Famous Sam Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Sam poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous sam poems. These examples illustrate what a famous sam poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Robert William Service
"The North has got him." --Yukonism.
I tried to refine that neighbor of mine, honest to God, I did.
I grieved for his fate, and early and late I watched over him like a kid.
I gave him excuse, I bore his abuse in every way that I could;
I swore to prevail; I camped on his trail; I plotted and planned for...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen ***** sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee,...Read more of this...
by
Marriott Edgar
When Sam Small retired from the Army
He'd a pension of ninepence a day,
And seven pounds fourteen and twopence
He'd saved from his rations and pay.
He knew this 'ere wasn't a fortune,
But reckoned with prudence and care
He'd find some investment to save him
From hard work and things like that there.
He thought he'd invest in a race orse,...Read more of this...
by
Marriott Edgar
Sam Small had retired from the Army,
In the old Duke of Wellington's time,
So when present unpleasantness started,
He were what you might call... past his prime.
He'd lived for some years in retirement,
And knew nowt of war, if you please,
Till they blasted and bombed his allotment,
And shelled the best part of his peas.
'T were as if bugles called Sam to duty,
For...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
"The spirits do not like the light,"
The medium said, and turned the switch;
The little lady on my right
Clutched at my hand with nervous twitch.
(She seemed to be a pretty *****.)
The moustached women on my left,
With spirits on hr heavy breath,
Lasciviously leaned her heft
On me as one who languisheth.
The sordid room was still as death.
"A shape I see," the medium...Read more of this...
by
Eugene Field
TO MISS GRACE KING
Down in the old French quarter,
Just out of Rampart street,
I wend my way
At close of day
Unto the quaint retreat
Where lives the Voodoo Doctor
By some esteemed a sham,
Yet I'll declare there's none elsewhere
So skilled as Doctor Sam
With the claws of a deviled crawfish,
The juice of the prickly prune,
And the quivering dew
From a yarb that grew
In the light...Read more of this...
by
Andrew Barton Paterson
By the winding Wollondilly where the weeping willows weep,
And the shepherd, with his billy, half awake and half asleep,
Folds his fleecy flocks that linger homewards in the setting sun
Lived my hero, Jim the Ringer, "cocky" on Mylora Run.
Jimmy loved the super's daughter, Miss Amelia Jane McGrath.
Long and earnestly he sought her, but he feared...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
Only a Leather Medal, hanging there on the wall,
Dingy and frayed and faded, dusty and worn and old;
Yet of my humble treasures I value it most of all,
And I wouldn't part with that medal if you gave me its weight in gold.
Read the inscription: For Valour - presented to Millie MacGee.
Ah! how in mem'ry it takes me back to...Read more of this...
by
Richard Wilbur
I.
Kick at the rock, Sam Johnson, break your bones:
But cloudy, cloudy is the stuff of stones.
II.
We milk the cow of the world, and as we do
We whisper in her ear, 'You are not true.'...Read more of this...
by
William Blake
When silver snow decks Susan's clothes,
And jewel hangs at th' shepherd's nose,
The blushing bank is all my care,
With hearth so red, and walls so fair;
`Heap the sea-coal, come, heap it higher,
The oaken log lay on the fire.'
The well-wash'd stools, a circling row,
With lad and lass, how fair the show!
The merry can of nut-brown ale,
The laughing jest, the love-sick tale,
Till,...Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
I has hyeahd o' people dancin' an' I 's hyeahd o' people singin'.
An' I 's been 'roun' lots of othahs dat could keep de banjo ringin';
But of all de whistlin' da'kies dat have lived an' died since Ham,
De whistlin'est I evah seed was ol' Ike Bates's Sam.
In de kitchen er de stable, in de fiel' er mowin' hay,
You could hyeah...Read more of this...
by
Rg Gregory
sam swill
took a pill
went blue
ate stew
had pains
no brains
sucked a date
too late
swallowed stone
all alone
too proud
to cry aloud
scoffed cake
great ache
at work
went beserk
in a funk
did a bunk
hitch hike
stole a bike
empty car
not too far
flat tyre
on fire
skid swerve
lost his nerve
bang crash
frantic dash
turned bend
pond at end
police whistle
fall on thistle
jump in air
pond there
shocked scream
can't swim
hold breath
certain death
police leap
foot deep
soaking wet
vow they'll get
sam swill
off up hill
put in...Read more of this...
by
David Lehman
700 francs will get you $109.91
on this muggy May afternoon
which is good to know since
I just found 700 francs in my wallet
while Dinah Washington was singing
"My Old Flame" I was thinking of where
I was with Glen when Allen Ginsberg died
and if I could relax for one hour
if I knew what that felt like
it would seem like a very long...Read more of this...
by
Marriott Edgar
It was Christmas Day in the trenches
In Spain in Penninsular War,
And Sam Small were cleaning his musket
A thing as he'd ne're done before.
They'd had 'em inspected that morning
And Sam had got into disgrace,
For when sergeant had looked down the barrel
A sparrow flew out in his face.
The sergeant reported the matter
To Lieutenant Bird then and there.
Said Lieutenant 'How very disgusting'
The...Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
Dear Miss Lucy: I been t'inkin' dat I 'd write you long fo' dis,
But dis writin' 's mighty tejous, an' you know jes' how it is.
But I 's got a little lesure, so I teks my pen in han'
Fu' to let you know my feelin's since I retched dis furrin' lan'.
I 's right well, I 's glad to tell you...Read more of this...
by
Alfred Lord Tennyson
Dosn't thou 'ear my 'erse's legs, as they canters awaäy?
Proputty, proputty, proputty--that's what I 'ears 'em saäy.
Proputty, proputty, proputty--Sam, thou's an ass for thy paaïns:
Theer's moor sense i' one o' 'is legs, nor in all thy braaïns.
Woä--theer's a craw to pluck wi' tha, Sam; yon 's parson's 'ouse--
Dosn't thou knaw that a man mun be eäther a man or...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
When I was boxing in the ring
In 'Frisco back in ninety-seven,
I used to make five bucks a fling
To give as good as I was given.
But when I felt too fighting gay,
And tried to be a dinger-donger,
My second, Mike Muldoon. would say:
"Go easy, kid; you'll stay the longer."
When I was on the Yukon trail
The boys would warn, when things were...Read more of this...
by
Allen Ginsberg
I
In the depths of the Greyhound Terminal
sitting dumbly on a baggage truck looking at the sky
waiting for the Los Angeles Express to depart
worrying about eternity over the Post Office roof in
the night-time red downtown heaven
staring through my eyeglasses I realized shuddering
these thoughts were not eternity, nor the poverty
of...Read more of this...
by
Craig Raine
(for Rona, Jeremy, Sam & Grace)
All the lizards are asleep--
perched pagodas with tiny triangular tiles,
each milky lid a steamed-up window.
Inside, the heart repeats itself like a sleepy gong,
summoning nothing to nothing.
In winter time, the zoo reverts to metaphor,
God's poetry of boredom:
the cobra knits her Fair-Isle skin,
rattlers titter over the same joke.
All of them endlessly finish spaghetti.
The python runs down...Read more of this...
by
Marriott Edgar
When Sam Small joined the regiment,
'E were no' but a raw recruit,
And they marched 'im away one wint'ry day,
'Is musket course to shoot.
They woke 'im up at the crack o' dawn,
Wi' many a nudge and shake,
'E were dreaming that t' Sergeant 'ad broke 'is neck,
And 'e didn't want to wake.
Lieutenant Bird came on parade,
And chided the lads for mooning,
'E...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
The porter in the Pullman car
Was charming, as they sometimes are.
He scanned my baggage tags: "Are you
The man who wrote of Lady Lou?"
When I said "yes" he made a fuss -
Oh, he was most assiduous;
And I was pleased to think that he
Enjoyed my brand of poetry.
He was forever at my call,
So when we got to Montreal
And he had brushed...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
Says I to my Missis: "Ba goom, lass! you've something I see, on your mind."
Says she: "You are right, Sam, I've something. It 'appens it's on me be'ind.
A Boil as 'ud make Job jealous. It 'urts me no end when I sit."
Says I: "Go to 'ospittel, Missis. They might 'ave to coot it a bit."
Says she: "I just 'ate...Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
Oh, de grubbin'-hoe 's a-rustin' in de co'nah,
An' de plow 's a-tumblin' down in de fiel',
While de whippo'will 's a-wailin' lak a mou'nah
When his stubbo'n hea't is tryin' ha'd to yiel'.
In de furrers whah de co'n was allus wavin',
Now de weeds is growin' green an' rank an' tall;
An' de swallers roun' de whole place is a-bravin'
Lak dey thought deir folks...Read more of this...
by
Edgar Lee Masters
I ran away from home with the circus,
Having fallen in love with Mademoiselle Estralada,
The lion tamer.
One time, having starved the lions
For more than a day,
I entered the cage and began to beat Brutus
And Leo and Gypsy.
Whereupon Brutus sprang upon me,
And killed me.
On entering these regions
I met a shadow who cursed me,
And said it served me right....
It was Robespierre!...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
You want me to tell you a story, a yarn of the firin' line,
Of our thin red kharki 'eroes, out there where the bullets whine;
Out there where the bombs are bustin',
and the cannons like 'ell-doors slam --
Just order another drink, boys, and I'll tell you of Soulful Sam.
Oh, Sam, he was never 'ilarious, though I've 'ad some mates as...Read more of this...
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