Famous Tavern Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Tavern poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous tavern poems. These examples illustrate what a famous tavern poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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...ath
The broken, iron instruments of death:
At sight of whom our Sprites forgat their kindling wrath.
Note 1. A noted tavern at the Auld Brig end.—R. B. [back]
Note 2. The two steeples.—R. B. [back]
Note 3. The two steeples.—R. B. [back]
Note 4. The Gos-hawk, or Falcon.—R. B. [back]
Note 5. A noted ford, just above the Auld Brig.—R. B. [back]
Note 6. The source of the River Ayr.—R. B. [back]
Note 7. A well-known performer of Scottish music on the violin.—R. B. [back]
Note 8...Read more of this...
by
Burns, Robert
...the drizzle) crept
Still downward thinking `dead or dead to me!'
Down to the pool and narrow wharf he went,
Seeking a tavern which of old he knew,
A front of timber-crost antiquity,
So propt, worm-eaten, ruinously old,
He thought it must have gone; but he was gone
Who kept it; and his widow, Miriam Lane,
With daily-dwindling profits held the house;
A haunt of brawling seamen once, but now
Stiller, with yet a bed for wandering men.
There Enoch rested silently many days.
Bu...Read more of this...
by
Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...ering notes caress the night
Mellowed deep indigo ?still they play.
Departures linger. Absences do not
Deplete the tavern. They hang over the haze
As exhalations from receded shores. Soon,
Night repossesses the silence, but till dawn
The notes hold sway, smoky
Epiphanies, possessive of the hours.
This music's plaint forgives, redeems
The deafness of the world. Night turns
Homewards, sheathed in notes of solace, pleats
The broken silence of the heart.
...Read more of this...
by
Soyinka, Wole
...ad; aye, you
Who this very line may scan:
Think of all you planned to do . . .
Have you done the best you can?
See! the tavern lights are low;
Black's the night, and how you shrink!
God! and is it time to go?
Ah! the clock is always slow;
It is later than you think;
Sadly later than you think;
Far, far later than you think....Read more of this...
by
Service, Robert William
...he darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped in
away in the meadow.
Then we came to a tavern with
vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for
pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no imformation, and so
we continued
And arrived at evening, not a moment
too soon
Finding the place; it was (you may say)
satisfactory.
All this was a long time ago, I
remember,
And I would do it again...Read more of this...
by
Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns)
...Souls of Poets dead and gone,
What Elysium have ye known,
Happy field or mossy cavern,
Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern?
Have ye tippled drink more fine
Than mine host's Canary wine?
Or are fruits of Paradise
Sweeter than those dainty pies
Of venison? O generous food!
Drest as though bold Robin Hood
Would, with his maid Marian,
Sup and bowse from horn and can.
I have heard that on a day
Mine host's sign-board flew away,
Nobody knew whither, till
An astrologer's old q...Read more of this...
by
Keats, John
...r warm'd with Homer's nectar'd liquor,
That fill'd the veins of gods with ichor.
At hand for new supplies in store,
The tavern opes its friendly door,
Whence to and fro the waiters run,
Like bucket-men at fires in town.
Then with three shouts that tore the sky,
'Tis consecrate to Liberty.
To guard it from th' attacks of Tories,
A grand Committee cull'd of four is;
Who foremost on the patriot spot,
Had brought the flip, and paid the shot.
By this, M'Fingal with his train
Adv...Read more of this...
by
Trumbull, John
...wns to stem
With simpleness for stratagem.
But if the brave old mould is broke,
And end in clowns the mountain-folk,
In tavern cheer and tavern joke,—
Sink, O mountain! in the swamp,
Hide in thy skies, O sovereign lap!
Perish like leaves the highland breed!
No sire survive, no son succeed!
Soft! let not the offended muse
Toil's hard hap with scorn accuse.
Many hamlets sought I then,
Many farms of mountain men;—
Found I not a minstrel seed,
But men of bone, and good at need.
...Read more of this...
by
Emerson, Ralph Waldo
...or south,
The psalm in the country church, or mid the clustering trees, the open air camp-meeting,
The fiddler in the tavern—the glee, the long-strung sailor-song,
The lowing cattle, bleating sheep—the crowing cock at dawn.
8
All songs of current lands come sounding ’round me,
The German airs of friendship, wine and love,
Irish ballads, merry jigs and dances—English warbles,
Chansons of France, Scotch tunes—and o’er the rest,
Italia’s peerless compositions.
Across th...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...ided to him by their parents.
The same, at last and at last, when peace is declared,
He stands in the room of the old tavern—the well-belov’d soldiers all pass
through,
The officers speechless and slow draw near in their turns,
The chief encircles their necks with his arm, and kisses them on the cheek,
He kisses lightly the wet cheeks one after another—he shakes hands, and bids good-by
to
the
army.
13
Now I tell what my mother told me to-day as we sat at dinner toge...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...f honey sweet;
Well was the wenche that with him might meet.
At every bridal would he sing and hop;
He better lov'd the tavern than the shop.
For when there any riding was in Cheap,
Out of the shoppe thither would he leap,
And, till that he had all the sight y-seen,
And danced well, he would not come again;
And gather'd him a meinie* of his sort, *company of fellows
To hop and sing, and make such disport:
And there they *sette steven* for to meet *made appointment*
To play...Read more of this...
by
Chaucer, Geoffrey
...rly the prize. *songs
His neck was white as is the fleur-de-lis.
Thereto he strong was as a champion,
And knew well the taverns in every town.
And every hosteler and gay tapstere,
Better than a lazar* or a beggere, *leper
For unto such a worthy man as he
Accordeth not, as by his faculty,
To have with such lazars acquaintance.
It is not honest, it may not advance,
As for to deale with no such pouraille*, *offal, refuse
But all with rich, and sellers of vitaille*. *victuals
And...Read more of this...
by
Chaucer, Geoffrey
...the patch
Of candle-light a shadow falls, its girth
Proclaims the host himself, and master of his shop.
2
This is the tavern of one Hilverdink,
Jan Hilverdink, whose wines are much esteemed.
Within his cellar men can have to drink
The rarest cordials old monks ever schemed
To coax from pulpy grapes, and with nice art
Improve and spice their virgin juiciness.
Here froths the amber beer of many a brew,
Crowning each pewter tankard with as smart
A cap as ever in his wantonness...Read more of this...
by
Lowell, Amy
...ng sometimes a loud quinible* *treble
And as well could he play on a gitern.* *guitar
In all the town was brewhouse nor tavern,
That he not visited with his solas*, *mirth, sport
There as that any *garnard tapstere* was. *licentious barmaid*
But sooth to say he was somedeal squaimous* *squeamish
Of farting, and of speeche dangerous.
This Absolon, that jolly was and gay,
Went with a censer on the holy day,
Censing* the wives of the parish fast; *burning incense for
And many a ...Read more of this...
by
Chaucer, Geoffrey
...reet—
Where any one playing on pipe or tabor
Was sure for the future to lose his labour.
Nor suffered they hostelry or tavern
To shock with mirth a street so solemn;
But opposite the place of the cavern
They wrote the story on a column,
And on the great Church-Window painted
The same, to make the world acquainted
How their children were stolen away;
And there it stands to this very day.
And I must not omit to say
That in Transylvania there's a tribe
Of alien people that ascr...Read more of this...
by
Browning, Robert
...with whom the bell-mouthed glass had wrought,
Or mastered by the sense of sport, began
To troll a careless, careless tavern-catch
Of Moll and Meg, and strange experiences
Unmeet for ladies. Florian nodded at him,
I frowning; Psyche flushed and wanned and shook;
The lilylike Melissa drooped her brows;
'Forbear,' the Princess cried; 'Forbear, Sir' I;
And heated through and through with wrath and love,
I smote him on the breast; he started up;
There rose a shriek as o...Read more of this...
by
Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...The Sultan's Turret in a Noose of Light.
II.
Dreaming when Dawn's Left Hand was in the Sky
I heard a voice within the Tavern cry,
"Awake, my Little ones, and fill the Cup
Before Life's Liquor in its Cup be dry."
III.
And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before
The Tavern shouted -- "Open then the Door!
You know how little while we have to stay,
And, once departed, may return no more."
IV.
Now the New Year reviving old Desires,
The thoughtful Soul to Solitude retires,
...Read more of this...
by
Khayyam, Omar
...t
The Sultan's Turret in a Noose of Light.
2
Dreaming when Dawn's Left Hand was in the Sky
I heard a Voice within the Tavern cry,
"Awake, my Little ones, and fill the Cup
Before Life's Liquor in its Cup be dry."
3
And, as the Cock crew, those who stood before
The Tavern shouted—"Open then the Door!
You know how little while we have to stay,
And, once departed, may return no more."
4
Now the New Year reviving old Desires,
The thoughtful Soul to Solitude retires,
Where th...Read more of this...
by
Fitzgerald, Edward
...IN the tavern of my heart
Many a one has sat before,
Drunk red wine and sung a stave,
And, departing, come no more.
When the night was cold without,
And the ravens croaked of storm,
They have sat them at my hearth,
Telling me my house was warm.
As the lute and cup went round,
They have rhymed me well in lay;--
When the hunt was on at morn,
Each, departi...Read more of this...
by
Cather, Willa
...d wood-berries,
and
the
commonest weeds by the road;
And the old drunkard staggering home from the out-house of the tavern, whence he had
lately
risen,
And the school-mistress that pass’d on her way to the school,
And the friendly boys that pass’d—and the quarrelsome boys,
And the tidy and fresh-cheek’d girls—and the barefoot ***** boy and girl,
And all the changes of city and country, wherever he went.
His own parents,
He that had father’d him, and she that had c...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
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