Famous Snuff Out Poems by Famous Poets

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

See also:

Alexander VI Dines with the Cardinal of Capua

by Stephen Vincent Benet
 Next, then, the peacock, gilt 
With all its feathers. Look, what gorgeous dyes 
Flow in the eyes! 
And how deep, lustrous greens are splashed and spilt 
Along the back, that like a sea-wave's crest 
Scatters soft beauty o'er th' emblazoned breast! 

A strange fowl! But most fit 
For feasts like this, whereby I honor one 
Pure as the sun!...Read more of this...

The Ladys Dressing Room

by Jonathan Swift
 Five hours, (and who can do it less in?)
By haughty Celia spent in dressing;
The goddess from her chamber issues,
Arrayed in lace, brocades, and tissues.
Strephon, who found the room was void
And Betty otherwise employed,
Stole in and took a strict survey
Of all the litter as it lay;
Whereof, to make the matter clear,
An inventory follows here.
And first a dirty smock appeared,
Beneath the...Read more of this...

The Emperor's Return

by Victor Hugo
 ("Un bouffon manquait à cette fête.") 
 
 {LES BURGRAVES, Part II.} 


 The EMPEROR FREDERICK BARBAROSSA, believed to be dead, appearing 
 as a beggar among the Rhenish nobility at a castle, suddenly reveals 
 himself. 
 
 HATTO. This goodly masque but lacked a fool! 
 First gypsy; next a beggar;—good! Thy name? 
 
 BARBAROSSA. Frederick...Read more of this...

Nine Little Goblins

by James Whitcomb Riley
 THEY all climbed up on a high board-fence---
 Nine little Goblins, with green-glass eyes---
Nine little Goblins that had no sense,
 And couldn't tell coppers from cold mince pies;
 And they all climbed up on the fence, and sat---
 And I asked them what they were staring at.

And the first one said, as he scratched his head
 With a *****...Read more of this...

White Horses

by Rudyard Kipling
 Where run your colts at pasture?
 Where hide your mares to breed?
'Mid bergs about the Ice-cap
 Or wove Sargasso weed;
By chartless reef and channel,
 Or crafty coastwise bars,
But most the ocean-meadows
 All purple to the stars!

Who holds the rein upon you?
 The latest gale let free.
What meat is in your mangers?
 The glut of all the sea.
'Twixt tide and...Read more of this...

Phantasmagoria CANTO IV ( Hys Nouryture )

by Lewis Carroll
 "OH, when I was a little Ghost, 
A merry time had we! 
Each seated on his favourite post, 
We chumped and chawed the buttered toast 
They gave us for our tea." 

"That story is in print!" I cried. 
"Don't say it's not, because 
It's known as well as Bradshaw's Guide!" 
(The Ghost uneasily replied 
He hardly thought it was)....Read more of this...

The Rape of the Lock: Canto 5

by Alexander Pope
 She said: the pitying audience melt in tears, 
But Fate and Jove had stopp'd the Baron's ears.
In vain Thalestris with reproach assails,
For who can move when fair Belinda fails?
Not half so fix'd the Trojan could remain,
While Anna begg'd and Dido rag'd in vain.
Then grave Clarissa graceful wav'd her fan;
Silence ensu'd, and thus the nymph began.
"Say, why are beauties prais'd...Read more of this...

There was an old man at a Station

by Edward Lear
There was an old man at a Station,Who made a promiscuous oration;But they said, "Take some snuff!—You have talk'd quite enough,You afflicting old man at a Station!" ...Read more of this...

The Rape of the Lock: Canto 3

by Alexander Pope
 Close by those meads, for ever crown'd with flow'rs, 
Where Thames with pride surveys his rising tow'rs,
There stands a structure of majestic frame,
Which from the neighb'ring Hampton takes its name.
Here Britain's statesmen oft the fall foredoom
Of foreign tyrants and of nymphs at home;
Here thou, great Anna! whom three realms obey,
Dost sometimes counsel take--and sometimes tea.
Hither the heroes and the...Read more of this...

Milkmaid

by Laurie Lee
 The girl's far treble, muted to the heat,
calls like a fainting bird across the fields
to where her flock lies panting for her voice,
their black horns buried deep in marigolds.

They climb awake, like drowsy butterflies,
and press their red flanks through the tall branched grass,
and as they go their wandering tongues embrace
the vacant summer mirrored in their eyes.

Led to the limestone...Read more of this...

Meddlesome Matty

by Ann Taylor
 One ugly trick has often spoil'd
The sweetest and the best; 
Matilda, though a pleasant child, 
One ugly trick possess'd, 
Which, like a cloud before the skies, 
Hid all her better qualities. 

Sometimes she'd lift the tea-pot lid, 
To peep at what was in it, 
Or tilt the kettle, if you did 
But turn your back a minute. 
In vain...Read more of this...

Lepracaun or Fairy Shoemaker The

by William Allingham
 Little Cowboy, what have you heard,
Up on the lonely rath's green mound?
Only the plaintive yellow bird
Sighing in sultry fields around,
Chary, chary, chary, chee-ee! -
Only the grasshopper and the bee? -
"Tip-tap, rip-rap,
Tick-a-tack-too!
Scarlet leather, sewn together,
This will make a shoe.
Left, right, pull it tight;
Summer days are warm;
Underground in winter,
Laughing at the storm!"
Lay your ear close to the hill.
Do you not catch...Read more of this...

Barber

by Mother Goose
Barber, barber, shave a pig.
How many hairs will make a wig?
Four and twenty; that's enough.
Give the barber a pinch of snuff....Read more of this...

Waring

by Robert Browning
 I

What's become of Waring
Since he gave us all the slip,
Chose land-travel or seafaring,
Boots and chest, or staff and scrip,
Rather than pace up and down
Any longer London-town?

Who'd have guessed it from his lip,
Or his brow's accustomed bearing,
On the night he thus took ship,
Or started landward?—little caring
For us, it seems, who supped together,
(Friends of his too, I remember)
And walked home through...Read more of this...

A dull sound varying now and again

by Forrest Hamer
 And then we began eating corn starch,
chalk chewed wet into sirup. We pilfered
Argo boxes stored away to stiffen
my white dress shirt, and my cousin
and I played or watched TV, no longer annoyed
by the din of never cooling afternoons.

On the way home from church one fifth Sunday,
shirt outside my pants, my tie clipped on
its wrinkling collar, I found a new...Read more of this...

In The Morning

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
'Lias! 'Lias! Bless de Lawd!
Don' you know de day's erbroad?
Ef you don' git up, you scamp,
Dey 'll be trouble in dis camp.
T'ink I gwine to let you sleep
W'ile I meks yo' boa'd an' keep?
Dat's a putty howdy-do—
Don' you hyeah me, 'Lias—you?
Bet ef I come crost dis flo'
You won' fin' no time to sno'.
Daylight all a-shinin' in
Wile you sleep—w'y hit's a...Read more of this...

A Satirical Elegy

by Jonathan Swift
 On the Death of a Late FAMOUS GENERAL


His Grace! impossible! what dead!
Of old age, too, and in his bed!
And could that Mighty Warrior fall?
And so inglorious, after all!
Well, since he's gone, no matter how,
The last loud trump must wake him now:
And, trust me, as the noise grows stronger,
He'd wish to sleep a little longer.
And could he be indeed so...Read more of this...

Cleared

by Rudyard Kipling
 Help for a patriot distressed, a spotless spirit hurt,
Help for an honourable clan sore trampled in the dirt!
From Queenstown Bay to Donegal, O listen to my song,
The honourable gentlemen have suffered grievous wrong.

Their noble names were mentioned -- O the burning black disgrace! --
By a brutal Saxon paper in an Irish shooting-case;
They sat upon it for a year, then...Read more of this...

Kaspar Is Dead

by Jean Arp
 alas our good kaspar is dead.
who will bury a burning flag in the wings of the clouds who will pull
black wool over our eyes day by day.
who will turn the coffee mills in the primal barrel.
who will lure the idyllic roe from his petrified paperbag.
who will sneeze oceanliners unbrellas windudders beekeepers spindles
of ozone who will pick clean the pyramids'...Read more of this...

Restless Leg Syndrome

by James Tate
 After the burial 
we returned to our units 
and assumed our poses. 
Our posture was the new posture 
and not the old sick posture. 
When we left our stations 
it was just to prove we could, 
not a serious departure 
or a search for yet another beginning. 
We were done with all that.
We were settled in, as they say,...Read more of this...

On Spies

by Ben Jonson
LIX. — TO FOOL, OR KNAVE. SPIES, you are lights in state, but of base stuff, Who, when you've burnt yourselves down to the snuff, Stink, and are thrown away. End fair enough. ...Read more of this...

Master Hugues Of Saxe-Gotha

by Robert Browning
 An imaginary composer.]

I.

Hist, but a word, fair and soft!
Forth and be judged, Master Hugues!
Answer the question I've put you so oft:
What do you mean by your mountainous fugues?
See, we're alone in the loft,---

II.

I, the poor organist here,
Hugues, the composer of note,
Dead though, and done with, this many a year:
Let's have a colloquy, something to quote,
Make the world prick up...Read more of this...

A Satirical Elegy on the Death of a Late Famous General

by Jonathan Swift
His Grace! impossible! what dead!
Of old age too, and in his bed!
And could that mighty warrior fall?
And so inglorious, after all!
Well, since he's gone, no matter how,
The last loud trump must wake him now:
And, trust me, as the noise grows stronger,
He'd wish to sleep a little longer.
And could he be indeed so old
As by the newspapers we're told?
Threescore, I think,...Read more of this...

Silence and Stealth of Days

by Henry Vaughan
 Silence, and stealth of days! 'tis now 
Since thou art gone, 
Twelve hundred hours, and not a brow 
But clouds hang on. 
As he that in some cave's thick damp 
Lockt from the light, 
Fixeth a solitary lamp, 
To brave the night, 
And walking from his sun, when past 
That glim'ring ray 
Cuts through the heavy mists in haste...Read more of this...

Give Me Women Wine and Snuff

by John Keats
 GIVE me women, wine, and snuff 
Untill I cry out "hold, enough!" 
You may do so sans objection 
Till the day of resurrection: 
For, bless my beard, they aye shall be 
My beloved Trinity....Read more of this...

Dont forget to view our wonderful member Snuff Out poems.

Get a Premium Membership
Turn off ads, get more exposure for your poetry, and get more features with a Premium Membership.
Book: Diverse Voices: The Poetry of Human Rights and the Pursuit of Peace