what is your favorite poem?

[Mindfields]

O Captain! My Captain!
Walt Whitman

O CAPTAIN! my Captain! our fearful trip is done;
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won;
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring:
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.



O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills;
For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths—for you the shores a-crowding;
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head;
It is some dream that on the deck,
You’ve fallen cold and dead.



My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip, the victor ship, comes in with object won;
Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells!
But I, with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

Heard it in 6th grade while at Alternative School. They put me in Advanced 8th grade English class, so now two years later I look forward to doing the same poetic stuff that we did 2 years ago. I'm in English 1 (High School class), however, and doubt that the curriculum features poetry in it...

[Triking]

My favorite poem?

The apparition of these faces in the crowd:
Petals on a wet, black bough.

[SethSquall]

I couldnt tell you a favourite. One poem however, that has stuck with me for a long time is "The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. I remember my grandad was a huge fan of his. He used to always read me his poems. The rhyme of the Ancient Mariner stood out the most to me. That poem has many values to me after he passed away. I read it out at his funeral in honor of him. I would love to post it but its so long. So i surgest if you are generally interested it wouldnt be hard to find on google. However i will post a another poem i am fond of by Sir Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Its called "The Dungeon"

And this place our forefathers made for man!
This is the process of our love and wisdom,
To each poor brother who offends against us -
Most innocent, perhaps -and what if guilty?
Is this the only cure? Merciful God!
Each pore and natural outlet shrivelled up
By Ignorance and parching Poverty,
His energies roll back upon his heart,
And stagnate and corrupt; till changed to poison,
They break out on him, like a loathsome plague-spot;
Then we call in our pampered mountebanks -
And this is their best cure! uncomforted
And friendless solitude, groaning and tears,
And savage faces, at the clanking hour,
Seen through the steam and vapours of his dungeon,
By the lamp's dismal twilgiht! So he lies
Circled with evil, till his very soul
Unmoulds its essence, hopelessly deformed
By sights of ever more deformity!

With other ministrations thou, O Nature!
Healest thy wandering and distempered child:
Thou pourest on him thy soft influences,
Thy sunny hues, fair forms, and breathing sweets,
Thy melodies of woods, and winds, and waters,
Till he relent, and can no more endure
To be a jarring and a dissonant thing
Amid this general dance and minstrelsy;
But, bursting into tears, wins back his way,
His angry spirit healed and harmonized
By the benignant touch of Love and Beauty.

[KiwiChick]

Ayanepuck gets lots of cool points, because Plath and Bukowski are brilliant poets. (No I'm not going to post my favourites, because there are too many.)

[FoJaR]

plath was a fraud who offed herself because she couldnt stand living in her husband's shadow.

[xiron]

Not technically poetry, but the lyrics to the Every Time I Die song, Floater.

To my mistress the bridge, I don't feel well.
I'll be leaving, you can't stop me.
We've been carrying on too long.
I'm sorry, but I'm gone. I've got a bad reputation to think about.
I've been dirty, I've been wrong.
Maybe someday they'll find that I've washed up.
I'm stepping out to clear my head.
I'm breathing in to fill my lungs. We're all dead.
Farewell scenic highway overpass.
It's better this way anyways.
My lover, the river, makes a better soldier than a bride.
But I left my heart at the side of her bed and she's got the warmest body that I've ever had.
Drag the lake, you'll find it full of love.
Bring the children to the water, and let them see what heartache did.
This matrimony needs a witness, and you can teach them to swim.
You can teach them all to swim.
Don't let your dreamers grow up to be dead men. Drown us at birth, save her some time.
Drifting on romantic holiday, breathless as her cold arms cover me.
Drag the lake. You'll find it full of love.

[bill_clinton]

Five Meals
By lord carbo

Today I have strangely
been in the mood
To eat a hill
a mountain of food

A breakfast for four
Makes me want more

Lunch for a king
Is hardly a thing

An elephant snack
I gorge and attack

Dinner is big
I eat like a pig

Yet a small desert
Makes my tummy hurt

[ayanepuck]

plath was a fraud who offed herself because she couldnt stand living in her husband's shadow.

How was Plath a fraud? I love her poems, I have read The Bell Jar close to 22 times, and I have yet to find what is fraudulent about her....so please, enlighten me.

[GuidoHunter]

Uh, SethSquall? You love that poem so much yet you don't know it's not "The Rhyme", but rather "The Rime"?

--Guido

http://andy.mikee385.com

[QreepyBORIS]

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is excellent. My personal favorite, though, is A Dust of Snow by Robert Frost, mostly because it's short enough for me to have (kind of) committed to memory. Here goes:

The way a crow shook down on me
A dust of snow from a hemlock tree
Has given my heart a change of mood
And saved a part of a day I rued

Haven't heard it for about 3 years, though, so that might be a bit off.

[SethSquall]

Uh, SethSquall? You love that poem so much yet you don't know it's not "The Rhyme", but rather "The Rime"?

--Guido

http://andy.mikee385.com

Yea your right, my mistake. Thats annoyied me >__<. Shouldn't make that mistake. It's is on my bloody wall as well. I can be such an idiot at times. Anyway. I do love that poem so much.

edit: Seems the quote thing is not working, either that or it just shows how html wise i am ...o.O

[FoJaR]

plath was a fraud who offed herself because she couldnt stand living in her husband's shadow.

How was Plath a fraud? I love her poems, I have read The Bell Jar close to 22 times, and I have yet to find what is fraudulent about her....so please, enlighten me.

sorry, fraud was the wrong word. i should have said "sorry excuse for a human being".

[Boxorox]

My personal favorite is "Epigram" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Sir, I admit your general rule,
That every poet is a fool,
But you yourself may serve to show it,
That every fool is not a poet.

Actually, I have a second favorite, from Alexander Pope's "Essay on Man"

Know then thyself, presume not God to scan,
The proper study of mankind is Man.
Placed on this isthmus of a middle state,
A being darkly wise and rudely great:
With too much knowledge for the Sceptic side,
With too much weakness for the Stoic's pride,
He hangs between, in doubt to act or rest;
In doubt to deem himself a God or Beast;
In doubt his mind or body to prefer;
Born but to die, and reas'ning but to err;
Alike in ignorance, his reason such,
Whether he thinks too little or too much;
Chaos of thought and passion, all confused;
Still by himself abused or disabused;
Created half to rise, and half to fall:
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all;
Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl'd;
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!

[chickendude]

And this is the way the world ends
not with a bang but a whimper

P.S.
Quotes aren't working with some accounts

[ayanepuck]

plath was a fraud who offed herself because she couldnt stand living in her husband's shadow.

How was Plath a fraud? I love her poems, I have read The Bell Jar close to 22 times, and I have yet to find what is fraudulent about her....so please, enlighten me.

sorry, fraud was the wrong word. i should have said "sorry excuse for a human being".

And why exactly would that be? Oh wait, let me guess...she was a strong, assertive, independent woman with a wonderful mind, a beautiful imagination and a a great knack for putting her feelings and thoughts down on paper. You are so right. I can see how you would think she was a "sorry excuse for a human being." My mistake.