Famous Pittance Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Pittance poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous pittance poems. These examples illustrate what a famous pittance poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Thomas Hardy
THE sun had wheeled from Grey's to Dammer's Crest,
And still I mused on that Thing imminent:
At length I sought the High-street to the West.
The level flare raked pane and pediment
And my wrecked face, and shaped my nearing friend
Like one of those the Furnace held unshent.
"I've news concerning her," he said. "Attend.
They fly to-night at the late moon's first gleam:
Watch...Read more of this...
by
William Cowper
Here lies, whom hound did ne’er pursue,
Nor swiftewd greyhound follow,
Whose foot ne’er tainted morning dew,
Nor ear heard huntsman’s hallo’,
Old Tiney, surliest of his kind,
Who, nurs’d with tender care,
And to domestic bounds confin’d,
Was still a wild Jack-hare.
Though duly from my hand he took
His pittance ev’ry night,
He did it with a jealous look,
And, when he could, would bite.
His diet was of...Read more of this...
by
Rainer Maria Rilke
I am always going from door to door,
whether in rain or heat,
and sometimes I will lay my right ear in
the palm of my right hand.
And as I speak my voice seems strange as if
it were alien to me,
for I'm not certain whose voice is crying:
mine or someone else's.
I cry for a pittance to sustain me.
The poets cry for more.
In...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
She risked her all, they told me, bravely sinking
The pinched economies of thirty years;
And there the little shop was, meek and shrinking,
The sum of all her dreams and hopes and fears.
Ere it was opened I would see them in it,
The gray-haired dame, the daughter with her crutch;
So fond, so happy, hoarding every minute,
Like artists, for the final tender touch.
The...Read more of this...
by
Robert Southey
(Time, Noon.)
HUMPHREY:
See'st thou not William that the scorching Sun
By this time half his daily race has run?
The savage thrusts his light canoe to shore
And hurries homeward with his fishy store.
Suppose we leave awhile this stubborn soil
To eat our dinner and to rest from toil!
WILLIAM:
Agreed. Yon tree whose purple gum bestows
A ready medicine for the sick-man's woes,
Forms with its shadowy...Read more of this...
by
Barry Tebb
Memories bursting like tears or waves
On some lonely Adriatic shore
Beating again and again
Threshings of green sea foam
Flecked like the marble Leonardo
Chipped for his ‘Moses’.
And my tears came as suddenly
In that dream, criss-crossed
With memory and desire.
Grandad Nicky had worked
Down the pits for a pittance
To bring up his six children
But nothing left over for more
Than a few nuts and an orange
For...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Give me a skin of wine, a crust of bread
A pittance bare, a book of verse to read;
With thee, O love, to share my lowly roof,
I would not take the Sultan's realm instead!...Read more of this...
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...
by
William Butler Yeats
I
Blessed be this place,
More blessed still this tower;
A bloody, arrogant power
Rose out of the race
Uttering, mastering it,
Rose like these walls from these
Storm-beaten cottages -
In mockery I have set
A powerful emblem up,
And sing it rhyme upon rhyme
In mockery of a time
Half dead at the top.
II
Alexandria's was a beacon tower, and Babylon's
An image of the moving heavens, a log-book of the...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Superiority to Fate
Is difficult to gain
'Tis not conferred of Any
But possible to earn
A pittance at a time
Until to Her surprise
The Soul with strict economy
Subsist till Paradise....Read more of this...
by
William Cowper
Delia, the unkindest girl on earth,
When I besought the fair,
That favour of intrinsic worth
A ringlet of her hair,
Refused that instant to comply
With my absurd request,
For reasons she could specify,
Some twenty score at least.
Trust me, my dear, however odd
It may appear to say,
I sought it merely to defraud
Thy spoiler of his prey.
Yes! when its sister locks shall fade,
As quickly fade...Read more of this...
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