Famous Specimens Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Before you thought of spring

...ellow in the skies
Of independent hues,
A little weather-worn,
Inspiriting habiliments
Of indigo and brown.

With specimens of song,
As if for you to choose,
Discretion in the interval,
With gay delays he goes
To some superior tree
Without a single leaf,
And shouts for joy to nobody
But his seraphic self!...Read more of this...
by Dickinson, Emily


Kidnaped

...-lived flit;
This Scientist, as I am alive
Had seen my heart and captured it.
Right tightly now 'tis held among
The specimens that he has trapped,
And sings (Oh, love is ever young),
'Tis passing sweet to be kidnaped.[Pg 256]
...Read more of this...
by Laurence Dunbar, Paul

Myself and Mine

...ages, languages, reminiscences, 
Unwitting to-day that you do not know how to speak a single word?) 

Let others finish specimens—I never finish specimens; 
I shower them by exhaustless laws, as Nature does, fresh and modern continually. 

I give nothing as duties;
What others give as duties, I give as living impulses; 
(Shall I give the heart’s action as a duty?) 

Let others dispose of questions—I dispose of nothing—I arouse unanswerable
 questions;

Who are they I see and ...Read more of this...
by Whitman, Walt

New Hampshire

...ng in "old rags" in San Francisco.
Ob, it was terrible as well could be.
We both of us turned over in our graves.

Just specimens is all New Hampshire has,
One each of everything as in a showcase,
Which naturally she doesn't care to sell.

She had one President. (Pronounce him Purse,
And make the most of it for better or worse.
He's your one chance to score against the state.)
She had one Daniel Webster. He was all
The Daniel Webster ever was or shall be.
She had the Dartmout...Read more of this...
by Frost, Robert

Original Preface

...cellaneous Poems, &c.

In addition to those portions of Goethe's poetical works which 
are given in this complete form, specimens of the different other 
classes of them, such as the Epigrams, Elegies, &c., are added, 
as well as a collection of the various Songs found in his Plays, 
making a total number of about 400 Poems, embraced in the present 
volume.

A sketch of the life of Goethe is prefixed, in order that the 
reader may have before him both the Poet himself and the...Read more of this...
by von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang


Robinson Crusoe's Story

...of jungleberry tea.

      Then we gather as we travel,
      Bits of moss and dirty gravel,
And we chip off little specimens of stone;
      And we carry home as prizes
      Funny bugs, of handy sizes,
Just to give the day a scientific tone.

      If the roads are wet and muddy
      We remain at home and study,—
For the Goat is very clever at a sum,—
      And the Dog, instead of fighting,
      Studies ornamental writing,
While the Cat is taking lessons on ...Read more of this...
by Carryl, C. E.

While The Bannock Bakes

...rown as berries, and could wrestle with a bear:
(That bannock's raising nicely, pal; just jab it with your knife.)
Fine specimens of manhood they would reckon us out there.
It's the tracking and the packing and the poling in the sun;
It's the sleeping in the open, it's the rugged, unfaked food;
It's the snow-shoe and the paddle, and the campfire and the gun,
And when I think of what I was, I know that it is good.

Just think of how we've poled all day up this strange little s...Read more of this...
by Service, Robert William

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