Favorite Poem (20 lines or less)

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shadowslayer

So this poem is twenty two lines, oh well...

The Dead Slaver's Tale

Dim an grey was the silent sea,
    Dim was the crescent moon;
From the jungle back of the shadowed lea
    Came a tom-tom's eerie croon
When we glutted the waves with a hundred slavers
From a Jerkra barracoon

Our was to bar, with a man of war
    Was sailing with a canvas full;
So the doomed men up from the hold we bore,
    Hacked them to pieces and hurled them o'er,
And we heard the grim sharks as they  tore
    The flesh from each sword-cleft skull.

Then fast we fled to the rising sun
    But we could not flee the dead
And ever behind our flying ship
    Wavered a trail of red.

She sank like a stone off Calabar
    With all of her bloody crew.
There was no breeze to shake a spar,
    No reef her hull to hew.
But ducky hands rose out of the deep,
    And dragged her under the blue.


I like different things than the rest of everyone, as you can tell.

draconlord

This is an amazing one by the younger Sylvia Plath

 

Tea leaves thwart those who court catastrophe,
designing futures where nothing will occur:
cross the gypsy’s palm and yawning she
will still predict no perils left to conquer.
Jeopardy is jejune now: naïve knight
finds ogres out-of-date and dragons unheard
of, while blasé princesses indict
tilts at terror as downright absurd.

The beast in Jamesian grove will never jump,
compelling hero’s dull career to crisis;
and when insouciant angels play God’s trump,
while bored arena crowds for once look eager,
hoping toward havoc, neither pleas nor prizes
shall coax from doom’s blank door lady or tiger.   

vinco_interdum

My favorite short poem is probably "Das Radwechsel" by Bertolt Brecht:

Ich sitze am Strassenhang.
Der Fahrer wechselt das Rad.
Ich bin nicht gern, wo ich herkomme.
Ich bin nicht gern, wo ich hinfahre.
Warum sehe ich den Radwechsel
mit Ungeduld?


--and in English translation:

 

The Wheel Change

I sit by the roadside 
The driver changes the wheel. 
I do not like the place I have come from.  
I do not like the place I am going to.  
Why with impatience do I 
Watch him changing the wheel?

Gomer_Pyle

If the world were a fruit for which everyone yearns,
I would toss it away because of the worms

Pat_Zerr

There once was a man from Nantucket...

Here I sit all broken-hearted...

goldendog
Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes;
Nothing of him that does fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.

Shakespeare (The Tempest)
shmiff

Written by a famous tramp;

WHAT is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare?—

No time to stand beneath the boughs,
And stare as long as sheep and cows:

No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass:

No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night:

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance:

No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began?

A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

Alice12_c

If this is longer than 20 lines im sorry...

“Watching Silently”

 

They point and laugh

Making fun of her

Every chance they get

 

Her friends join in or walk away

Silently watching

Doing nothing and everything

 

She stands and takes it

Sometimes she joins in

Just for kicks

 

She’s been beaten and bruised

Hurt by the ones she called friends

Stabbed in the back time and time again

 

They break her anyway they can

With their words and fists

They bring her to her knees little by little

 

She’s broken down

Given up

But never given in

 

im_ghostburger
Stop!