What is your best poem of all time?

Question

There have been some rreally great inspiring poems through the years whats yours?

Answer 1

This is my favorite one from childhood: http://home3.inet.tele.dk/stadil/poemnau.htm

But as an adult it has to be: http://www.mat.upm.es/~jcm/poe--shadow.html


it is a toss up between both. Childhood was different than adulthood, and they both are very good poems.

Answer 2

I have a few:

Dulce et Decorum Est - Wilfred Owen
Exposure - Wilfred Owen
Charge of the Light Brigade - Alfred Lord Tennyson
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner - Samuel Taylor Colridge
Jakerwocky - Lewis Carol
and nearly anything by Edward Lear - the last 2 not really inspiring but still some of my favourite poems

Answer 3

Well, frankly speaking it is really hard to pick just one rose from the full bloomed garden of poetry.....and again your question is rather tricky......the bold face type asks for "Best Poem" whereas in supplement you were saying "Great inspiring".... This is debatable because inspirational poem may not be the "Best Poem" and vice-versa.....for example, I always had been getting inspiration in those schooling days while listening to school song ....but this poem or song is certainly cannot be the "Best Poem"....similarly Best Poem may not be the inspirational poem. So,.....I wish to add two instead of one for each category. "Lady of Shallot" by Lord Tennyson is Best of all time....and "The Rime of The Ancient Mariner" by Coleridge is Great inspiring poem.
Hope everybody will understand my difficulty in selecting just one.

Answer 4

She Dwelt Among the Untrodden Ways - William Wordsworth
(This poem touches some raw nerves and I can't figure out why - maybe I can somehow feel the despair. It also takes me back to my childhood where poetry was one of my favourite subjects in school)

She dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove,—
A maid whom there were none to praise
And very few to love.

A violet by a mossy stone
Half hidden from the eye;
Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.

She lived unknown, and few could know
When Lucy ceased to be;
But she is in her grave, and oh
The difference to me!

Answer 5

Take one happy, laughing boy
His mothers pride, his fathers joy
Tell him he's simple,
and really quite barmy
And say that he needs a life
in the Army!
Now take him and drill him
and with a wave of a hand
Pack him with his rifle
to a far troubled land,
when the bombing
and the killing
become to much to bare,
and he know's his friends
are dying,
but he doesn't really care,

The message was simple and quietly read,
The Army regrets That your son is dead.

The moral of my poem, is really very plain
Each day a life is sacrificed,
Time and Time again,
Our factories pile up bullets
each day by the Ton,
And Each Will Claim The Life Of Other Mothers Sons....

Answer 6

hi..... firstly can i ask that you do not judge this poem as a sympathy vote.... as i just wanted to share this with you ..

My sister wrote the first part of this poem when her daughter was born.. sadly she died from meningitis at the age of 3... then my sister added the last part.......


Our life turned to colour on that day in may When all your loveliness came our way,No more grey days,no more blues,
God sent us an angel and that was you.You lifed us from the loneliness that we had,and made our lives feel oh so glad. you're everything we've ever yearned for so beautiful so precious and so much more you're our one and only Ellie-may...

So our lives were so wonderful, as anyone could see, because us two had become us three. but now god needs an angel to sit by his side so with a heavy heart i say with pride that i knew a hero and darling that was you brave , courageous and so innocently true so god made you a star to twinkle in the sky so mummy and daddy never have to say goodbye and we`ll love you forever even though our hearts have died you're our Ellie-may, you're our baby you're our ever lasting pride.

Answer 7

The Road less Travelled by Robert Frost

Answer 8

There's a poem called 'My Child' about a parent's grief for a son killed in the Iraq war; you'll find it (and many others) at www. wordsforiraq.com

My Child:

My child. My dead child.
Brought home. So I'm told.

They will say that you died for your country.
They may say that you died for your buddy.
They may say you were shot down in error.
My child; oh, my child died in terror.

I remember the day you were made, my child;
I remember the love on the day you were made,
And my hands on the first kicks of your feet
And you, new, in my hands, and the flood
Of placing my whole self to safeguard
My child. Oh my child, my dead child.

How could a tiny mouth have such strength?
Such small hands a grip of such force?
He's got your eyes, they said, as if I didn't know;
He's my child: he's got my life.

Oh my child. When we fed you
With the bodies that made you
And the milk overflowed so it sometimes fed three;
How do I comfort the breasts that are aching?
Will we ever make love without thinking of thee?

Oh my child. My dead child. Oh give back my child.
They spoke high words of duty, and of Christ meek and mild,
But over my dead body. Just give back my child.
This loss is the simplest, most incurable grief;
I lay it before God. And pray for the soul of your Commander-in Chief.

Answer 9

My favourite is a deceptively short and simple poem called The Conventionalist by Stevie Smith which gives important wisdom on how to deal with teenagers - and in fact all humanity. Teenagers are ridiculous because it is their time to be ridiculous.

Answer 10

Not til the loom is silent
And the shuttles cease to fly
Will God unroll the canvas
And explain the reason 'Why'.
The dark threads are as needful
In the Weaver's skilful hands
As the threads of gold and silver
In the pattern He has planned.