Famous Station Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Station poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous station poems. These examples illustrate what a famous station poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
John Matthew
A kite flutters,
On a high tension wire —
Against a stark blue sky.
Beggar and old mother huddle
On Govandi Railway Station —
The dirtiest station in the universe.
He shows her a plastic watch,
Smiles, “See I have time,”
She, old, gnarled, wrinkled,
Looks through beady eyes,
“I have no need for time.”
Children toss rubber ball —
In cricketing passion.
Jagged slum roofs puncture the sky,
Open drain stinks.
Mother and...Read more of this...
by
Andrew Barton Paterson
I bought a run a while ago,
On country rough and ridgy,
Where wallaroos and wombats grow --
The Upper Murrumbidgee.
The grass is rather scant, it's true,
But this a fair exchange is,
The sheep can see a lovely view
By climbing up the ranges.
And She-oak Flat's the station's name,
I'm not surprised at that, sirs:
The...Read more of this...
by
Lewis Carroll
There was a young lady of station,
"I love man!" was her sole exclamation;
But when men cried, "You flatter!"
She replied, "Oh, no matter!
Isle of Man, is the true explanation."...Read more of this...
by
Friedrich von Schiller
Even the moral world its nobility boasts--vulgar natures
Reckon by that which they do; noble, by that which they are....Read more of this...
by
William Topaz McGonagall
Annie Marshall was a foundling, and lived in Downderry,
And was trained up by a coast-guardsman, kind-hearted and merry
And he loved Annie Marshall as dear as his life,
And he resolved to make her his own loving wife.
The night was tempestuous, most terrific, and pitch dark,
When Matthew Pengelly rescued Annie Marshall from an ill-fated barque,
But her parents were engulfed in...Read more of this...
by
Susan Rich
Republic of Niger
Nomads are said to know their way by an exact spot in the sky,
the touch of sand to their fingers, granules on the tongue.
But sometimes a system breaks down. I witness a shift of light,
study the irregular shadings of dunes. Why am I traveling
this road to Zinder, where really there is no road? No service station
at this...Read more of this...
by
Isaac Watts
Rejoice, ye righteous, in the Lord,
This work belongs to you;
Sing of his name, his ways, his word,
How holy, just, and true.
His mercy and his righteousness
Let heav'n and earth proclaim;
His works of nature and of grace
Reveal his wondrous name.
His wisdom and almighty word
The heav'nly arches spread,
And by the Spirit of the Lord
Their shining hosts were made.
He bid the liquid waters...Read more of this...
by
Elizabeth Bishop
Oh, but it is dirty!
--this little filling station,
oil-soaked, oil-permeated
to a disturbing, over-all
black translucency.
Be careful with that match!
Father wears a dirty,
oil-soaked monkey suit
that cuts him under the arms,
and several quick and saucy
and greasy sons assist him
(it's a family filling station),
all quite thoroughly dirty.
Do they live in the station?
It has a cement porch
behind the pumps, and on it
a set of...Read more of this...
by
Vachel Lindsay
Would that by Hindu magic we became
Dark monks of jeweled India long ago,
Sitting at Prince Siddartha's feet to know
The foolishness of gold and love and station,
The gospel of the Great Renunciation,
The ragged cloak, the staff, the rain and sun,
The beggar's life, with far Nirvana gleaming:
Lord, make us Buddhas, dreaming....Read more of this...
by
A S J Tessimond
The tube lift mounts,
sap in a stem,
And blossoms its load,
a black, untidy rose.
The fountain of the escalator
curls at the crest,
breaks and scatters
A winnow of men,
a sickle of dark spray....Read more of this...
by
Andrew Barton Paterson
"Only a pound," said the auctioneer,
"Only a pound; and I'm standing here
Selling this animal, gain or loss --
Only a pound for the drover's horse?
One of the sort that was ne'er afraid,
One of the boys of the Old Brigade;
Thoroughly honest and game, I'll swear,
Only a little the worse for wear;
Plenty as bad...Read more of this...
by
William Topaz McGonagall
'Twas in the year of 1858, and on October the fourteenth day,
That a fire broke out in a warehouse, and for hours blazed away;
And the warehouse, now destroyed, was occupied by the Messrs R. Wylie, Hill & Co.,
Situated in Buchanan Street, in the City of Glasgow.
The flames burst forth about three o'clock in the afternoon,
And intimation of the...Read more of this...
by
Andrew Barton Paterson
The run of Billabong-go-dry
Is just beyond Lime Burner's Gap;
Its waterhole and tank supply
Is excellent -- upon the map.
But lacking nature's liquid drench,
The station staff are wont to try
With "Bob-in Sweeps" their thirst to quench,
Or nearly quench, at Bong-go-dry.
The parson made five-yearly rounds
That soil of arid souls to delve,
He wrote,...Read more of this...
by
Du Fu
Far escort from now on part Green mountains in vain repeat feeling When cup again grasp? Last night moon together walk Each prefecture eulogise cherish Three reigns out enter honour River village alone return place Lonely recuperate remaining years After long escort, from now on we part, Green mountains: in vain I repeat my emotion. What...Read more of this...
by
Philip Larkin
Delay, well, travellers must expect
Delay. For how long? No one seems to know.
With all the luggage weighed, the tickets checked,
It can't be long... We amble too and fro,
Sit in steel chairs, buy cigarettes and sweets
And tea, unfold the papers. Ought we to smile,
Perhaps make friends? No: in the race for seats
You're best...Read more of this...
by
Ezra Pound
The apparition of these faces in the crowd;
Petals on a wet, black bough....Read more of this...
by
Andrew Barton Paterson
There was movement at the station, for the word has passed around
That the colt from old Regret had got away,
And had joined the wild bush horses—he was worth a thousand pound,
So all the cracks had gathered to the fray.
All the tried and noted riders from the stations near and far
Had mustered at the homestead overnight,
For the bushmen love hard...Read more of this...
by
Thomas Hardy
'There is not much that I can do,
For I've no money that's quite my own!'
Spoke up the pitying child--
A little boy with a violin
At the station before the train came in,--
'But I can play my fiddle to you,
And a nice one 'tis, and good in tone!'
The man in the handcuffs smiled;
The constable...Read more of this...
by
Andrew Barton Paterson
Now the stock have started dying, for the Lord has sent a drought;
But we're sick of prayers and Providence -- we're going to do without;
With the derricks up above us and the solid earth below,
We are waiting at the lever for the word to let her go.
Sinking down, deeper down,
Oh, we'll sink it deeper...Read more of this...
by
Rg Gregory
(after hiroshige – stations of oi)
here at the sixty-ninth station
of the gregokaido road
i have a sense of completion
that is not completed yet
the long journey to this moment
has many disparate paths
fragments of people within me
have stuttered their broken mantras
what a bowl of uneasy pieces
litters the well of my bed - my name
doesn't know how to welcome
tomorrow with its single demands
this...Read more of this...
by
Rudyard Kipling
As I left the Halls at Lumley, rose the vision of a comely
Maid last season worshipped dumbly, watched with fervor from afar;
And I wondered idly, blindly, if the maid would greet me kindly.
That was all -- the rest was settled by the clinking tonga-bar.
Yea, my life and hers were coupled by the tonga coupling-bar.
For my misty meditation, at the...Read more of this...
by
Rudyard Kipling
To the Heavens above us
O look and behold
The Planets that love us
All harnessed in gold!
What chariots, what horses
Against us shall bide
While the Stars in their courses
Do fight on our side?
All thought, all desires,
That are under the sun,
Are one with their fires,
As we also are one:
All matter, all spirit,
All fashion, all frame,
Receive and inherit
Their strength from the same.
(Oh, man that...Read more of this...
by
Edward Lear
There was an old man at a Station,Who made a promiscuous oration;But they said, "Take some snuff!—You have talk'd quite enough,You afflicting old man at a Station!" ...Read more of this...
by
Amy Lowell
Study in Whites
Wax-white --
Floor, ceiling, walls.
Ivory shadows
Over the pavement
Polished to cream surfaces
By constant sweeping.
The big room is coloured like the petals
Of a great magnolia,
And has a patina
Of flower bloom
Which makes it shine dimly
Under the electric lamps.
Chairs are ranged in rows
Like sepia seeds
Waiting fulfilment.
The chalk-white spot of a cook's cap
Moves unglossily against the vaguely bright wall --
Dull chalk-white striking the...Read more of this...
by
Philip Larkin
Light spreads darkly downwards from the high
Clusters of lights over empty chairs
That face each other, coloured differently.
Through open doors, the dining-room declares
A larger loneliness of knives and glass
And silence laid like carpet. A porter reads
An unsold evening paper. Hours pass,
And all the salesmen have gone back to Leeds,
Leaving full ashtrays in the Conference Room.
In shoeless corridors, the lights burn....Read more of this...
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