Famous Take The Easy Way Out Poems by Famous Poets

These are examples of famous Take The Easy Way Out poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous take the easy way out poems. These examples illustrate what a famous take the easy way out poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).

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The Electric Slide Boogie

by Audre Lorde
 New Year's Day 1:16 AM
and my body is weary beyond
time to withdraw and rest
ample room allowed me in everyone's head
but community calls
right over the threshold
drums beating through the walls
children playing their truck dramas
under the collapsible coatrack
in the narrow hallway outside my room

The TV lounge next door is wide open
it is midnight in Idaho
and the throb easy subtle spin
of the...Read more of this...

netley 47

by Rg Gregory
 army hospital
rheumatic fever
bed-tied many weeks
too embarrassed to ask for bedpan
the rigmarole of screens and knowing attention
- for my pains
severe constipation
and bleeding piles

am led away to be injected

crouching
waist-down undressed
upon a marble table

being shaved the wrong end
(easy talk between doctor and nurse)

the needle takes its time
feeling for entrance
(gentle talk between fingers and tongue)

JAB
searing lava
stuck pig

bouquets in white coats

sorely to bed
time
evaporates the...Read more of this...

Sonnets xvii

by William Shakespeare
 O NEVER say that I was false of heart, 
Though absence seem'd my flame to qualify! 
As easy might I from myself depart, 
As from my soul, which in thy breast doth lie: 
That is my home of love; if I have ranged, 
Like him that travels I return again, 
Just to the time, not with the time exchanged,...Read more of this...

Robbed by Death -- but that was easy --

by Emily Dickinson
 Robbed by Death -- but that was easy --
To the failing Eye
I could hold the latest Glowing --
Robbed by Liberty

For Her Jugular Defences --
This, too, I endured --
Hint of Glory -- it afforded --
For the Brave Beloved --

Fraud of Distance -- Fraud of Danger,
Fraud of Death -- to bear --
It is Bounty -- to Suspense's
Vague Calamity --

Stalking our entire...Read more of this...

An Easy-goin' Feller

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Ther' ain't no use in all this strife,
An' hurryin', pell-mell, right thro' life.
I don't believe in goin' too fast
To see what kind o' road you 've passed.
It ain't no mortal kind o' good,
'N' I would n't hurry ef I could.
I like to jest go joggin' 'long,
To limber up my soul with song;
To stop awhile 'n' chat the men,
'N' drink some...Read more of this...

Sleep Spaces

by Robert Desnos
 In the night there are of course the seven wonders
of the world and the greatness tragedy and enchantment.
Forests collide with legendary creatures hiding in thickets.
There is you.
In the night there are the walker's footsteps the murderer's
the town policeman's light from the street lamp and the ragman's lantern
There is you.
In the night trains go past and boats
and the fantasy of...Read more of this...

Apollo Belvedere

by Robert William Service
 A-sitttin' on a cracker box an' spittin' in the stove,
I took a sudden notion that I'd kindo' like to rove;
An' so I bought a ticket, jest as easy as could be,
From Pumpkinville in Idaho to Rome in Italy;
An' found myself in seven days of mostly atmosphere
A-starin' at a statoo called Appoller Belvydeer.

Now I'm a rum-soaked sinner, an' religion ain't...Read more of this...

In the Droving Days

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...

A Plantation Portrait

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Hain't you see my Mandy Lou,
Is it true?
Whaih you been f'om day to day,
Whaih, I say?
Dat you say you nevah seen
Dis hyeah queen
Walkin' roun' f'om fiel' to street
Smilin' sweet?
Slendah ez a saplin' tree;
[Pg 174]Seems to me
Wen de win' blow f'om de bay
She jes' sway
Lak de reg'lar saplin' do
Ef hit's grew
Straight an' graceful, 'dout a limb,
Sweet an' slim.
Browner den...Read more of this...

My Papas Waltz

by Theodore Roethke
 The whiskey on your breath 
Could make a small boy dizzy; 
But I hung on like death: 
Such waltzing was not easy. 

We romped until the pans 
Slid from the kitchen shelf; 
My mother's countenance 
Could not unfrown itself. 

The hand that held my wrist 
Was battered on one knuckle; 
At every step you missed 
My right ear scraped...Read more of this...

Her -- last Poems

by Emily Dickinson
 Her -- "last Poems" --
Poets -- ended --
Silver -- perished -- with her Tongue --
Not on Record -- bubbled other,
Flute -- or Woman --
So divine --
Not unto its Summer -- Morning
Robin -- uttered Half the Tune --
Gushed too free for the Adoring --
From the Anglo-Florentine --
Late -- the Praise --
'Tis dull -- conferring
On the Head too High to Crown...Read more of this...

The Disturber

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Oh, what shall I do? I am wholly upset;
I am sure I 'll be jailed for a lunatic yet.
I 'll be out of a job—it's the thing to expect
When I 'm letting my duty go by with neglect.
You may judge the extent and degree of my plight
When I 'm thinking all day and a-dreaming all night,
And a-trying my hand at...Read more of this...

The Auction Sale

by Robert William Service
 Her little head just topped the window-sill;
She even mounted on a stool, maybe;
She pressed against the pane, as children will,
And watched us playing, oh so wistfully!
And then I missed her for a month or more,
And idly thought: "She's gone away, no doubt,"
Until a hearse drew up beside the door . . .
I saw a tiny coffin carried out.

And after...Read more of this...

Necrological

by John Crowe Ransom
 The friar had said his paternosters duly 
And scourged his limbs, and afterwards would have slept; 
But with much riddling his head became unruly, 
He arose, from the quiet monastery he crept. 

Dawn lightened the place where the battle had been won. 
The people were dead -- it is easy he thought to die -- 
These dead remained, but...Read more of this...

The ride to bumpville

by Eugene Field
 Play that my knee was a calico mare
Saddled and bridled for Bumpville;
Leap to the back of this steed, if you dare,
And gallop away to Bumpville!
I hope you'll be sure to sit fast in your seat,
For this calico mare is prodigiously fleet,
And many adventures you're likely to meet
As you journey along to Bumpville.

This calico mare both gallops and trots
While whisking...Read more of this...

We are Transmitters

by D. H. Lawrence
 As we live, we are transmitters of life.
And when we fail to transmit life, life fails to flow through us.

That is part of the mystery of sex, it is a flow onwards.
Sexless people transmit nothing.

And if, as we work, we can transmit life into our work,
life, still more life, rushes into us to compensate, to be ready
and we ripple...Read more of this...

Its easy to invent a Life --

by Emily Dickinson
 It's easy to invent a Life --
God does it -- every Day --
Creation -- but the Gambol
Of His Authority --

It's easy to efface it --
The thrifty Deity
Could scarce afford Eternity
To Spontaneity --

The Perished Patterns murmur --
But His Perturbless Plan
Proceed -- inserting Here -- a Sun --
There -- leaving out a Man --...Read more of this...

Good-night

by Carl Sandburg
 MANY ways to spell good night.

Fireworks at a pier on the Fourth of July spell it with red wheels and yellow spokes.

They fizz in the air, touch the water and quit.
Rockets make a trajectory of gold-and-blue and then go out.

Railroad trains at night spell with a smokestack mushrooming a white pillar.

Steamboats turn a curve in the Mississippi crying in...Read more of this...

Winter Journey Over The Hartz Mountains

by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
 [The following explanation is necessary, in order 
to make this ode in any way intelligible. The Poet is supposed to 
leave his companions, who are proceeding on a hunting expedition 
in winter, in order himself to pay a visit to a hypochondriacal 
friend, and also to see the mining in the Hartz mountains. The ode 
alternately describes, in a...Read more of this...

Pheasant

by Sylvia Plath
 You said you would kill it this morning.
Do not kill it. It startles me still,
The jut of that odd, dark head, pacing

Through the uncut grass on the elm's hill.
It is something to own a pheasant,
Or just to be visited at all.

I am not mystical: it isn't
As if I thought it had a spirit.
It is simply in its element.

That gives...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...

The False Gods

by Edwin Arlington Robinson
 “We are false and evanescent, and aware of our deceit, 
From the straw that is our vitals to the clay that is our feet. 
You may serve us if you must, and you shall have your wage of ashes,—
Though arrears due thereafter may be hard for you to meet. 

“You may swear that we are solid, you may say...Read more of this...

Black Harrys Team

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 No soft-skinned Durham steers are they, 
No Devons plump and red, 
But brindled, black and iron-grey 
That mark the mountain-bred; 
For mountain-bred and mountain-broke, 
With sullen eyes agleam, 
No stranger's hand could put a yoke 
On old Black Harry's team. 


Pull out, pull out, at break of morn 
The creeks are running white, 
And Tiger, Spot and Snailey-horn 
Must...Read more of this...

Sonnet III

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET III. Era 'l giorno ch' al sol si scoloraro. HE BLAMES LOVE FOR WOUNDING HIM ON A HOLY DAY (GOOD FRIDAY).  'Twas on the morn, when heaven its blessed rayIn pity to its suffering master veil'd,First did I, Lady, to your beauty yield,Of your victorious eyes th' unguarded prey.Ah! little...Read more of this...

It is easy to work when the soul is at play

by Emily Dickinson
 It is easy to work when the soul is at play --
But when the soul is in pain --
The hearing him put his playthings up
Makes work difficult -- then --

It is simple, to ache in the Bone, or the Rind --
But Gimlets -- among the nerve --
Mangle daintier -- terribler --
Like a Panter in the Glove --...Read more of this...

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