# Have you ever had a poem stuck in your head? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 29, 2008, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308 "2008-04-29T02:47:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Mouse\_Maven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@Mouse\_Maven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mouse_Maven)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/1 "2008-04-29T02:47:18Z")
For the past couple of weeks, Langston Hughes’ poem _A Dream Deferred_ has been running around in my head. Its driving me **nuts**! If you’ve had a lingering poem, what was it? ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/2 "2008-04-29T03:09:05Z")
Robert Frost, every time I see _Telefon_ 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Yorikke](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yorikke/32/4335_2.png) [@Yorikke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yorikke)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/3 "2008-04-29T03:09:27Z")
I hate poetry, as a rule. I like some Poe, and some Blake, but every so often, I have the first two lines of [Shakespeare’s Sonnet 29](http://www.albionmich.com/inspiration/whenindisgrace.html) running over and over in my head. Annoying. Joe ---
**Author:** ![Morgyn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morgyn/32/3041_2.png) [@Morgyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgyn)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/4 "2008-04-29T03:11:44Z")
Mary Coleridge, the last two lines of “The weapon that you fought with was a word”. I read it in high school and those lines stuck, but I could never remember who wrote it or what the poem’s title was. Recently I looked again using Google, and there it was. The last two lines: > [@](#): > > They have not buried me. They do not know > Life from its ghost. ---
**Author:** ![whistlepig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/73ab20/32.png) [@whistlepig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whistlepig)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/5 "2008-04-29T03:34:02Z")
Gregory Corso, “Sidewalk Orgy.” I think it’s because a friend told me about seeing a trumpeter swan recently. ---
**Author:** ![Campion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@Campion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Campion)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/6 "2008-04-29T03:42:44Z")
“[Sympathy](http://www.potw.org/archive/potw219.html)” by Paul Laurence Dunbar: “And a pain still throbs in the old, old scars, and they pulse again with a keener sting --” And, of course, this month I always hear part of “[The Wasteland](http://www.theotherpages.org/poems/eliot01.html)” by T.S. Eliot: “April is the cruelest month, breeding lilacs out of the dead land, mixing memory and desire, stirring dull roots with spring rain.” It’s funny: I started out hating The Wasteland in college, but every time I read it, I find something new in it, and it’s become one of my favorite poems. ---
**Author:** ![sinjin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ebca7d/32.png) [@sinjin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sinjin)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/7 "2008-04-29T03:52:25Z")
Billy Collins’ [Questions About Angels](http://www.poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=176044) I just can’t get the image of the tired band and the lone angel dancing on the tiny dance floor out of my head. And swinging on hinges saying they’re names backwards and forwards. I guess it’s just the whimsey of it. Makes me smile whenever it pops into my brain. ---
**Author:** ![pinkfreud](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pinkfreud/32/17603_2.png) [@pinkfreud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pinkfreud)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 4:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/8 "2008-04-29T04:30:09Z")
For years I’ve had a recurring mindworm that is a scrap of Dylan Thomas’s [Fern Hill](http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15378): _Time held me green and dying Though I sang in my chains like the sea._ ---
**Author:** ![Intravenus\_De\_Milo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Intravenus\_De\_Milo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Intravenus_De_Milo)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/9 "2008-04-29T04:57:51Z")
> [@wheresgeorge04](#): > > I hate poetry, as a rule. I like some Poe, and some Blake, but every so often, I have the first two lines of Shakespeare’s Sonnet 29 running over and over in my head. Annoying. Heheh…I love the Sonnets because roughly 90% of the people who fawn over and borrow the “shall I compare thee to a summer’s day etc. etc.” have no idea that that was written by a man and directed at another man. The poem that has haunted me the most, if you will, is [The Lady of Shallott](http://charon.sfsu.edu/TENNYSON/TENNLADY.HTML). It’s just so beautiful and tragic, I found it hard to get out of my head the first time I heard it. ---
**Author:** ![Lama\_Pacos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Lama\_Pacos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lama_Pacos)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/10 "2008-04-29T05:12:32Z")
I get the first line of Plath’s “Daddy” stuck in my head all the time: “_You do not do, you do not do_”. It lodges in my brain like a rap hook. ---
**Author:** ![HazelNutCoffee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@HazelNutCoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HazelNutCoffee)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 5:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/11 "2008-04-29T05:15:29Z")
[QUOTE=Lama Pacos] I get the first line of Plath’s “Daddy” stuck in my head all the time: “_You do not do, you do not do_”. It lodges in my brain like a rap hook. [/QUOTE] Gee thanks. Now I have it stuck in my head! _Ach, du_ Better than “Prufrock,” I suppose. The thing about “Prufrock” is that I have the damn thing memorized so when I get one line stuck in my head I end up running through the entire poem. ---
**Author:** ![exclamation](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/858c86/32.png) [@exclamation](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/exclamation)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/12 "2008-04-29T05:32:52Z")
> [@](#): > > As I was walking up the stair > I met a man who wasn’t there. > He wasn’t there again today. > I wish, I wish he’d stay away. This is the poem stuck in my head. ALL THE TIME!!! It’s credited to Hughes Mearns, but I have the feeling I picked it up through Stephen King. It gives me the shivers. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 7:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/13 "2008-04-29T07:13:23Z")
> [@](#): > > Cattle die and kinsmen die, > thyself too soon must die, > but one thing never, I ween, will die, > fair fame of one who has earned. > > Cattle die and kinsmen die, > thyself too soon must die, > but one thing never, I ween, will die, > the doom on each one dead. from [The Havamel](http://altreligion.about.com/library/texts/bl_havamal.htm) All day long. I think it’s a way of telling myself “you gotta quit smoking dude”. An Emerson poem that goes through my head fairly frequently is A subtle chain of countless rings The next unto the farthest brings; The eye reads omens where it goes, And speaks all languages the rose; And, striving to be man, the worm Mounts through all the spires of form. [Nature](http://www.ecotopia.org/about/nature/natureintro.html) And a poem that it took me forever to learn when I was in a production of _Night of the Iguana_ is now lodged there perfectly (“How calmly does the orange branch/observe the sky begin to blanch…”- you can google the rest- I can’t stand that poem.) ---
**Author:** ![Surok](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@Surok](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Surok)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 7:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/14 "2008-04-29T07:27:26Z")
As it’s spring, Housman’s ‘Loveliest of trees the cherry now’ is a constant background music in my brain. ---
**Author:** ![thirdwarning](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecccb3/32.png) [@thirdwarning](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thirdwarning)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 8:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/15 "2008-04-29T08:39:34Z")
For a month or so last winter I had _Pippa’s Song_ stuck in my head, just showing up all the time and repeating. I couldn’t figure out for the life of me what set it off, until I realized I was reading David McCullough’s bio of Teddy Roosevelt, Mornings on Horseback. Apparently the rhythm got it going. Morning’s at seven The hillside’s dew-pearled God’s in His heaven All’s right with the world ---
**Author:** ![The\_Them](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/898d66/32.png) [@The\_Them](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Them)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 10:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/16 "2008-04-29T10:55:36Z")
_The woods are lovely, dark and deep But I have promises to keep And miles to go before I sleep And miles to go before I sleep. -_ Robert Frost ---
**Author:** ![Darth\_Nader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Darth\_Nader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Nader)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/17 "2008-04-29T15:02:28Z")
\*While shepherds watched their flocks by night, All seated on the ground, A high-explosive shell came down And mutton rained around. \* -Hector Munro ---
**Author:** ![Marlitharn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/779978/32.png) [@Marlitharn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marlitharn)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/18 "2008-04-29T15:17:22Z")
\*If I had a shiny gun, I could have a world of fun, Speeding bullets through the brains Of the folks who give me pains. Or had I some poisonous gas, I could make the moments pass Bumping off a number of People whom I do not love. But I have no lethal weapon. Thus does Fate our pleasure step on! So they still are quick and well, Who should be, by rights, in hell.\* This one usually pops up while I’m at work. Get out of my head, Dorothy Parker! ---
**Author:** ![Verminary](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/71e660/32.png) [@Verminary](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Verminary)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/19 "2008-04-29T15:18:34Z")
I have two, which permanently implanted themselves in my brain the moment I read them: “[You Fit Into Me](http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/you-fit-into-me/)” by Margaret Atwood. Also the last lines of “Trauma,” by Brad Leithauser: _The past never passes. It simply amasses._ ---
**Author:** ![glee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b5a626/32.png) [@glee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glee)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2008, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308/20 "2008-04-29T16:14:05Z")
‘Don John of Austria is going to the war’ ([Lepanto by GK Chesterton](http://www.bartleby.com/103/91.html)) I once played a 6 hour game of chess with this stuck in my mind… :eek: [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/have-you-ever-had-a-poem-stuck-in-your-head/447308.md?page=2)