Poetry

Updated on October 09, 2014
W.X. asks from Fayetteville, AR
6 answers

Do English teachers still require students to memorize classic poems?

What classic poems did you memorize as a student? (any level--Junior High to College).

Out of nowhere I started reciting Poe's, Eldorado, today.

Now, I am trying to think of this other sad, classic poem from a dad to a young man turning 21 and I cannot find it anywhere or even recall the name of it. Help if you can. It is nagging me...

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So What Happened?

Thanks mamas. You gave me great new ones. But, the poem (not song) I am thinking of is especially about a man's son turning 21 and how he feels...

More Answers

F.W.

answers from Danville on

I think you may be thinking of Rudyard Kipling's poem "If". A true classic!

If—
By Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

Source: A Choice of Kipling's Verse (1943)

***ETA...I see 'B' thought the same!***

5 moms found this helpful

L.U.

answers from Seattle on

When I was in high school we memorized Shakespear's Sonnet 18 (Shall I compare the to a Summer's day)
Other than that? i don't remember any!
L.

1 mom found this helpful

B.C.

answers from Norfolk on

In college we never had to memorize poems.
In high school I think we did but after 35 years I can't remember doing it.

It's probably not what you're looking for but the only poem I can think of from Dad to son is 'If' by Rudyard Kipling but his son died at 18.

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/175772#poem

1 mom found this helpful

M.M.

answers from Chicago on

I never had to memorize any poems...

But poets that we studied heavily were Emily Browning, Robert Frost, Poe, etc...

1 mom found this helpful

T.N.

answers from Albany on

Sure you're not thinking about Harry Chapin's Cat's In The Cradle? Songs, poems, semantics.

:)

Smallavatar-fefd015f3e6a23a79637b7ec8e9ddaa6

R.M.

answers from San Francisco on

Thanks for this question! I love the Rudyard Kipling poem, but hadn't heard it before.

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