Famous Spoil Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Sonnet CLXVI

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET CLXVI. O bella man, che mi distringi 'l core. THE STOLEN GLOVE.  O beauteous hand! that dost my heart subdue,And in a little space my life confine;Hand where their skill and utmost efforts joinNature and Heaven, their plastic powers to show!Sweet fingers, seeming pearls of orient hue,To my wounds...Read more of this...

Gallios Song

by Rudyard Kipling
 "And Gallio cared for none of these things."-- Acts xviii. 17 "Little Foxes"-- Actions and Reactions.
All day long to the judgment-seat
The crazed Provincials drew--
All day long at their ruler's feet
Howled for the blood of the Jew.
Insurrection with one accord
Banded itself and woke,
And Paul was about to open his mouth
When Achaia's Deputy spoke--

"Whether the God descend from above
Or the Man...Read more of this...

Is Bliss then such Abyss

by Emily Dickinson
 Is Bliss then, such Abyss,
I must not put my foot amiss
For fear I spoil my shoe?

I'd rather suit my foot
Than save my Boot --
For yet to buy another Pair
Is possible,
At any store --

But Bliss, is sold just once.
The Patent lost
None buy it any more --
Say, Foot, decide the point --
The Lady cross, or not?
Verdict for Boot!...Read more of this...

The City That Will Not Repent

by Vachel Lindsay
 Climbing the heights of Berkeley 
Nightly I watch the West. 
There lies new San Francisco, 
Sea-maid in purple dressed, 
Wearing a dancer's girdle 
All to inflame desire: 
Scorning her days of sackcloth, 
Scorning her cleansing fire. 

See, like a burning city 
Sets now the red sun's dome. 
See, mystic firebrands sparkle 
There on each store and home. 
See how...Read more of this...

Childhood

by Richard Aldington
 I 

The bitterness. the misery, the wretchedness of childhood 
Put me out of love with God. 
I can't believe in God's goodness; 
I can believe 
In many avenging gods. 
Most of all I believe 
In gods of bitter dullness, 
Cruel local gods 
Who scared my childhood. 

II 

I've seen people put 
A chrysalis in a match-box, 
"To see," they...Read more of this...

Brother Jonathans Lament

by Oliver Wendell Holmes
 SHE has gone,-- she has left us in passion and pride,--
Our stormy-browed sister, so long at our side!
She has torn her own star from our firmament's glow,
And turned on her brother the face of a foe!

Oh, Caroline, Caroline, child of the sun,
We can never forget that our hearts have been one,--
Our foreheads both sprinkled in Liberty's name,
From the fountain...Read more of this...

The Song of Seven Cities

by Rudyard Kipling
 I was Lord of Cities very sumptuously builded.
Seven roaring Cities paid me tribute from far.
Ivory their outposts were--the guardrooms of them gilded,
And garrisoned with Amazons invincible in war.

All the world went softly when it walked before my Cities--
Neither King nor Army vexed my peoples at their toil.
Never horse nor chariot irked or overbore my Cities.
Never Mob nor Ruler questioned...Read more of this...

The Perfect Marriage

by Vachel Lindsay
 I

I hate this yoke; for the world's sake here put it on:
Knowing 'twill weigh as much on you till life is gone.
Knowing you love your freedom dear, as I love mine—
Knowing that love unchained has been our life's great wine:
Our one great wine (yet spent too soon, and serving none;
Of the two cups free love at last the deadly...Read more of this...

To A Lady

by George (Lord) Byron
 O! had my Fate been join'd with thine,
As once this pledge appear'd a token,
These follies had not, then, been mine,
For, then, my peace had not been broken.

To thee, these early faults I owe,
To thee, the wise and old reproving:
They know my sins, but do not know
'Twas thine to break the bonds of loving.

For once my soul, like thine, was...Read more of this...

526. Song—The Dumfries Volunteers

by Robert Burns
 DOES haughty Gaul invasion threat?
 Then let the louns beware, Sir;
There’s wooden walls upon our seas,
 And volunteers on shore, Sir:
The Nith shall run to Corsincon,
 And Criffel sink in Solway,
Ere we permit a Foreign Foe
 On British ground to rally!
We’ll ne’er permit a Foreign Foe
 On British ground to rally!


O let us not, like snarling curs,
 In wrangling...Read more of this...

The Song of a Man Who has Come Through

by D. H. Lawrence
 Not I, not I, but the wind that blows through me!
A fine wind is blowing the new direction of Time.
If only I let it bear me, carry me, if only it carry me!
If only I am sensitive, subtle, oh, delicate, a winged gift!
If only, most lovely of all, I yield myself and am borrowed
By the fine, fine wind that...Read more of this...

Heccar and Gaira

by Thomas Chatterton
 Where the rough Caigra rolls the surgy wave, 
Urging his thunders thro' the echoing cave; 
Where the sharp rocks, in distant horror seen, 
Drive the white currents thro' the spreading green; 
Where the loud tiger, pawing in his rage, 
Bids the black archers of the wilds engage; 
Stretch'd on the sand, two panting warriors lay, 
In all the burning...Read more of this...

The Granny Grey a Love Tale

by Mary Darby Robinson
 DAME DOWSON, was a granny grey,
Who, three score years and ten,
Had pass'd her busy hours away,
In talking of the Men !
They were her theme, at home, abroad,
At wake, and by the winter fire,
Whether it froze, or blew, or thaw'd,
In sunshine or in shade, her ire
Was never calm'd; for still she made
Scandal her pleasure--and her trade!

A Grand-daughter DAME DOWSON had--
As...Read more of this...

The Nostomaniac

by Robert William Service
 On the ragged edge of the world I'll roam,
And the home of the wolf shall be my home,
And a bunch of bones on the boundless snows
The end of my trail . . . who knows, who knows!

I'm dreaming to-night in the fire-glow, alone in my study tower,
My books battalioned around me, my Kipling flat on my knee;
But I'm not...Read more of this...

Justice

by Rudyard Kipling
 October, 1918
Across a world where all men grieve
 And grieving strive the more,
The great days range like tides and leave
 Our dead on every shore.
Heavy the load we undergo,
 And our own hands prepare,
If we have parley with the foe,
 The load our sons must bear.

Before we loose the word
 That bids new worlds to birth,
Needs must we loosen...Read more of this...

The Song of the Old Guard

by Rudyard Kipling
 Army Reform-.After Boer war "The Army of a Dream"-Traffics and Discoveries.


Know this, my brethren, Heaven is clear
 And all the clouds are gone--
The Proper Sort shall flourish now,
 Good times are coming on"--
The evil that was threatened late
 To all of our degree
Hath passed in discord and debate,
 And,Hey then up go we!

A common people strove in vain
 To...Read more of this...

Under the Shadow of Kileys Hill

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 This is the place where they all were bred; 
Some of the rafters are standing still; 
Now they are scattered and lost and dead, 
Every one from the old nest fled, 
Out of the shadow of Kiley's Hill. 

Better it is that they ne'er came back -- 
Changes and chances are quickly rung; 
Now the old homestead is gone...Read more of this...

To The Men Of England

by Percy Bysshe Shelley
 Men of England, wherefore plough
For the lords who lay ye low?
Wherefore weave with toil and care
The rich robes your tyrants wear?

Wherefore feed and clothe and save,
From the cradle to the grave,
Those ungrateful drones who would
Drain your sweat -- nay, drink your blood?

Wherefore, Bees of England, forge
Many a weapon, chain, and scourge,
That these stingless drones may spoil
The forced produce of...Read more of this...

A Voice from the Town

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 I thought, in the days of the droving, 
Of steps I might hope to retrace, 
To be done with the bush and the roving 
And settle once more in my place. 
With a heart that was well nigh to breaking, 
In the long, lonely rides on the plain, 
I thought of the pleasure of taking 
The hand of a...Read more of this...

The Poor Mans Lamb

by Anne Kingsmill Finch
 NOW spent the alter'd King, in am'rous Cares, 
The Hours of sacred Hymns and solemn Pray'rs: 
In vain the Alter waits his slow returns, 
Where unattended Incense faintly burns: 
In vain the whisp'ring Priests their Fears express, 
And of the Change a thousand Causes guess. 
Heedless of all their Censures He retires, 
And in his Palace feeds his secret...Read more of this...

Archibalds Example

by Edwin Arlington Robinson
 Old Archibald, in his eternal chair,
Where trespassers, whatever their degree, 
Were soon frowned out again, was looking off 
Across the clover when he said to me: 

“My green hill yonder, where the sun goes down
Without a scratch, was once inhabited 
By trees that injured him—an evil trash 
That made a cage, and held him while he bled. 

“Gone fifty...Read more of this...

Song of Marions Men

by William Cullen Bryant
OUR band is few but true and tried  
Our leader frank and bold; 
The British soldier trembles 
When Marion's name is told. 
Our fortress is the good greenwood 5 
Our tent the cypress-tree; 
We know the forest round us  
As seamen know the sea. 
We know its walls of thorny vines  
Its glades of reedy grass 10...Read more of this...

Vergissmeinnicht

by Keith Douglas
 Three weeks gone and the combatants gone
returning over the nightmare ground
we found the place again, and found
the soldier sprawling in the sun.

The frowning barrel of his gun
overshadowing. As we came on
that day, he hit my tank with one
like the entry of a demon.

Look. Here in the gunpit spoil
the dishonoured picture of his girl
who has put: Steffi. Vergissmeinnicht.
in a copybook...Read more of this...

Davis Matlock

by Edgar Lee Masters
 Suppose it is nothing but the hive:
That there are drones and workers
And queens, and nothing but storing honey --
(Material things as well as culture and wisdom) --
For the next generation, this generation never living,
Except as it swarms in the sun-light of youth,
Strengthening its wings on what has been gathered,
And tasting, on the way to the hive
From the clover field,...Read more of this...

The Chimney Sweeper (Innocence)

by William Blake
 When my mother died I was very young,
And my father sold me while yet my tongue,
Could scarcely cry weep weep weep weep,
So your chimneys I sweep & in soot I sleep.

Theres little Tom Dacre, who cried when his head
That curled like a lambs back was shav'd, so I said.
Hush Tom never mind it, for when your head's bare,
You know...Read more of this...

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