Famous Musicians Poems by Famous Poets

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

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A Letter From Li Po

...m and the music too:
time becomes still, time becomes time, in rhyme.
Thus, in the Court of Aloes, Lady Yang
called the musicians from the Pear Tree Garden,
called for Li Po, in order that the spring,
tree-peony spring, might so be made immortal.
Li Po, brought drunk to court, took up his brush,
but washed his face among the lilies first,
then wrote the song of Lady Flying Swallow:
which Hsuang Sung, the emperor, forthwith played,
moving quick fingers on a flute of jade.
Who ...Read more of this...
by Aiken, Conrad


A Woman Waits for Me

...of the best-beloved of me and America, 
The drops I distil upon you shall grow fierce and athletic girls, new artists, musicians,
 and singers,
The babes I beget upon you are to beget babes in their turn, 
I shall demand perfect men and women out of my love-spendings, 
I shall expect them to interpenetrate with others, as I and you interpenetrate now, 
I shall count on the fruits of the gushing showers of them, as I count on the fruits of
 the gushing showers I give now, 
I ...Read more of this...
by Whitman, Walt

Abt Vogler

...heme of the weal and woe:
But God has a few of us whom he whispers in the ear;
The rest may reason and welcome; 'tis we musicians know.

Well, it is earth with me; silence resumes her reign:
I will be patient and proud, and soberly acquiesce.
Give me the keys. I feel for the common chord again,
Sliding by semitones till I sink to the minor,--yes,
And I blunt it into a ninth, and I stand on alien ground,
Surveying awhile the heights I rolled from into the deep;
Which, hark, I ...Read more of this...
by Browning, Robert

Another Reason Why I Dont Keep A Gun In The House

...here in the oboe section barking,
his eyes fixed on the conductor who is
entreating him with his baton

while the other musicians listen in respectful
silence to the famous barking dog solo,
that endless coda that first established
Beethoven as an innovative genius....Read more of this...
by Collins, Billy

As a Strong Bird on Pinions Free

...t, 
(To thy immortal breasts, Mother of All, thy every daughter, son, endear’d alike,
 forever
 equal;)
Thee in thy own musicians, singers, artists, unborn yet, but certain; 
Thee in thy moral wealth and civilization (until which thy proudest material wealth and
 civilization must remain in vain;) 
Thee in thy all-supplying, all-enclosing Worship—thee in no single bible, saviour,
 merely,

Thy saviours countless, latent within thyself—thy bibles incessant, within thyself,
 eq...Read more of this...
by Whitman, Walt


Blanche Sweet

...Oil and Water.")


Beauty has a throne-room
In our humorous town,
Spoiling its hob-goblins,
Laughing shadows down.
Rank musicians torture
Ragtime ballads vile,
But we walk serenely
Down the odorous aisle.
We forgive the squalor
And the boom and squeal
For the Great Queen flashes
From the moving reel.

Just a prim blonde stranger
In her early day,
Hiding brilliant weapons,
Too averse to play,
Then she burst upon us
Dancing through the night.
Oh, her maiden radiance,
Veils and ...Read more of this...
by Lindsay, Vachel

Death and Fame

...old man." "He made 
 sure I came first"
This the crowd most surprised proud at ceremonial place of honor--
Then poets & musicians -- college boys' grunge bands -- age-old rock 
 star Beatles, faithful guitar accompanists, gay classical con-
 ductors, unknown high Jazz music composers, funky trum-
 peters, bowed bass & french horn black geniuses, folksinger 
 fiddlers with dobro tamborine harmonica mandolin auto-
 harp pennywhistles & kazoos
Next, artist Italian romantic reali...Read more of this...
by Ginsberg, Allen

Elegy II: The Anagram

...d face.
If we might put the letters but one way,
In the lean dearth of words, what could we say?
When by the Gamut some Musicians make
A perfect song, others will undertake,
By the same Gamut changed, to equal it.
Things simply good can never be unfit.
She's fair as any, if all be like her,
And if none be, then she is singular.
All love is wonder; if we justly do
Account her wonderful, why not lovely too?
Love built on beauty, soon as beauty, dies;
Choose this face, changed b...Read more of this...
by Donne, John

Hiawathas Wedding-Feast

...u-Puk-Keewis, 
How the handsome Yenadizze 
Danced at Hiawatha's wedding; 
How the gentle Chibiabos, 
He the sweetest of musicians, 
Sang his songs of love and longing; 
How Iagoo, the great boaster, 
He the marvellous story-teller, 
Told his tales of strange adventure, 
That the feast might be more joyous, 
That the time might pass more gayly, 
And the guests be more contented.
Sumptuous was the feast Nokomis 
Made at Hiawatha's wedding; 
All the bowls were made of bass-wood,...Read more of this...
by Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth

January 1795

...
More in talking than in fighting ;
Lovers old, and beaux decrepid ;
Lordlings empty and insipid.

Poets, painters, and musicians ;
Lawyers, doctors, politicians :
Pamphlets, newspapers, and odes,
Seeking fame by diff'rent roads.

Gallant souls with empty purses ;
Gen'rals only fit for nurses ;
School-boys, smit with martial spirit,
Taking place of vet'ran merit.

Honest men who can't get places,
Knaves who shew unblushing faces ;
Ruin hasten'd, peace retarded ;
Candour spurn...Read more of this...
by Robinson, Mary Darby

Jubilate Agno: Fragment C

...n of an apothecary rejoice with Bdellium. 

Let Hassenaah rejoice with the White Beet. God be gracious to Hasse and all musicians. 

Let Hachaliah rejoice with Muscus Arboreus. 

Let Sanballat rejoice with Ground Moss found sometimes on human skulls. 

Let Col-hozeh rejoice with Myrobalans, Bellerica, Chebula, Citrina, Emblica and Indica. 

Let Meah rejoice with Varias, a kind of streaked panther. April 8th praise the name of the Lord. 

Let Eliashib rejoice with Shepherd's P...Read more of this...
by Smart, Christopher

Jubilate Agno: Fragment D

...ked by bees. 

Let Waite, house of Waite rejoice with the Shittah-Tree -- blessed be the name of the Lord Jesus for the musicians and dancers this holiday-time. 

Let Stedman, house of Stedman rejoice with Jacobasa St James's Wort. God be merciful to the house of Stuart. 

Let Poet, house of Poet rejoice with Hedrychum a kind of ointment of a sweet smelling savour. God speed the New Year thro' Christ 1763. 

Let Jesse, house of Jesse rejoice with the Lawrey a kind of bird. Go...Read more of this...
by Smart, Christopher

On the Way

...out of tune 
With your intention. How in the name of Cain,
I seem to hear you ask, are men to dance, 
When all men are musicians. Tell me that, 
I hear you saying, and I’ll tell you the name 
Of Samson’s mother. But why shroud yourself 
Before the coffin comes? For all you know,
The tree that is to fall for your last house 
Is now a sapling. You may have to wait 
So long as to be sorry; though I doubt it, 
For you are not at home in your new Eden 
Where chilly whispers of a ...Read more of this...
by Robinson, Edwin Arlington

Proclamation Without Pretension

...ATIONS

Hypodrome of immortal guarantees: there is
no such thing as importance there is no transparence 
or appearance

MUSICIANS SMASH YOUR INSTRUMENTS 
BLIND MEN take the stage

THE SYRINGE is only for my understanding. I write because it is
natural exactly the way I piss the way I'm sick

ART NEEDS AN OPERATION

Art is a PRETENSION warmed by the
TIMIDITY of the urinary basin, the hysteria born
in THE STUDIO

We are in search of
the force that is direct pure sober 
UNIQUE w...Read more of this...
by Tzara, Tristan

Proud Music of The Storm

...ll the rest—maternity of all the rest; 
And with it every instrument in multitudes,
The players playing—all the world’s musicians, 
The solemn hymns and masses, rousing adoration, 
All passionate heart-chants, sorrowful appeals, 
The measureless sweet vocalists of ages, 
And for their solvent setting, Earth’s own diapason,
Of winds and woods and mighty ocean waves; 
A new composite orchestra—binder of years and climes—ten-fold renewer, 
As of the far-back days the poets tell—...Read more of this...
by Whitman, Walt

Song of the Broad-Axe

..., forts, armaments? 

Away! These are not to be cherish’d for themselves; 
They fill their hour, the dancers dance, the musicians play for them;
The show passes, all does well enough of course, 
All does very well till one flash of defiance. 

The great city is that which has the greatest man or woman; 
If it be a few ragged huts, it is still the greatest city in the whole world. 

5
The place where the great city stands is not the place of stretch’d wharves, docks,
 manufact...Read more of this...
by Whitman, Walt

The City of the Dead XX

...amented his going. As the cortege reached the place of interment the priests commenced praying and burning incense, and musicians blowing and plucking their instruments, mourning the departed. Then the leaders came forward one after the other and recited their eulogies with fine choice of words. 

At last the multitude departed, leaving the dead resting in a most spacious and beautiful vault, expertly designed in stone and iron, and surrounded by the most expensively-entwined...Read more of this...
by Gibran, Kahlil

The Comedian As The Letter C

...y? 
421 Scrawl a tragedian's testament? Prolong 
422 His active force in an inactive dirge, 
423 Which, let the tall musicians call and call, 
424 Should merely call him dead? Pronounce amen 
425 Through choirs infolded to the outmost clouds? 
426 Because he built a cabin who once planned 
427 Loquacious columns by the ructive sea? 
428 Because he turned to salad-beds again? 
429 Jovial Crispin, in calamitous crape? 
430 Should he lay by the personal and make 
431 ...Read more of this...
by Stevens, Wallace

The Man Who Raised Charlestown

...aring sheet and shift and shirt 
To make bandages and roll them for the men that would get hurt. 
And he called out his musicians and he told them what to play: 
"For I want my men excited when they march at break o' day." 

And he set the women cooking – with a wood-and-water crew – 
"For I want no empty stomachs for the work we have to do." 
Then he said to his new soldiers: "Eat your fill while yet you may; 
'Tis a heavy road to Buckland that we'll march at break o' day." ...Read more of this...
by Lawson, Henry

The Sun Weilds Mercy

...a pond circling senselessly;
the painters paint dipping
their reds and greens and yellows,
poets rhyme their lonliness,
musicians starve as always
and the novelists miss the mark,
but not the pelican , the gull;
pelicans dip and dive, rise,
shaking shocked half-dead
radioactive fish from their beaks;
indeed, indeed, the waters wash
the rocks with slime; and on wall st.
the market staggers like a lost drunk
looking for his key; ah,
this will be a good one,by God:
it will take ...Read more of this...
by Bukowski, Charles

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