Famous Sentenced Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Sentenced poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous sentenced poems. These examples illustrate what a famous sentenced poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Scannell, Vernon
...eam before me, like apples ranged on shelves,
And yet I feel no pinch or prick of envy
Nor would I have them know their sentenced selves.
With careful effort I can separate the faces,
The dull, the clever, the various shapes and sizes,
But in the autumn shades I find I only
Brood upon death, who carries off all the prizes....Read more of this...
by
von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang
...a bridge chanced to have the ill luck,
When once a man with head and ears
A saint in people's eyes appears,
Or has been sentenced piteously
Beneath the hangman's hand to die,
He's as a noted person prized,
In portrait is immortalized.
Engravings, woodcuts, are supplied,
And through the world spread far and wide.
Upon them all is seen his name,
And ev'ry one admits his claim;
Even the image of the Lord
Is not with greater zeal ador'd.
Strange fancy of the human rac...Read more of this...
by
Cohen, Leonard
...They sentenced me to twenty years of boredom
For trying to change the system from within
I'm coming now, I'm coming to reward them
First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin.
I'm guided by a signal in the heavens
I'm guided by this birthmark on my skin
I'm guided by the beauty of our weapons
First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin.
I'd really...Read more of this...
by
Scannell, Vernon
...The less certain I feel of anything I do.
But now I begin
To digress. Write down these simple sentences:--
I am sentenced: I love: I murder: I sin....Read more of this...
by
Hugo, Victor
...ook her life.
Kings, he is of you! fit companion! one
Whom day by day the lightning looks upon
Keen; while the sentenced man triples his guard
And trembles; for his hour approaches hard.
Ye ask me "when?" I say soon! Hear ye not
Yon muttering in the skies above the spot?
Mark ye no coming shadow, Kings? the shroud
Of a great storm driving the thunder-cloud?
Hark! like the thief-catcher who pulls the pin,
God's thunder asks to speak to o...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...,
The stammerer, the sick, the perfect-form’d, the homely,
The criminal that stood in the box, the judge that sat and sentenced him, the fluent
lawyers,
the
jury, the audience,
The laugher and weeper, the dancer, the midnight widow, the red squaw,
The consumptive, the erysipelite, the idiot, he that is wrong’d,
The antipodes, and every one between this and them in the dark,
I swear they are averaged now—one is no better than the other,
The night and sleep have liken’...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...shape of the gambling-board with its devilish winnings and losings;
The shape of the step-ladder for the convicted and sentenced murderer, the murderer with
haggard
face and pinion’d arms,
The sheriff at hand with his deputies, the silent and white-lipp’d crowd, the dangling of
the
rope.
The shapes arise!
Shapes of doors giving many exits and entrances;
The door passing the dissever’d friend, flush’d and in haste;
The door that admits good news and bad news;
Th...Read more of this...
by
Cohen, Leonard
...in Vienna
where your mouth had a thousand reviews.
There's a bar where the boys have stopped talking,
they've been sentenced to death by the blues.
Ah, but who is it climbs to your picture
with a garland of freshly cut tears?
Ay, ay ay ay
Take this waltz, take this waltz,
take this waltz, it's been dying for years.
There's an attic where children are playing,
where I've got to lie down with you soon,
in a dream of Hungarian lanterns,
in the mist of some sweet af...Read more of this...
by
Housman, A E
...mptiness, and cursed
Whatever brute and blackguard made the world.
It is in truth iniquity on high
To cheat our sentenced souls of aught they crave,
And mar the merriment as you and I
Fare on our long fool's-errand to the grave.
Iniquity it is; but pass the can.
My lad, no pair of kings our mothers bore;
Our only portion is the estate of man:
We want the moon, but we shall get no more.
If here to-day the cloud of thunder lours
To-morrow it will h...Read more of this...
by
Hood, Thomas
...dge, and a little judge,
The judges of a-size !
The great judge took his judgment cap,
And put it on his head,
And sentenced Tim by law to hang
Till he was three times dead.
So he was tried, and he was hung
(Fit punishment for such)
On Horsham-drop, and none can say
It was a drop too much....Read more of this...
by
Milligan, Spike
...Unaware of my crime
they stood me in the dock.
I was sentenced to life....
without her.
Strange trial.
No judge.
No jury.
I wonder who my visitors will be....Read more of this...
by
Dickinson, Emily
...Door
Thou paused at, for a passing bounty --
No More --
Accused -- wert Thou -- and Myself -- Tribunal --
Convicted -- Sentenced -- Ermine -- not to Me
Half the Condition, thy Reverse -- to follow --
Just to partake -- the infamy --
The Tenant of the Narrow Cottage, wert Thou --
Permit to be
The Housewife in thy low attendance
Contenteth Me --
No Service hast Thou, I would not achieve it --
To die -- or live --
The first -- Sweet, proved I, ere I saw thee --
For Life -- be...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...YOU felons on trial in courts;
You convicts in prison-cells—you sentenced assassins, chain’d and
hand-cuff’d
with
iron;
Who am I, too, that I am not on trial, or in prison?
Me, ruthless and devilish as any, that my wrists are not chain’d with iron, or my
ankles
with
iron?
You prostitutes flaunting over the trottoirs, or obscene in your rooms,
Who am I, that I should call you more obscene than myself?
O culpab...Read more of this...
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