows and rocks frame it —
I have no words
Only emotions
Which boil and rise
With the thunder of horses,
The sound of stick
And ball thudding
Across the turf;
The ghosts of this place,
Had I but seen them,
Pale as the snow
Cold as...Read more of this...
by
William Blake
Piping down the valleys wild,
Piping songs of pleasant glee,
On a cloud I saw a child,
And he laughing said to me:
'Pipe a song about a Lamb!'
So I piped with merry cheer.
'Piper, pipe that song again;'
So I piped: he wept to hear.
'Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe;
Sing thy songs of happy cheer:!'
So I sang the same again,
While he wept with joy...Read more of this...
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