Looking for a Poem

[Sage_Rat]

I was never a big poetry guy, but as a literature major I have been exposed to a good bit of it. But that’s all in classes that were doing reviews of the “top ten” most famous authors of such and such a time period in such and such a region–examining just their top four or five, smaller poems. Probably nothing earlier than 1800 or later than 1950.

So, what I can remember of the poem:

It’s about a king. At first blush it seems like he is talking about his exploits. But then you realise that he’s more contemplating the hardships that his sons will have to meet, like he did, as young men.

It was decently short. Probably four or five stanzas.

[Surok]

Have you got any half-remembered lines/ phrases?

[Sage_Rat]

I’m thinking that he (the king narrator) compares himself to a stone mountain at some point, but I might be entirely off.

But out of Yeats, Keats, Shelley, Dickinson, Woolsworth, Blake, etc. I wouldn’t think there’s all that many short poems about a king and his sons. We’re probably only looking at 20 poets or so.

[HazelNutCoffee]

I think you’re talking about “Ulysses” by Tennyson.

Part where he talks about his son:

This is my son, mine own Telemachus,
To whom I leave the scepter and the isle—
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil
This labour, by slow prudence to make mild
A rugged people, and thro’ soft degrees
Subdue them to the useful and the good.
Most blameless is he, centred in the sphere
Of common duties, decent not to fail
In offices of tenderness, and pay
Meet adoration to my household gods,
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine.

[Sage_Rat]

@HazelNutCoffee

I think you’re talking about “Ulysses” by Tennyson.

No, I don’t think that’s it.

I think the poem I’m looking for is less florid and more grizzled. And shorter.

[Sage_Rat]

@Sage Rat

Woolsworth

-> Wordsworth

(Just correcting my spelling error.)

[HazelNutCoffee]

Huh. Most of 19th century poetry is florid. Early 20th century as well. (Not all, obviously, but most.)

The subject matter seems like something Yeats would write about.

Damnit, this is bugging me now. I wish I had my Norton anthology with me.

[Sage_Rat]

Well I’ve spent a good 4 hours or so going through online poetry sites, looking at the titles of all the poets whose names I recall. So I’m trying for it too, no worry.

And it was “florid” just not as much as the one.

[Pixilated]

the only king one I can think of is Ozymandias by Shelley

[WF_Tomba]

It sounds like something Robert Browning might possibly have written.

[HazelNutCoffee]

@WF Tomba

It sounds like something Robert Browning might possibly have written.

Conor? Is that you?

I sent the question to some of my friends from grad school. Hopefully they’ll have some ideas.

[Askance]

@Pixilated

the only king one I can think of is Ozymandias by Shelley

I thought of that too, but it misses most of the OP’s clues. Here it is anyway, if for nothing else than my own pleasure:

@Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter’d visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp’d on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock’d them and the heart that fed.

And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away

[eleanorigby]

Shakespeare, maybe? He’s not florid, (well…), but it sounds like a subject of his.
Please post back and let us know if you remember–this is starting to bug me!

[HazelNutCoffee]

@WF Tomba

It sounds like something Robert Browning might possibly have written.

Upon reflection, first-person narration does sound like Browning, but the subject matter doesn’t really sound like him.

I don’t think it’s Shakespeare either, even if the OP is wrong about the time period. The narrator in his sonnets, when in first person, is always the poet himself.

My friend suggested Eliot’s “Journey of the Magi,” but there’s really nothing in there about the narrator’s exploits or any of his sons. I suppose the Magi are called the Three Kings though.

:: goes to search JSTOR ::

[HazelNutCoffee]

Just a suggestion, but it might be something by Seamus Heany, from what I can tell from skimming some JSTOR articles. Unfortunately Heany’s work isn’t public domain yet. (He’s also a contemporary poet, but his poems are usually a staple for modern poetry classes.)

[Sage_Rat]

Hm, the name Seamus Heany isn’t familiar, but I could well have forgotten.

And yeah, a bit hard to tell yes or no given that I’d have to buy his works to be able to go through them.

[vison]

Could it be Seamus Heaney’s translation of Beowulf? Did he not translate the Illiad, as well?

[eleanorigby]

Any other clues at all? A king with son(s)… is the poem written in first person? Is it reflective? Can you remember even one phrase?
(must not dwell on this. Must go back to doing my homework)

[Two_and_a_Half_Inches_of_Fun]

@vison

Did he not translate the Illiad, as well?

No. I think you are thinking of his play The Cure at Troy which is based on Sophocles’ Philoctetes.

[Sage_Rat]

@eleanorigby

Any other clues at all? A king with son(s)… is the poem written in first person? Is it reflective? Can you remember even one phrase?

It’s written first personish and reflective, yes. Can’t recall any phrases.

I mean, really it’s possible that it is Ulysses and my brain just made up a bunch of stuff. But if so it gave me an entirely different impression in class than it does now. It doesn’t feel to me like we’ve found it but who knows really.