Famous Washes Poems by Famous Poets

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

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4:02 p.m

...olds on to him grip tight
through hair wool
his head all that's 
left of her

in tunisia
she folds pay up into stocking
washes his european semen
off her head
hands her heart to god
and this month's rent to mother
sings berber the gold
haired one favored me, rode
and ripped my flesh, i now
have food to eat

brooklyn lover
stumbles—streets ragged under sneakers
she carries her heart
banged up against
thighs crying ghetto
look, look what's been done with
my flesh, my trust, hum...Read more of this...
by Hammad, Suheir


Across the Sea Along the Shore

...untain down,
What was it ye went out to see,
Ye silly folk Galilee?
The reed that in the wind doth shake?
The weed that washes in the lake?
The reeds that waver, the weeds that float?
A young man preaching in a boat.
What was it ye went out to hear
By sea and land from far and near?
A teacher? Rather seek the feet
Of those who sit in Moses' seat.
Go humbly seek, and bow to them,
Far off in great Jerusalem.
From them that in her courts ye saw,
Her perfect doctors of the law,
W...Read more of this...
by Clough, Arthur Hugh

Beowulf (Old English)

...st
on the brink he yields ere he brave the plunge
to hide his head: ’tis no happy place!
Thence the welter of waters washes up
wan to welkin when winds bestir
evil storms, and air grows dusk,
and the heavens weep. Now is help once more
with thee alone! The land thou knowst not,
place of fear, where thou findest out
that sin-flecked being. Seek if thou dare!
I will reward thee, for waging this fight,
with ancient treasure, as erst I did,
with winding gold, if thou ...Read more of this...
by Anonymous,

Black Bonnet

...one. 
There's scarce a sound of dish on dish 
Or cup slipped into cup, 
When left alone, as is her wish, 
Black Bonnet "washes up."...Read more of this...
by Lawson, Henry

Charmides

..., ah! then indeed
She feared his lips upon her lips would never care to feed,

And cried, 'Awake, already the pale moon
Washes the trees with silver, and the wave
Creeps grey and chilly up this sandy dune,
The croaking frogs are out, and from the cave
The nightjar shrieks, the fluttering bats repass,
And the brown stoat with hollow flanks creeps through the dusky
grass.

Nay, though thou art a god, be not so coy,
For in yon stream there is a little reed
That often whispers ho...Read more of this...
by Wilde, Oscar


Domestic Work 1937

...
church clothes starched
and hanging, a record spinning
on the console, the whole house
dancing. She raises the shades,
washes the rooms in light,
buckets of water, Octagon soap.

Cleanliness is next to godliness ...

Windows and doors flung wide,
curtains two-stepping
forward and back, neck bones
bumping in the pot, a choir
of clothes clapping on the line.

Nearer my God to Thee ...

She beats time on the rugs,
blows dust from the broom
like dandelion spores, each one
a wish...Read more of this...
by Trethewey, Natasha

For I Will Consider My Cat Jeoffry (excerpt Jubilate Agno)

...thirdly he works it upon stretch with the forepaws extended.
For fourthly he sharpens his paws by wood.
For fifthly he washes himself.
For sixthly he rolls upon wash.
For seventhly he fleas himself, that he may not be interrupted upon the beat.
For eighthly he rubs himself against a post.
For ninthly he looks up for his instructions.
For tenthly he goes in quest of food.
For having consider'd God and himself he will consider his neighbour.
For if he meets another cat he will...Read more of this...
by Smart, Christopher

Jubilate Agno: Fragment B Part 4

...dly he works it upon stretch with the fore paws extended. 

For fourthly he sharpens his paws by wood. 

For fifthly he washes himself. 

For Sixthly he rolls upon wash. 

For Seventhly he fleas himself, that he may not be interrupted upon the beat. 

For Eighthly he rubs himself against a post. 

For Ninthly he looks up for his instructions. 

For Tenthly he goes in quest of food. 

For having consider'd God and himself he will consider his neighbour. 

For if he meets anoth...Read more of this...
by Smart, Christopher

Late Summer

...stifled. 

A little faith in him, and the ruinous 
Past would be for time to annihilate,
And wash out, like a tide that washes 
Out of the sand what a child has drawn there. 

God, what a shining handful of happiness, 
Made out of days and out of eternities, 
Were now the pulsing end of patience—
Could he but have what a ghost had stolen! 

What was a man before him, or ten of them, 
While he was here alive who could answer them, 
And in their teeth fling confirmations 
Harde...Read more of this...
by Robinson, Edwin Arlington

May

...lds to fame
Whose red and purple mottled flowers
Are cropt by maids in weeding hours
To boil in water milk and way1
For washes on an holiday
To make their beauty fair and sleak
And scour the tan from summers cheek
And simple small forget me not
Eyd wi a pinshead yellow spot
I'th'2 middle of its tender blue
That gains from poets notice due
These flowers the toil by crowds destroys
And robs them of their lowly joys
That met the may wi hopes as sweet
As those her suns in gardens...Read more of this...
by Clare, John

Slough

...e a week a half a crown 
For twenty years. 

And get that man with double chin
Who'll always cheat and always win, 
Who washes his repulsive skin 
In women's tears: 

And smash his desk of polished oak
And smash his hands so used to stroke
And stop his boring dirty joke
And make him yell. 

But spare the bald young clerks who add
The profits of the stinking cad;
It's not their fault that they are mad, 
They've tasted Hell. 

It's not their fault they do not know 
The birdsong...Read more of this...
by Betjeman, John

Song of Myself

...that supports
 them?) 

I am not the poet of goodness only—I do not decline to be the poet of
 wickedness also. 

Washes and razors for foofoos—for me freckles and a bristling beard. 

What blurt is this about virtue and about vice? 
Evil propels me, and reform of evil propels me—I stand indifferent;
My gait is no fault-finder’s or rejecter’s gait; 
I moisten the roots of all that has grown. 

Did you fear some scrofula out of the unflagging pregnancy? 
Did you ...Read more of this...
by Whitman, Walt

The Ballad of the White Horse

...e the gods must die.

"The little brooks are very sweet,
Like a girl's ribbons curled,
But the great sea is bitter
That washes all the world.

"Strong are the Roman roses,
Or the free flowers of the heath,
But every flower, like a flower of the sea,
Smelleth with the salt of death.

"And the heart of the locked battle
Is the happiest place for men;
When shrieking souls as shafts go by
And many have died and all may die;
Though this word be a mystery,
Death is most distant the...Read more of this...
by Chesterton, G K

The Broken Balance

...em at last: what, even the bald ape's by-shot
Was moderately admirable?

VI. Palinode

All summer neither rain nor wave washes the cormorants'
Perch, and their droppings have painted it shining white.
If the excrement of fish-eaters makes the brown rock a snow-mountain
At noon, a rose in the morning, a beacon at moonrise
On the black water: it is barely possible that even men's present
Lives are something; their arts and sciences (by moonlight)
Not wholly ridiculous, nor thei...Read more of this...
by Jeffers, Robinson

The Building of the Ship

...reign lands, 
With shadows of palms, and shining sands, 
Where the tumbling surf, 
O'er the coral reefs of Madagascar, 
Washes the feet of the swarthy Lascar, 
As he lies alone and asleep on the turf. 
And the trembling maiden held her breath 
At the tales of that awful, pitiless sea, 
With all its terror and mystery, 
The dim, dark sea, so like unto Death, 
That divides and yet unites mankind! 
And whenever the old man paused, a gleam 
From the bowl of his pipe would awhile ...Read more of this...
by Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth

The Frog Prince

...t bag of green.

The moon will not have him.
The sun wants to shut off
like a light bulb.
At the sight of him
the stone washes itself in a tub.
The crow thinks he's an apple
and drops a worm in.
At the feel of frog
the touch-me-nots explode
like electric slugs.
Slime will have him.
Slime has made him a house.

Mr. Poison
is at my bed.
He wants my sausage.
He wants my bread.

Mama Brundig,
he wants my beer.
He wants my Christ
for a souvenir.

Frog has boil disease
and a bellyf...Read more of this...
by Sexton, Anne

The Hammers

...running all over the white and copper stem timbers.
"Success to his Majesty's ship, the Bellerophon!"
And the red wine washes away in the waters of the Medway.

II
Paris, March, 1814
Fine yellow sunlight down the rue du Mont Thabor.
Ten o'clock striking from all the clock-towers of Paris.
Over the door of a shop, in gilt letters:
"Martin -- Parfumeur", and something more.
A large gilded wooden something.
Listen! What a ringing of hammers!
Tap!
Tap!
Squeak!
Tap! Squeak! Tap-a...Read more of this...
by Lowell, Amy

The Ladys Dressing Room

...th puppy water, beauty's help,
Distilled from Tripsy's darling whelp;
Here gallypots and vials placed,
Some filled with washes, some with paste,
Some with pomatum, paints and slops,
And ointments good for scabby chops.
Hard by a filthy basin stands,
Fouled with the scouring of her hands;
The basin takes whatever comes,
The scrapings of her teeth and gums,
A nasty compound of all hues,
For here she spits, and here she spews.
But oh! it turned poor Strephon's bowels,
When he be...Read more of this...
by Swift, Jonathan

The Pied Piper Of Hamelin

...A Child's Story

Hamelin Town's in Brunswick,
By famous Hanover city;
The river Weser, deep and wide,
Washes its wall on the southern side;
A pleasanter spot you never spied;
But, when begins my ditty,
Almost five hundred years ago,
To see the townsfolk suffer so
From vermin, was a pity.

Rats!
They fought the dogs, and killed the cats,
And bit the babies in the cradles,
And ate the cheeses out of the vats,
And licked the soup from the cook's own ladles,
Spl...Read more of this...
by Browning, Robert

The Rape of the Lock

...l feel sharp Vengeance soon o'ertake his Sins,
Be stopt in Vials, or transfixt with Pins.
Or plung'd in Lakes of bitter Washes lie,
Or wedg'd whole Ages in a Bodkin's Eye:
Gums and Pomatums shall his Flight restrain,
While clog'd he beats his silken Wings in vain; 
Or Alom-Stypticks with contracting Power
Shrink his thin Essence like a rivell'd Flower.
Or as Ixion fix'd, the Wretch shall feel
The giddy Motion of the whirling Mill,
In Fumes of burning Chocolate shall glow,
And...Read more of this...
by Pope, Alexander

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