Famous Stampede Poems by Famous Poets

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

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The Ballad Of Hard-Luck Henry

by Robert William Service
 Now wouldn't you expect to find a man an awful crank
That's staked out nigh three hundred claims, and every one a blank;
That's followed every fool stampede, and seen the rise and fall
Of camps where men got gold in chunks and he got none at all;
That's prospected a bit of ground and sold it for a song
To see it yield...Read more of this...

Cape Breton

by Elizabeth Bishop
 Out on the high "bird islands," Ciboux and Hertford, 
the razorbill auks and the silly-looking puffins all stand 
with their backs to the mainland 
in solemn, uneven lines along the cliff's brown grass-frayed edge, 
while the few sheep pastured there go "Baaa, baaa." 
(Sometimes, frightened by aeroplanes, they stampede 
and fall over into the sea or onto the rocks.)...Read more of this...

The Gramaphone At Fond-Du-Lac

by Robert William Service
 Now Eddie Malone got a swell grammyfone to draw all the trade to his store;
An' sez he: "Come along for a season of song, which the like ye had niver before."
Then Dogrib, an' Slave, an' Yellow-knife brave, an' Cree in his dinky canoe,
Confluated near, to see an' to hear Ed's grammyfone make its dayboo.

Then Ed turned the crank, an'...Read more of this...

The Ballad Of Gum-Boot Ben

by Robert William Service
 He was an old prospector with a vision bleared and dim.
 He asked me for a grubstake, and the same I gave to him.
 He hinted of a hidden trove, and when I made so bold
 To question his veracity, this is the tale he told.

"I do not seek the copper streak, nor yet the yellow dust;
I am not...Read more of this...

Take It Easy

by Robert William Service
 When I was boxing in the ring
In 'Frisco back in ninety-seven,
I used to make five bucks a fling
To give as good as I was given.
But when I felt too fighting gay,
And tried to be a dinger-donger,
My second, Mike Muldoon. would say:
"Go easy, kid; you'll stay the longer."

When I was on the Yukon trail
The boys would warn, when things were...Read more of this...

Back Home

by Vladimir Mayakovsky
 Thoughts, go your way home.
Embrace,
 depths of the soul and the sea.
In my view,
 it is
 stupid
to be
 always serene.
My cabin is the worst
 of all cabins - 
All night above me
 Thuds a smithy of feet.
All night,
 stirring the ceiling’s calm,
dancers stampede
 to a moaning motif:
“Marquita,
 Marquita,
Marquita my darling,
why won’t you,
 Marquita,
why won’t you love me …”
But why
...Read more of this...

A Hillside Thaw

by Robert Frost
 To think to know the country and now know
The hillside on the day the sun lets go
Ten million silver lizards out of snow!
As often as I've seen it done before
I can't pretend to tell the way it's done.
It looks as if some magic of the sun
Lifted the rug that bred them on the floor
And the light breaking on them...Read more of this...

The Volunteer

by Robert William Service
 Sez I: My Country calls? Well, let it call.
 I grins perlitely and declines wiv thanks.
Go, let 'em plaster every blighted wall,
 'Ere's ONE they don't stampede into the ranks.
Them politicians with their greasy ways;
 Them empire-grabbers -- fight for 'em? No fear!
I've seen this mess a-comin' from the days
 Of Algyserious and Aggydear:
 I've felt me passion rise...Read more of this...

A Roundup Lullaby

by Badger Clark
  Desert blue and silver in the still moonshine,
    Coyote yappin' lazy on the hill,
  Sleepy winks of lightnin' down the far sky line,
    Time for millin' cattle to be still.

    _So--o now, the lightnin's far away,_
      _The coyote's nothiny skeery;_
   ...Read more of this...

The Burning of the Peoples Variety Theatre Aberdeen

by William Topaz McGonagall
 'Twas in the year of 1896, and on the 30th of September,
Which many people in Aberdeen will long remember;
The burning of the People's Variety Theatre, in Bridge Place
Because the fire spread like lightning at a rapid pace. 

The fire broke out on the stage, about eight o'clock,
Which gave to the audience a very fearful shock;
Then a stampede ensued, and...Read more of this...

Storm-Music

by Henry Van Dyke
 O Music hast thou only heard
The laughing river, the singing bird,
The murmuring wind in the poplar-trees,--
Nothing but Nature's melodies?
Nay, thou hearest all her tones, 
As a Queen must hear! 
Sounds of wrath and fear, 
Mutterings, shouts, and moans, 
Madness, tumult, and despair,
All she has that shakes the air 
With voices fierce and wild!
Thou art a Queen and not a...Read more of this...

Requiem for the Croppies

by Seamus Heaney
 The pockets of our greatcoats full of barley...
No kitchens on the run, no striking camp...
We moved quick and sudden in our own country.
The priest lay behind ditches with the tramp.
A people hardly marching... on the hike...
We found new tactics happening each day: 
We'd cut through reins and rider with the pike
And stampede cattle into infantry, 
Then retreat through hedges...Read more of this...

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