Famous Railroad Track Poems by Famous Poets

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

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The Ballad Of Caseys Billy-Goat

by Robert William Service
 You've heard of "Casey at The Bat,"
 And "Casey's Tabble Dote";
 But now it's time
 To write a rhyme
 Of "Casey's Billy-goat."

Pat Casey had a billy-goat he gave the name of Shamus,
Because it was (the neighbours said) a national disgrace.
And sure enough that animal was eminently famous
For masticating every rag of laundry round the place.
For shirts to skirts prodigiously...Read more of this...

Travel

by Edna St. Vincent Millay
 The railroad track is miles away, 
 And the day is loud with voices speaking, 
Yet there isn't a train goes by all day 
 But I hear its whistle shrieking.

All night there isn't a train goes by, 
 Though the night is still for sleep and dreaming, 
But I see its cinders red on the sky, 
 And...Read more of this...

Child of the Romans

by Carl Sandburg
 THE dago shovelman sits by the railroad track
Eating a noon meal of bread and bologna.
A train whirls by, and men and women at tables
Alive with red roses and yellow jonquils,
Eat steaks running with brown gravy,
Strawberries and cream, eclaires and coffee.
The dago shovelman finishes the dry bread and bologna,
Washes it down with a dipper from the water-boy,
And goes back to...Read more of this...

A Ballad of Ducks

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 The railway rattled and roared and swung 
With jolting and bumping trucks. 
The sun, like a billiard red ball, hung 
In the Western sky: and the tireless tongue 
Of the wild-eyed man in the corner told 
This terrible tale of the days of old, 
And the party that ought to have kept the ducks. 
"Well, it ain't all joy...Read more of this...

Chemin De Fer

by Elizabeth Bishop
 Alone on the railroad track
 I walked with pounding heart.
The ties were too close together
 or maybe too far apart.

The scenery was impoverished:
 scrub-pine and oak; beyond
its mingled gray-green foliage
 I saw the little pond

where the dirty old hermit lives,
 lie like an old tear
holding onto its injuries
 lucidly year after year.

The hermit shot off his shot-gun
 and the...Read more of this...

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