Famous Rifles Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Rifles poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous rifles poems. These examples illustrate what a famous rifles poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Sassoon, Siegfried
...e;
Everywhere men bang and blunder,
Sweat and swear and worship Chance,
Creep and blink through cannon thunder.
Rifles crack and bullets flick,
Sing and hum like hornet-swarms.
Bones are smashed and buried quick.
Yet, through stunning battle storms,
All the while I watch the spark
Lit to guide me; for I know
Dreams will triumph, though the dark
Scowls above me where I go.
You can hear me; you can mingle
Radiant folly with my jingle.
War's a j...Read more of this...
by
Seeger, Alan
...tain menace grew,
And they gave two years of their youth or three
The more to insure their liberty
When the wrath of rifles and pennoned spears
Should roll like a flood on their wrecked frontiers.
They wanted the war no more than you,
But when the dreadful summons blew
And the time to settle the quarrel came
They sprang to their guns, each man was game;
And mark if they fight not to the last
For their hearths, their altars, and their past:
Yea, fight till their...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...Grime, heat, rush—aid-de-camps galloping by, or on a full run;
With the patter of small arms, the warning s-s-t of the rifles, (these in my vision
I
hear or
see,)
And bombs busting in air, and at night the vari-color’d rockets....Read more of this...
by
Lawson, Henry
...farmer bands, and the war for a while is over,
You will hold the land – ay, you'll hold the land – the land that your rifles cover.
Till your gold has levelled each mountain range where a wounded man can hide,
Till your gold has lighted the moonless night on the plains where the rebels ride;
Till the future is proved, and the past is bribed from the son of the land's dead lover –
You may hold the land – you may hold the land just as far as your rifles cover....Read more of this...
by
Sassoon, Siegfried
...ge.
‘Lead on there, by platoons.’ (The Line’s a-glare
With shell-fire through the poplars; distant rattle
Of rifles and machine-guns.) ‘Fritz is there!
‘Christ, ain’t it lively, Sergeant? Is’t a battle?’
More rain: the lightning blinks, and thunder rumbles.
‘There’s over-head artillery!’ some chap grumbles.
What’s all this mob at the cross-roads? Where are the guides?...
‘Lead on with number One.’ And off they go.
‘Three minut...Read more of this...
by
Wilcox, Ella Wheeler
...harge are met.
From east and west, from north and south they come,
At call of bugle and at roll of drum.
Their rifles rain hot hail upon the foe,
Who flee from danger in death's jaws to go.
The Indians fight like maddened bulls at bay,
And dying shriek and groan, wound the young ear of day.
XVII.
A pallid captive and a white-browed boy
Add to the tumult piercing cries of joy,
As forth they fly, with high hope animate.
A hideous squaw pursues the...Read more of this...
by
Lawson, Henry
...d when,
And every point where a man might hide in the days when they'll fight as men.
When silent men with their rifles lie by many a ferny dell;
And turn their heads when a scout goes by, with a cheery growl "All's well";
And scouts shall climb by the fisherman's ways, and watch for a sign of ships,
With stern eyes fixed on the threatening haze where the blue horizon dips.
When men shall camp in the dark and damp by the bough-marked battery,
Between the fort...Read more of this...
by
Paterson, Andrew Barton
...see why --
But I soon found out why, for before me the hillside rose up like a wall,
And there on the top with their rifles were Gilbert, O'Meally and Hall!
'Twas a good three-mile run to the homestead -- bad going, with plenty of trees --
So I gathered the youngster together, and gripped at his ribs with my knees.
'Twas a mighty poor chance to escape them! It puts a man's nerve to the test
On a half-broken colt to be hunted by the best mounted men in the West.Read more of this...
by
Sandburg, Carl
...miners, Italians, Scots, Cornishmen, Yanks.
Killings ran under the spoken commands of this boy
With eighty men and rifles on a hogback mountain.
They killed swearing to remember
The shot and charred wives and children
In the burnt camp of Ludlow,
And Louis Tikas, the laughing Greek,
Plugged with a bullet, clubbed with a gun butt.
As a home war
It held the nation a week
And one or two million men stood together
And swore by the retribution of steel.
It was ...Read more of this...
by
Service, Robert William
...of magnificent orange yonder
Is a battery blazing miles away.
With a rush and a singing a great shell passes;
The rifles resentfully bicker and brawl,
And here I crouch in the dew-drenched grasses,
And look and listen and love it all.
God! What a life! But I must make haste now,
Before the shadow of night be spent.
It's little the time there is to waste now,
If I'd do the job for which I was sent.
My bombs are right and my clippers ready,
And I wriggle ...Read more of this...
by
Bryant, William Cullen
...ds of oaken leaves.
Well knows the fair and friendly moon
The band that Marion leads¡ª
The glitter of their rifles
The scampering of their steeds. 40
'T is life to guide the fiery barb
Across the moonlit plain;
'T is life to feel the night-wind
That lifts his tossing mane.
A moment in the British camp¡ª 45
A moment¡ªand away
Back to the pathless forest
Before the peep of day.
Grave men there are by broad Santee
Grave men with...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...straps on his light boots to complete in the race;
The western turkey-shooting draws old and young—some lean on their rifles,
some sit on logs,
Out from the crowd steps the marksman, takes his position, levels his piece;
The groups of newly-come immigrants cover the wharf or levee;
As the woolly-pates hoe in the sugar-field, the overseer views them from his
saddle;
The bugle calls in the ball-room, the gentlemen run for their partners, the
dancers bow to each o...Read more of this...
by
Lawson, Henry
...led him three times in the name of the Queen.
Then came from the darkness the clicking of locks;
The crack of the rifles was heard in the rocks!
A shriek and a shout, and a rush of pale men --
And there lay the bushranger, chancing it then.
The sergeant dismounted and knelt on the sod --
`Your bushranging's over -- make peace, Jack, with God!'
The bushranger laughed -- not a word he replied,
But turned to the girl who knelt down by his side.
He gazed in ...Read more of this...
by
Nowlan, Alden
...h
like a scaffolded king, straightened and lifted his horns
so that even the wardens backed away as they raised their rifles.
When he roared, people ran to their cars. All the young men
leaned on their automobile horns as he toppled....Read more of this...
by
Lawson, Henry
...their hides;
Long to feel the saddle tremble once again between our knees
And to hear the stockwhips rattle just like rifles in the trees!
Long to feel the bridle-leather tugging strongly in the hand
And to feel once more a little like a native of the land.
And the ring of bitter feeling in the jingling of our rhymes
Isn't suited to the country nor the spirit of the times.
Let us go together droving, and returning, if we live,
Try to understand each other whil...Read more of this...
by
Allingham, William
...ark and mean;
Poor always, not despairing until now;
Long used, as well as poverty knows how,
With life's oppressive trifles to contend.
This day will bring its history to an end.
Moveless and grim against the cottage walls
Lean a few silent men: but someone calls
Far off; and then a child 'without a stitch'
Runs out of doors, flies back with piercing screech,
And soon from house to house is heard the cry
Of female sorrow, swelling loud and high,
Which makes th...Read more of this...
by
Kipling, Rudyard
...e weeping fog rolled fold on fold the wrath of man to cloak,
And the flame-spurts pale ran down the rail as the sealing-rifles spoke.
The bullets bit on bend and butt, the splinter slivered free
(Little they trust to sparrow-dust that stop the seal in his sea!),
The thick smoke hung and would not shift, leaden it lay and blue,
But three were down on the Baltic's deck and two of the Stralsund's crew.
An arm's-length out and overside the banked fog held them bound,
But,...Read more of this...
by
Lawson, Henry
...scout,
When the race they ride on the battle track, and the waning distance hums,
And the shelled sky shrieks or the rifles crack
like stockwhip amongst the gums --
And the `straight' is reached and the field is `gapped'
and the hoof-torn sward grows red
With the blood of those who are handicapped with iron and steel and lead;
And the gaps are filled, though unseen by eyes,
with the spirit and with the shades
Of the world-wide rebel dead who'll rise and rush with th...Read more of this...
by
Lawson, Henry
...Bushman from Out Back,
From mountain range and rolling downs,
And carts race on each rough bush track
With food and rifles from the towns;
I see my Bushmen fight and die
Amongst the torn blood-spattered trees,
And hear all night the wounded cry
For men! More men and batteries!
I see the brown and yellow rule
The southern lands and southern waves,
White children in the heathen school,
And black and white together slaves;
I see the colour-line so drawn
(I see it ...Read more of this...
by
Dyke, Henry Van
...st meet.
The hoarse roar
Of the monster guns;
And the sharp bark
Of the lesser guns;
The whine of the shells,
The rifles' clatter
Where the bullets patter,
The rattle, rattle, rattle
Of the mitrailleuse in battle,
And the yells
Of the men who charge through hells
Where the poison gas descends,
And the bursting shrapnel rends
Limb from limb
In the dim
Chaos and clamor of the strife
Where no man thinks of his life
But only of fighting through,
Blindly fighting through, th...Read more of this...
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