Famous Pretensions Poems by Famous Poets

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

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548. The Dean of Faculty: A new Ballad

...e,
Which shews that heaven can boil the pot,
 Tho’ the devil piss in the fire.


Squire Hal, besides, had in this case
 Pretensions rather brassy;
For talents, to deserve a place,
 Are qualifications saucy.
So their worships of the Faculty,
 Quite sick of merit’s rudeness,
Chose one who should owe it all, d’ye see,
 To their gratis grace and goodness.


As once on Pisgah purg’d was the sight
 Of a son of Circumcision,
So may be, on this Pisgah height,
 Bob’s purblind mental v...Read more of this...
by Burns, Robert


Maternity

...d Cube led to the bridal bed
That cute and acute Triangle.
The Square's sad lot she has long forgot,
And his passionate pretensions . . .
For she dotes on her kids-Oh such cute Pyramids
In a world of three dimensions....Read more of this...
by Service, Robert William

On Receipt Of My Mothers Picture

...ay to me.
My boast is not that I deduce my birth
From loins enthron'd, and rulers of the earth;
But higher far my proud pretensions rise--
The son of parents pass'd into the skies.
And now, farewell--time, unrevok'd, has run
His wonted course, yet what I wish'd is done.
By contemplation's help, not sought in vain,
I seem t' have liv'd my childhood o'er again;
To have renew'd the joys that once were mine,
Without the sin of violating thine:
And, while the wings of fancy still ...Read more of this...
by Cowper, William

Poetry Is A Kind Of Lying

...eauty. But also in
that truth may be told only so.

Those who, admirably, refuse
to falsify (as those who will not
risk pretensions) are excluded
from saying even so much.

Degas said he didn't paint
what he saw, but what
would enable them to see
the thing he had....Read more of this...
by Gilbert, Jack

Possum Trot

...ich locality as this I 've named to you;
But never mind, I know the place, an' I love it dearly too.
It don't make no pretensions to bein' great or fine,
The circuses don't come that way, they ain't no railroad line.
It ain't no great big city, where the schemers plan an' plot,
But jest a little settlement, this place called Possum Trot.
But don't you think the folks that lived in that outlandish place
Were ignorant of all the things that go for sense or grace.
Why, t...Read more of this...
by Laurence Dunbar, Paul


The Flaming Circle

...completion,
Surrounded by flames that embraced us but left no burns,
To-day we are only ourselves; we have plans and pretensions;
We move in dividing streets with our small and different concerns.

Merging and rending, we wait for the miracle. Meanwhile
The fire runs deeper, consuming these selves in its growth.
Can this be the mystical marriage—this clash and communion;
This pain of possession that frees and encircles us both?...Read more of this...
by Untermeyer, Louis

The Revolutionary

...ays. 

I shall be so glad when it comes down. 
I am so tired of the limitations of their Infinite. 
I am so sick of the pretensions of the Spirit. 
I am so weary of pale-face importance. 

Am I not blind, at the round-turning mill? 
Then why should I fear their pale faces? 
Or love the effulgence of their holy light, 
The sun of their righteousness? 

To me, all faces are dark, 
All lips are dusky and valved. 

Save your lips, O pale-faces, 
Which are slips of metal, 
Like sl...Read more of this...
by Lawrence, D. H.

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