Famous Sorry Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Veteran Sirens

by Edwin Arlington Robinson
 The ghost of Ninon would be sorry now 
To laugh at them, were she to see them here, 
So brave and so alert for learning how 
To fence with reason for another year. 

Age offers a far comelier diadem
Than theirs; but anguish has no eye for grace, 
When time’s malicious mercy cautions them 
To think a while of number...Read more of this...

The Cuckoo

by Robert William Service
 No lyric line I ever penned
The praise this parasitic bird;
And what is more, I don't intend
To write a laudatory word,
Since in my garden robins made
A nest with eggs of dainty spot,
And then a callous cuckoo laid
 A lone on on the lot.

Of course the sillies hatched it out
Along with their two tiny chicks,
And there it threw its weight about,
But...Read more of this...

Sorry I Missed You

by Barry Tebb
 (or ‘Huddersfield the Second Poetry Capital of England Re-visited’)



What was it Janice Simmons said to me as James lay dying in Ireland?

“Phone Peter Pegnall in Leeds, an ex-pupil of Jimmy’s. He’s organising

A benefit reading, he’d love to hear from you and have your help.”



‘Like hell he would’ I thought but I phoned him all the same

At his converted farmhouse...Read more of this...

Sorry

by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
 There is much in life that makes me sorry as I journey 
down life’s way.
And I seem to see more pathos in poor human
Lives each day.
I’m sorry for the strong brave men, who shield
the weak from harm, 
But who, in their own troubled hours find no
Protecting arm.

I’m sorry for the victors who have reached
success, to stand
As targets for the...Read more of this...

Ah Are You Digging On My Grave?

by Thomas Hardy
 "Ah, are you digging on my grave, 
My loved one? -- planting rue?" 
-- "No: yesterday he went to wed 
One of the brightest wealth has bred. 
'It cannot hurt her now,' he said, 
'That I should not be true.'" 

"Then who is digging on my grave, 
My nearest dearest kin?" 
-- "Ah, no: they sit and think, 'What...Read more of this...

An Epitaph On A Child Of Queen Elizabeths Chapel

by Ben Jonson
 Weep with me, all you that read
This little story;
And know, for whom a tear you shed
Death's self is sorry.
'Twas a child that so did thrive
In grace and feature,
As heaven and nature seemed to strive
Which owned the creature.

Years he numbered scarce thirteen
When fates turned cruel,
Yet three filled zodiacs had be been
The stage's jewel;
And did act what now we moan,
Old men...Read more of this...

Noddin' By De Fire

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Some folks t'inks hit's right an' p'opah,
Soon ez bedtime come erroun',
Fu' to scramble to de kiver,
Lak dey 'd hyeahed de trumpet soun'.
But dese people dey all misses
Whut I mos'ly does desiah;
Dat 's de settin' roun' an' dozin',
An' a-noddin' by de fiah.
When you 's tiahed out a-hoein',
Er a-followin' de plough,
Whut's de use of des a-fallin'
On yo' pallet lak a cow?
W'y, de...Read more of this...

Winnie

by Robert William Service
 When I went by the meadow gate
The chestnut mare would trot to meet me,
And as her coming I would wait,
She'd whinney high as if to greet me.
And I would kiss her silky nose,
And stroke her neck until it glistened,
And speak soft words: I don't suppose
She understand - but how she listened!

Then in the war-net I was caught,
Returning three black...Read more of this...

Two Blind Men

by Robert William Service
 Two blind men met. Said one: "This earth
Has been a blackout from my birth.
Through darkness I have groped my way,
Forlorn, unknowing night from day.
But you - though War destroyed your sight,
Still have your memories of Light,
And to allay your present pain
Can live your golden youth again."

Then said the second: "Aye, it's true,
It must seem magical to you
To know the...Read more of this...

The Parabolic Ballad

by Andrei Voznesensky
  My life, like a rocket, makes a parabola 
 flying in darkness, -- no rainbow for traveler. 

 There once lived an artist, red-haired Gauguin, 
 he was a bohemian, a former tradesman. 
 To get to the Louvre 
 from the lanes of Montmartre 
 he circled around 
 as far as Sumatra! 

 He had to...Read more of this...

Kathleen

by Robert William Service
 It was the steamer Alice May that sailed the Yukon foam.
And touched in every river camp from Dawson down to Nome.
It was her builder, owner, pilot, Captain Silas Geer,
Who took her through the angry ice, the last boat of the year;
Who patched her cracks with gunny sacks and wound her pipes with wire,
And cut the spruce upon the banks...Read more of this...

Oh Oh You Will Be Sorry

by Edna St. Vincent Millay
 Oh, oh, you will be sorry for that word!
Give me back my book and take my kiss instead.
Was it my enemy or my friend I heard,
"What a big book for such a little head!"
Come, I will show you now my newest hat,
And you may watch me purse my mouth and prink!
Oh, I shall love you still, and all of...Read more of this...

Sorry

by R S Thomas
 Dear parents,
I forgive you my life,
Begotten in a drab town,
The intention was good;
Passing the street now,
I see still the remains of sunlight.

It was not the bone buckled;
You gave me enough food
To renew myself.
It was the mind's weight
Kept me bent, as I grew tall.

It was not your fault.
What should have gone on,
Arrow aimed from a tried bow
At a tried target,...Read more of this...

The Breast

by Russell Edson
 One night a woman's breast came to a man's room and
began to talk about her twin sister.
 Her twin sister this and her twin sister that.
 Finally the man said, but what about you, dear breast?
 And so the breast spent the rest of the night talking about
herself.
 It was the same as when she talked about her sister:...Read more of this...

Young Fellow My Lad

by Robert William Service
 "Where are you going, Young Fellow My Lad,
 On this glittering morn of May?"
"I'm going to join the Colours, Dad;
 They're looking for men, they say."
"But you're only a boy, Young Fellow My Lad;
 You aren't obliged to go."
"I'm seventeen and a quarter, Dad,
 And ever so strong, you know."

 * * * *

"So you're off to France, Young...Read more of this...

The Convalescent

by Robert William Service
 . . . So I walked among the willows very quietly all night;
There was no moon at all, at all; no timid star alight;
There was no light at all, at all; I wint from tree to tree,
And I called him as his mother called, but he nivver answered me.

Oh I called him all the night-time, as I walked the...Read more of this...

The Loss of the Victoria

by William Topaz McGonagall
 Alas! Now o'er Britannia there hangs a gloom,
Because over 400 British Tars have met with a watery tomb;
Who served aboard the " Victoria," the biggest ship in the navy,
And one of the finest battleships that ever sailed the sea. 

And commanded by Sir George Tyron, a noble hero bold,
And his name on his tombstone should be written in letters...Read more of this...

An Encounter

by Robert Frost
 ONCE on the kind of day called “weather breeder,”
When the heat slowly hazes and the sun
By its own power seems to be undone,
I was half boring through, half climbing through
A swamp of cedar. Choked with oil of cedar
And scurf of plants, and weary and over-heated,
And sorry I ever left the road I knew,
I paused and rested on a sort...Read more of this...

A Creed

by John Masefield
 I HOLD that when a person dies 
His soul returns again to earth; 
Arrayed in some new flesh-disguise 
Another mother gives him birth. 
With sturdier limbs and brighter brain 
The old soul takes the road again. 

Such is my own belief and trust; 
This hand, this hand that holds the pen, 
Has many a hundred times been dust 
And...Read more of this...

Longevity

by Robert William Service
 Said Brown: 'I can't afford to die
 For I have bought annuity,
And every day of living I
 Have money coming in to me:
While others toil to make their bread
 I make mine by not being dead.'

Said Jones: 'I can't afford to die,
 For I have books and books to write.
I do not care for pelf but I
 Would versify...Read more of this...

The Federal Bus Conductor and the Old Lady

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 'The man who brought the railway through -- our friend the engineer.' 
They cheer his pluck and enterprise and engineering skill! 
'Twas my old husband found the pass behind that big red hill. 
Before the engineer was born we'd settled with our stock 
Behind that great big mountain chain, a line of range and rock -- 
A line that...Read more of this...

Im sorry for the Dead -- Today --

by Emily Dickinson
 I'm sorry for the Dead -- Today --
It's such congenial times
Old Neighbors have at fences --
It's time o' year for Hay.

And Broad -- Sunburned Acquaintance
Discourse between the Toil --
And laugh, a homely species
That makes the Fences smile --

It seems so straight to lie away
From all of the noise of Fields --
The Busy Carts -- the fragrant Cocks --
The Mower's...Read more of this...

Escape

by Robert William Service
 Tell me, Tramp, where I may go
To be free from human woe;
Say where I may hope to find
Ease of heart and peace of mind;
Is thee not some isle you know
Where I may leave Care behind?

So spoke one is sore distress,
And I answered softly: "Yes,
There's an isle so sweet and kind
So to clemency inclined,
So serene in loveliness
That the blind may...Read more of this...

Ice Handler

by Carl Sandburg
 I KNOW an ice handler who wears a flannel shirt with
pearl buttons the size of a dollar,
And he lugs a hundred-pound hunk into a saloon ice-
box, helps himself to cold ham and rye bread,
Tells the bartender it's hotter than yesterday and will be
hotter yet to-morrow, by Jesus,
And is on his way with his head in the air and a...Read more of this...

A Servant to Servants

by Robert Frost
 I didn't make you know how glad I was 
To have you come and camp here on our land. 
I promised myself to get down some day 
And see the way you lived, but I don't know! 
With a houseful of hungry men to feed 
I guess you'd find.... It seems to me 
I can't express my feelings any...Read more of this...

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