Famous Yeah Poems by Famous Poets

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

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A Back-log Song

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
De axes has been ringin' in de woods de blessid day,
An' de chips has been a-fallin' fa' an' thick;
Dey has cut de bigges' hick'ry dat de mules kin tote away,
An' dey's laid hit down and soaked it in de crik.
Den dey tuk hit to de big house an' dey piled de wood erroun'
In de fiah-place f'om ash-flo' to de flue,
While...Read more of this...

Plutonian Ode

by Allen Ginsberg
 I

What new element before us unborn in nature? Is there
 a new thing under the Sun?
At last inquisitive Whitman a modern epic, detonative,
 Scientific theme
First penned unmindful by Doctor Seaborg with poison-
 ous hand, named for Death's planet through the 
 sea beyond Uranus
whose chthonic ore fathers this magma-teared Lord of 
 Hades, Sire of avenging Furies, billionaire Hell-
...Read more of this...

Anthem

by Leonard Cohen
 The birds they sang 
at the break of day 
Start again 
I heard them say 
Don't dwell on what 
has passed away 
or what is yet to be. 
Ah the wars they will 
be fought again 
The holy dove 
She will be caught again 
bought and sold 
and bought again 
the dove is never free. 
Ring the bells that...Read more of this...

Revolt In The Ranks

by Charles Bukowski
 I have just spent one-hour-and-a-half
handicapping tomorrow's
card.
when am I going to get at the poems?
well, they'll just have to wait
they'll have to warm their feet in the 
anteroom
where they'll sit gossiping about 
me.
"this Chinaski, doesn't he realize that
without us he would have long ago
gone mad, been dead?"
"he knows, but he thinks he can keep
us at his beck and call!"
"he's an...Read more of this...

Overheard Through The Walls Of The Invisible City

by Frank Bidart
 . . . telling those who swarm around him his desire
is that an appendage from each of them
fill, invade each of his orifices,—

repeating, chanting,
Oh yeah Oh yeah Oh yeah Oh yeah Oh yeah

until, as if in darkness he craved the sun, at last he reached
consummation.

—Until telling those who swarm around him begins again

(we are the wheel to which we...Read more of this...

Faith

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
I's a-gittin' weary of de way dat people do,
De folks dat's got dey 'ligion in dey fiah-place an' flue;
Dey's allus somep'n comin' so de spit'll have to turn,[Pg 245]
An' hit tain't no p'oposition fu' to mek de hickory bu'n.
Ef de sweet pertater fails us an' de go'geous yallah yam,
We kin tek a bit o' comfo't f'om ouah sto'...Read more of this...

Be Angry At San Pedro

by Charles Bukowski
 I say to my woman, "Jeffers was 
a great poet. think of a title
like Be Angry At The Sun. don't you 
realize how great that is?

"you like that negative stuff." she 
says

"positively," I agree, finishing my
drink and pouring another.
"in one of Jeffers' poems, not the sun poem,
this woman fucks a stallion because her 
husband is such a gross spirit....Read more of this...

Dark Prophecy: I Sing Of Shine

by Etheridge Knight
 And, yeah brothers
while white America sings about the unsinkable molly brown
(who was hustling the titanic
when it went down)
I sing to thee of Shine
the stoker who was hip enough to flee the fucking ship
and let the white folks drown
with screams on their lips
(jumped his black ass into the dark sea, Shine did,
broke free from the straining steel).
Yeah, I sing to...Read more of this...

Tower Of Song

by Leonard Cohen
 Well my friends are gone and my hair is grey 
I ache in the places where I used to play 
And I'm crazy for love but I'm not coming on 
I'm just paying my rent every day 
Oh in the Tower of Song 
I said to Hank Williams: how lonely does it get? 
Hank Williams hasn't answered yet 
But...Read more of this...

The Singing School

by Barry Tebb
 The Poetry School, The Poetry Book Society, The Poetry Business:

So much poetry about you’d think I’d want to shout, “Hurray, hurray,

Every day’s Poetry Day!” but I don’t and you don’t either-

You know its flim-flam on the ether, grants for Jack-the-lads

Of both sexes, poets who’ve never been seen in a little magazine

Then gone on to win the Oopla Prize and...Read more of this...

A Boy Named Sue

by Shel Silverstein
 Well, my daddy left home when I was three,
and he didn't leave much to Ma and me,
just this old guitar and a bottle of booze.
Now I don't blame him because he run and hid,
but the meanest thing that he ever did was
before he left he went and named me Sue.

Well, he must have thought it was quite a joke,
and...Read more of this...

Blues

by Derek Walcott
 Those five or six young guys
lunched on the stoop
that oven-hot summer night
whistled me over. Nice
and friendly. So, I stop.
MacDougal or Christopher
Street in chains of light.

A summer festival. Or some
saint's. I wasn't too far from
home, but not too bright
for a ******, and not too dark.
I figured we were all
one, wop, ******, jew,
besides, this wasn't Central Park.
I'm coming on too strong?...Read more of this...

Hard Rock Returns To Prison From The Hospital For The Criminal Insane

by Etheridge Knight
 Hard Rock/ was/ "known not to take no **** 
From nobody," and he had the scars to prove it:
Split purple lips, lumbed ears, welts above
His yellow eyes, and one long scar that cut
Across his temple and plowed through a thick 
Canopy of kinky hair. 

The WORD/ was/ that Hard Rock wasn't a mean ******
Anymore, that the doctors had bored...Read more of this...

The Hound of Heaven

by Francis Thompson
 I fled Him down the nights and down the days
I fled Him down the arches of the years
I fled Him down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind, and in the midst of tears
I hid from him, and under running laughter.
Up vistaed hopes I sped and shot precipitated
Adown titanic glooms of chasme d hears
From those strong feet that followed, followed...Read more of this...

Waiting For The Miracle

by Leonard Cohen
 (co-written by Sharon Robinson)
Baby, I've been waiting, 
I've been waiting night and day. 
I didn't see the time, 
I waited half my life away. 
There were lots of invitations 
and I know you sent me some, 
but I was waiting 
for the miracle, for the miracle to come. 
I know you really loved me. 
but, you see, my hands...Read more of this...

For/From Lew

by Gary Snyder
 Lew Welch just turned up one day,
live as you and me. "Damn, Lew" I said,
"you didn't shoot yourself after all."
"Yes I did" he said,
and even then I felt the tingling down my back.
"Yes you did, too" I said—"I can feel it now."
"Yeah" he said,
"There's a basic fear between your world and
mine. I don't know why.
What I came to say...Read more of this...

The Ballad Of Hank The Finn

by Robert William Service
 Now Fireman Flynn met Hank the Finn where lights of Lust-land glow;
"Let's leave," says he, "the lousy sea, and give the land a show.
I'm fed up to the molar mark with wallopin' the brine;
I feel the bloody barnacles a-carkin' on me spine.
Let's hit the hard-boiled North a crack, where creeks are paved with gold."
"You count me in," says Hank...Read more of this...

Sex Goddess

by Maggie Estep
 I am THE SEX GODDESS OF THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE 
so don't mess with me 
I've got a big bag full of SEX TOYS 
and you can't have any
'cause they're all mine
'cause I'm
the SEX GODDESS OF THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE.


"Hey," you may say to yourself, 
"who the hell's she tryin' to kid, 
she's no sex goddess," 
But trust me, 
I am...Read more of this...

Hunting Song

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Tek a cool night, good an' cleah,
Skiff o' snow upon de groun';
Jes' 'bout fall-time o' de yeah
W'en de leaves is dry an brown;
Tek a dog an' tek a axe,
Tek a lantu'n in yo' han',
Step light whah de switches cracks,
Fu' dey 's huntin' in de lan'.
Down thoo de valleys an' ovah de hills,
Into de woods whah de 'simmon-tree grows,
Wakin' an' skeerin'...Read more of this...

A Following

by Charles Bukowski
 the phone rang at 1:30 a.m.
 and it was a man from Denver:

 "Chinaski, you got a following in
 Denver..."
 "yeah?"
 "yeah, I got a magazine and I want some
 poems from you..."
 "**** YOU, CHINASKI!" I heard a voice
 in the background...
 "I see you have a friend,"
 I said.
 "yeah," he answered, "now, I want
 six poems..."
...Read more of this...

Bad Day At The Beauty Salon

by Maggie Estep
 I was a 20 year old unemployed receptionist with
dyed orange dreadlocks sprouting out of my skull. I needed a job, but first,
I needed a haircut.

So I head for this beauty salon on Avenue B.
I'm gonna get a hairdo.
I'm gonna look just like those hot Spanish haircut models, become brown
and bodacious, grow some 7 inch fingernails painted ***** red and...Read more of this...

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