Famous Socks Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Flophouse

by Charles Bukowski
 you haven't lived
until you've been in a
flophouse
with nothing but one
light bulb
and 56 men
squeezed together
on cots
with everybody
snoring
at once
and some of those
snores
so
deep and
gross and
unbelievable-
dark
snotty
gross
subhuman
wheezings
from hell
itself.
your mind
almost breaks
under those
death-like
sounds
and the
intermingling
odors:
hard
unwashed socks
pissed and
shitted 
underwear
and over it all
slowly circulating
air
much like that
emanating from 
uncovered
garbage
cans.
and those
bodies
in the dark
fat and
thin
and
bent
some
legless
armless
some 
mindless
and worst of
all:
the total
absence of
hope
it shrouds
them
covers them
totally.
it's not
bearable.
you get
up
go out
walk the 
streets
up and 
down
sidewalks
past buildings
around the 
corner
and...Read more of this...

Bazonka

by Spike Milligan
 Say Bazonka every day
That's what my grandma used to say
It keeps at bay the Asian Flu'
And both your elbows free from glue.
So say Bazonka every day
(That's what my grandma used to say)

Don't say it if your socks are dry!
Or when the sun is in your eye!
Never say it in the dark
(The word you see emits a spark)
Only say it...Read more of this...

Answers

by Elizabeth Jennings
 Why did you travel?
Because the house was cold.
Why did you travel?
Because it is what I have always done between sunset and sunrise.
What did you wear?
I wore a blue suit, a white shirt, yellow tie, and yellow socks.
What did you wear?
I wore nothing. A scarf of pain kept me warm.
Who did you sleep with?
I slept with a different woman each...Read more of this...

Strip Teaser

by Robert William Service
 My precious grand-child, aged two,
Is eager to unlace one shoe,
 And then the other;
Her cotton socks she'll deftly doff
Despite the mild reproaches of
 Her mother.

Around the house she loves to fare,
And with her rosy tootsies bare,
 Pit-pat the floor;
And though remonstrances we make
She presently decides to take
 Off something more.

Her pinafore she next unties,
And then before we realise,
 Her...Read more of this...

Disabled

by Wilfred Owen
 He sat in a wheeled chair, waiting for dark,
And shivered in his ghastly suit of grey,
Legless, sewn short at elbow. Through the park
Voices of boys rang saddening like a hymn,
Voices of play and pleasure after day,
Till gathering sleep had mothered them from him.

About this time Town used to swing so gay
When glow-lamps budded in the light-blue trees
And girls glanced...Read more of this...

Canute the Great

by Marriott Edgar
 I'll tell of Canute, King of England,
A native of Denmark was he,
His hobbies was roving and raiding
And paddling his feet in the sea. 

By trade he were what's called a Viking,
Every summer he'd visit our shore,
Help himself to whatever he wanted,
And come back in the autumn for more.

These trips always showed him a profit,
But what stumped him to know...Read more of this...

Birthday

by Robert William Service
 (16th January 1949)

I thank whatever gods may be
For all the happiness that's mine;
That I am festive, fit and free
To savour women, wit and wine;
That I may game of golf enjoy,
And have a formidable drive:
In short, that I'm a gay old boy
Though I be
 Seventy-and-five.

My daughter thinks. because I'm old
(I'm not a crock, when all is said),
I mustn't let my...Read more of this...

The Philistine And The Bohemian

by Robert William Service
 She was a Philistine spick and span,
He was a bold Bohemian.
She had the mode, and the last at that;
He had a cape and a brigand hat.
She was so riant and chic and trim;
He was so shaggy, unkempt and grim.
On the rue de la Paix she was wont to shine;
The rue de la Gaîté was more his line.
She doted on...Read more of this...

Five For Country Music

by Lisel Mueller
 I. Insomnia

The bulb at the front door burns and burns.
If it were a white rose it would tire of blooming
through another endless night. 

The moon knows the routine;
it beats the bushes from east to west
and sets empty-handed. Again the one
she is waiting for has outrun the moon. 

II. Old Money

The spotted hands shake as they polish the coins. 

The...Read more of this...

Sisters cake

by Eugene Field
 I'd not complain of Sister Jane, for she was good and kind,
Combining with rare comeliness distinctive gifts of mind;
Nay, I'll admit it were most fit that, worn by social cares,
She'd crave a change from parlor life to that below the stairs,
And that, eschewing needlework and music, she should take
Herself to the substantial art of manufacturing cake.

At breakfast, then, it...Read more of this...

Route Marchin

by Rudyard Kipling
 We're marchin' on relief over Injia's sunny plains,
A little front o' Christmas-time an' just be'ind the Rains;
Ho! get away you bullock-man, you've 'eard the bugle blowed,
There's a regiment a-comin' down the Grand Trunk Road;
 With its best foot first
 And the road a-sliding past,
 An' every bloomin' campin'-ground exactly like the last;
 While the Big Drum says,
 With 'is...Read more of this...

Asparagus

by Marriott Edgar
 Mr. Ramsbottom went to the races, 
A thing as he'd ne'er done before,
And as luck always follers beginners, 
Won five pounds, no-less and no-more.

He felt himself suddenly tempted
To indulge in some reckless orgee, 
So he went to a caffy-a-teerer 
And had a dressed crab with his tea.

He were crunching the claws at the finish
And wondering what next he would...Read more of this...

America

by Herman Melville
 Once in English they said America. Was it English to them.
Once they said Belgian.
We like a fog.
Do you for weather.
Are we brave.
Are we true.
Have we the national colour.
Can we stand ditches.
Can we mean well.
Do we talk together.
Have we red cross.
A great many people speak of feet.
And socks....Read more of this...

Spirit Dity Of No Fax Line Dial Tone

by Bob Hicok
 The telephone company calls and asks what the fuss is. 
Betty from the telephone company, who's not concerned 
with the particulars of my life. For instance 
if I believe in the transubstantiation of Christ 
or am gladdened at 7:02 in the morning to repeat 
an eighth time why a man wearing a hula skirt of tools 
slung low on...Read more of this...

A Banjo Song

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Oh, dere 's lots o' keer an' trouble
In dis world to swaller down;
An' ol' Sorrer 's purty lively
In her way o' gittin' roun'.
Yet dere's times when I furgit em,—
Aches an' pains an' troubles all,—
An' it's when I tek at ebenin'
My ol' banjo f'om de wall.
'Bout de time dat night is fallin'
An' my daily wu'k is done,
An' above de shady hilltops
I...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...

The Ruined Maid

by Thomas Hardy
"O 'Melia, my dear, this does everything crown!
Who could have supposed I should meet you in Town? 
And whence such fair garments, such prosperi-ty?"--
"O didn't you know I'd been ruined?" said she.

--"You left us in tatters, without shoes or socks,
Tired of digging potatoes, and spudding up docks;
And now you've gay bracelets and bright feathers three!"--
"Yes: that's how we dress when...Read more of this...

The Visitor

by Jack Prelutsky
 it came today to visit
and moved into the house
it was smaller than an elephant
but larger than a mouse

first it slapped my sister
then it kicked my dad
then it pushed my mother
oh! that really made me mad

it went and tickled rover
and terrified the cat
it sliced apart my necktie
and rudely crushed my hat

it smeared my head with honey
and filled the tub with...Read more of this...

Winding Wool

by Robert William Service
 She'd bring to me a skein of wool
And beg me to hold out my hands;
so on my pipe I cease to pull
And watch her twine the shining strands
Into a ball so snug and neat,
Perchance a pair of socks to knit
To comfort my unworthy feet,
Or pullover my girth to fit.

As to the winding I would sway,
A poem in my head...Read more of this...

Lizards And Snakes

by Anthony Hecht
 On the summer road that ran by our front porch
 Lizards and snakes came out to sun.
It was hot as a stove out there, enough to scorch
 A buzzard's foot. Still, it was fun
To lie in the dust and spy on them. Near but remote,
 They snoozed in the carriage ruts, a smile
In the set of the jaw, a...Read more of this...

Letter Of Recommendation From My Father To My Future Wife

by Richard Jones
 During the war, I was in China.
Every night we blew the world to hell.
The sky was purple and yellow
like his favorite shirt.

I was in India once
on the Ganges in a tourist boat.
There were soldiers,
some women with parasols.
A dead body floated by
going in the opposite direction.
My son likes this story
and requests it each year at Thanksgiving.

When he was twelve,
there was...Read more of this...

The Sharks Parlor

by James Dickey
 Memory: I can take my head and strike it on a wall on Cumberland Island 
Where the night tide came crawling under the stairs came up the first 
Two or three steps and the cottage stood on poles all night 
With the sea sprawled under it as we dreamed of the great fin circling 
Under the bedroom floor. In...Read more of this...

Glory Of Women

by Siegfried Sassoon
 You love us when we're heroes, home on leave, 
Or wounded in a mentionable place. 
You worship decorations; you believe 
That chivalry redeems the war's disgrace. 
You make us shells. You listen with delight, 
By tales of dirt and danger fondly thrilled. 
You crown our distant ardours while we fight, 
And mourn our laurelled memories when we're killed. 
You...Read more of this...

Leftovers

by Barry Tebb
 Empty chocolate boxes, a pillowcase with an orange at the bottom,

Nuts and tinsel with its idiosyncratic rustle and brilliant sheen

And the reflection in it of paper-chains hand-made and stuck with

Flour-paste stretching from the light-bowl to every corner of the room.

Father Christmas himself was plastic and his vast stomach painted red

With a bulging sack behind his back and he was...Read more of this...

The eathen

by Rudyard Kipling
 The 'eathen in 'is blindness bows down to wood an' stone;
'E don't obey no orders unless they is 'is own;
'E keeps 'is side-arms awful: 'e leaves 'em all about,
An' then comes up the Regiment an' pokes the 'eathen out.

 All along o' dirtiness, all along o' mess,
 All along o' doin' things rather-more-or-less,
 All along of abby-nay, kul, an'...Read more of this...

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