1. Lydia Puckett - written by Edgar Lee Masters
Read 426 times on American Poems.

Knowlt Hoheimer ran away to the war
The day before Curl Trenary
Swore out a warrant through Justice Arnett
For stealing hogs.
But that's not the reason he turned a soldier.
He caught me running with Lucius Atherton.
We quarreled and I told... (Read full poem)

A lilt and a swing, 
And a ditty to sing,
Or ever the night grow old;
The wine is within,
And I'm sure t'were a sin
For a soldier to choose to be cold, my dear,
For a soldier to choose to be cold.
We're right for a spell,
But the fever is... (Read full poem)

3. Adieu to a Soldier. - written by Walt Whitman
From Leaves of Grass. Published in 1900. Read 13629 times on American Poems.

ADIEU, O soldier! 
You of the rude campaigning, (which we shared,) 
The rapid march, the life of the camp, 
The hot contention of opposing fronts—the long manoeuver, 
Red battles with their slaughter,—the stimulus—the strong, terrific... (Read full poem)

‘By-and-bye, ’ the maiden sighed – ‘by-and-bye
He will claim me for his bride, 
Hope is strong and time is fleet; 
Youth is fair, and love is sweet, 
Clouds will pass that fleck my sky, 
He will come back by-and-bye.’

‘By-and-bye, ’ the... (Read full poem)

5. For The One Who Would Take Man's Life In His Hands - written by Delmore Schwartz
Read 19252 times on American Poems.

Tiger Christ unsheathed his sword,
Threw it down, became a lamb.
Swift spat upon the species, but
Took two women to his heart.
Samson who was strong as death
Paid his strength to kiss a slut.
Othello that stiff warrior
Was broken by a woman's... (Read full poem)

AS toilsome I wander’d Virginia’s woods, 
To the music of rustling leaves, kick’d by my feet, (for ’twas autumn,) 
I mark’d at the foot of a tree the grave of a soldier, 
Mortally wounded he, and buried on the retreat,... (Read full poem)

7. Silence - written by Edgar Lee Masters
Read 1534 times on American Poems.

I have known the silence of the stars and of the sea,
And the silence of the city when it pauses,
And the silence of a man and a maid,
And the silence of the sick
When their eyes roam about the room.
And I ask: For the depths,
Of what use is... (Read full poem)

TWO Swede families live downstairs and an Irish policeman upstairs, and an old soldier, Uncle Joe.
Two Swede boys go upstairs and see Joe. His wife is dead, his only son is dead, and his two daughters in Missouri and Texas don’t want him... (Read full poem)

9. Liebestod - written by Alan Seeger
Read 470 times on American Poems.

I who, conceived beneath another star, 
Had been a prince and played with life, instead 
Have been its slave, an outcast exiled far 
From the fair things my faith has merited. 
My ways have been the ways that wanderers tread 
And those that... (Read full poem)

My friend attacks my friend!
Oh Battle picturesque!
Then I turn Soldier too,
And he turns Satirist!
How martial is this place!
Had I a mighty gun
I think I'd shoot the human race
And then to glory run!(Read full poem)

11. Chicago Poet - written by Carl Sandburg
From Cornhuskers. Published in 1918. Read 2234 times on American Poems.

I SALUTED a nobody.
I saw him in a looking-glass.
He smiled—so did I.
He crumpled the skin on his forehead,
  frowning—so did I.
Everything I did he did.
I said, “Hello, I know you.”
And I was a liar to say so.
 
Ah, this... (Read full poem)

The river brought down
dead horses, dead men
and military debris,
indicative of war
or official acts upstream,
but it went by, it all
goes by, that is the thing
about the river. Then
a soldier on a log
went by. He seemed drunk
and we asked... (Read full poem)

13. John Ericsson Day Memorial, 1918 - written by Carl Sandburg
From Cornhuskers. Published in 1918. Read 1291 times on American Poems.

INTO the gulf and the pit of the dark night, the cold night, there is a man goes into the dark and the cold and when he comes back to his people he brings fire in his hands and they remember him in the years afterward as the fire bringer—they... (Read full poem)

NOT youth pertains to me, 
Nor delicatesse—I cannot beguile the time with talk; 
Awkward in the parlor, neither a dancer nor elegant; 
In the learn’d coterie sitting constrain’d and still—for learning. inures
    not to
	me;... (Read full poem)

15. One Sweeps By. - written by Walt Whitman
From Leaves of Grass. Published in 1900. Read 1857 times on American Poems.

ONE sweeps by, attended by an immense train, 
All emblematic of peace—not a soldier or menial among them. 
  
One sweeps by, old, with black eyes, and profuse white hair, 
He has the simple magnificence of health and strength, 
His face strikes... (Read full poem)

Reign of Louis Philippe

A great tall column spearing at the sky
With a little man on top.  Goodness!  Tell me 
why?
He looks a silly thing enough to stand up there so high.
What a strange fellow, like a soldier in a play,
Tight-fitting coat... (Read full poem)

17. Home Thoughts - written by Carl Sandburg
From Smoke and Steel. Published in 1922. Read 1846 times on American Poems.

THE SEA rocks have a green moss.
The pine rocks have red berries.
I have memories of you.
  
Speak to me of how you miss me.
Tell me the hours go long and slow.
  
Speak to me of the drag on your heart,
The iron drag of the long days.
  
I know... (Read full poem)

Yeats died Saturday in France.
Freedom from his animal
Has come at last in alien Nice,
His heart beat separate from his will:
He knows at last the old abyss
Which always faced his staring face.

No ability, no dignity
Can fail him now who trained so... (Read full poem)

19. The Soldier - written by Robert Frost
Read 36105 times on American Poems.

He is that fallen lance that lies as hurled,
That lies unlifted now, come dew, come rust,
But still lies pointed as it ploughed the dust.
If we who sight along it round the world,
See nothing worthy to have been its mark,
It is because like men we... (Read full poem)

The letters always just evade the hand
One skates like a stone into a beam, falls like a bird.
Surely the past from which the letters rise
Is waiting in the future, past the graves?
The soldiers are all haunted by their lives.
Their claims upon... (Read full poem)

21. A Soldier - written by Robert Frost
From West-Running Brook. Published in 1928. Read 12029 times on American Poems.

He is that fallen lance that lies as hurled,
That lies unlifted now, come dew, come rust,
But still lies pointed as it ploughed the dust.
If we who sight along it round the world,
See nothing worthy to have been its mark,
It is because like men we... (Read full poem)

The truth is dark under your eyelids.
What are you going to do about it?
The birds are silent; there's no one to ask.
All day long you'll squint at the gray sky.
When the wind blows you'll shiver like straw.

A meek little lamb you grew your... (Read full poem)

23. From the Rooms of the Prom Queen - written by Joseph Mayo Wristen
From The Code. Read 3530 times on American Poems.

I was there with the young men who danced to OZ.
I filled the room with 
my expectations,
creamed the walls with my visions
while applauding their rebelliousness.

They would watch me 
as I walked 
through the door 
with my lovely whore
by... (Read full poem)

If you danced from midnight
to six A.M. who would understand?

The runaway boy
who chucks it all
to live on the Boston Common
on speed and saltines,
pissing in the duck pond,
rapping with the street priest,
trading talk like blows,
another missing... (Read full poem)

25. To E.T. - written by Robert Frost
From New Hampshire. Published in 1923. Read 6943 times on American Poems.

I slumbered with your poems on my breast
Spread open as I dropped them half-read through
Like dove wings on a figure on a tomb
To see, if in a dream they brought of you,

I might not have the chance I missed in life
Through some delay, and... (Read full poem)