I need a poem, fast!?

Question

I have to read a poem in front of my class tomorrow, so I don't want it to be very long. It has to be by a well known author and have a specific mood because we are working on how we speak when reading certain poems. If you could please put the poem in your answer with the author, that'd be great! (also understandable for 15 year olds to understand and not get lost in)

can you write out the whole poem please?!

Answer 1

This is by WB Yeats and is one of his best known and most well liked poems. I would also think that it is straight forward enough for it to be enjoyed by 15 year olds.

He wishes for the cloths of heaven


Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half-light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly, because you tread on my dreams.

-- William Butler Yeats


Here is another option by a poet who, though famous, is perhaps not known as well as Yeats: Sigfried Sassoon. I love this poem, it is probably my favorite, and is a meditation on the death of loved one.


Slumber-Song


SLEEP; and my song shall build about your bed
A paradise of dimness. You shall feel
The folding of tired wings; and peace will dwell
Throned in your silence: and one hour shall hold
Summer, and midnight, and immensity
Lulled to forgetfulness. For, where you dream,
The stately gloom of foliage shall embower
Your slumbering thought with tapestries of blue.
And there shall be no memory of the sky,
Nor sunlight with its cruelty of swords.
But, to your soul that sinks from deep to deep
Through drowned and glimmering colour, Time shall be
Only slow rhythmic swaying; and your breath;
And roses in the darkness; and my love.


-- Siegfried Sassoon


Whichever one you choose I would recommend that you read it as many times as possible before you read it out loud. Get to known and understand the rythmn of the poem and how it was meant to sound. It will not only make for your reading to go better, but it will help you understand the poem better yourself.

Answer 2

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle mourning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead.
Put crepe bows round the white neck of public doves,
Let the traffic policeman wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out everyone,
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun,
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the woods;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

- W. H. Auden -
It was published with the title "Song IX" in 1936. Later was re-published and the title changed to "Tell Me The Truth About Love" in 1976. Then its popularity was so amazing that his title was in the last decades again changed when making several reprints as "Funeral Blues".
The poem also is know as "Stop all the clocks..." an it was masterly used in the film Four Weddings and a Funeral.
Notice also the way "airplane" was written by his English author in 1936.

Enjoy this awesome poem and I am wishing great luck!

Answer 3

The Changing Light
by Lawrence Ferlinghetti


The changing light
at San Francisco
is none of your East Coast light
none of your
pearly light of Paris
The light of San Francisco
is a sea light
an island light
And the light of fog
blanketing the hills
drifting in at night
through the Golden Gate
to lie on the city at dawn
And then the halcyon late mornings
after the fog burns off
and the sun paints white houses
with the sea light of Greece
with sharp clean shadows
making the town look like
it had just been painted

But the wind comes up at four o'clock
sweeping the hills

And then the veil of light of early evening

And then another scrim
when the new night fog
floats in
And in that vale of light
the city drifts
anchorless upon the ocean
or you could try this controversial one by the same author:

Speak Out!
by LAWRENCE FERLINGHETTI


And a vast paranoia sweeps across the land

And America turns the attack on its Twin Towers

Into the beginning of the Third World War

The war with the Third World

And the terrorists in Washington

Are drafting all the young men

And no one speaks

And they are rousting out

All the ones with turbans

And they are flushing out

All the strange immigrants

And they are shipping all the young men

To the killing fields again

And no one speaks

And when they come to round up

All the great writers and poets and painters

The National Endowment of the Arts of Complacency

Will not speak

While all the young men

Will be killing all the young men

In the killing fields again

So now is the time for you to speak

All you lovers of liberty

All you lovers of the pursuit of happiness

All you lovers and sleepers

Deep in your private dreams

Now is the time for you to speak

O silent majority

Before they come for you

Answer 4

Ode to a Cat
By Ted Pack

I've got a friend who licks his bottom
He's not much of a friend
But at least I've gott'im.

Answer 5

robert frost has lots of short poems.....

his stuff is great

15 years olds would love it

Answer 6

Jabberwocky by lewis carroll

i love it

Answer 7

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/chaucer-s-prophecy/


its one of my favorites, about the coruption of the church,
lechery = sex
privy solace = secret delight

Answer 8

hes my lover,
hes real,
hes the one i look for,
hes the one i fear,
hes the one that protects me,
hes the one that guides me,
his name is Jesus christ hes the one