Famous Sardonic Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Break of Day in the Trenches

...The darkness crumbles away 
It is the same old druid Time as ever, 
Only a live thing leaps my hand, 
A ***** sardonic rat, 
As I pull the parapet's poppy
To stick behind my ear. 
Droll rat, they would shoot you if they knew 
Your cosmopolitan sympathies, 
Now you have touched this English hand 
You will do the same to a German
Soon, no doubt, if it be your pleasure 
To cross the sleeping green between. 
It seems you inwardly grin as you pass 
Strong eyes, fine limb...Read more of this...
by Rosenberg, Isaac


Conversion

...ardian of Souls,
Drunk with rum,
Feasting on strange cassava,
Yielding to new words and a weak palabra
Of a white-faced sardonic god--
Grins, cries
Amen,
Shouts hosanna....Read more of this...
by Toomer, Jean

Lui Et Elle

...She is large and matronly
And rather dirty,
A little sardonic-looking, as if domesticity had driven her to it.
Though what she does, except lay four eggs at random in the garden once a year
And put up with her husband,
I don't know.

She likes to eat.
She hurries up, striding reared on long uncanny legs
When food is going.
Oh yes, she can make haste when she likes.
She snaps the soft bread from my hand in grea...Read more of this...
by Lawrence, D. H.

Poet And Peer

...e;
But when they asked would he recite
Something of late he'd chanced to write
 He ettled to decline.

Then with a sly, sardonic look
He opened up a little book
 Containing many a gem;
And as they sat in raiment fine,
So smug and soused with rosy wine,
 This verse he read to them.

'You see yon birkie caw'ed a Lord,
 Who struts and stares an' a' that,
Though hundreds worship at his word
 He's but a coof for a' that.
For a' that and a' that,
 A man's a man for a' that.

He poi...Read more of this...
by Service, Robert William

Robert William Service - Laughter

...a shining spear;
So let us laugh with all our might at folly, fraud and fear.
Yet on our sorry selves be spent our most sardonic glee.
Oh don't pay life a compliment to take is seriously.
For he who can himself despise, be surgeon to the bone,
May win to worth in others' eyes, to wisdom in his own....Read more of this...
by Service, Robert William


The Ballad Of The Black Fox Skin

...ered the snow; the air was strangely mild;
The valley's girth was dumb with mirth, the laughter of the wild;
The still, sardonic laughter of an ogre o'er a child.

The river writhed beneath the ice; it groaned like one in pain,
And yawning chasms opened wide, and closed and yawned again;
And sheets of silver heaved on high until they split in twain.

From out the road-house by the trail they saw a man afar
Make for the narrow river-reach where the swift cross-currents are;
Wh...Read more of this...
by Service, Robert William

The Great Adventure of Max Breuck

...lips could only cry, "Christine!
My Dearest Love! My Wife! Where are you gone?
What future is our past? What saturnine,
Sardonic devil's jest has bid us live
Two years together in a puff of smoke?
It was no dream, I swear it! In some star,
Or still imprisoned in Time's egg, you give
Me love. I feel it. Dearest Dear, this stroke
Shall never part us, I will reach to where you are."

61
His burning eyeballs stared into the dark.
The moon had long been set. And still he cried:
"C...Read more of this...
by Lowell, Amy

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