# Poems of our childhood



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

I suspect many of us had favorite poems when we were very young, poems that we might think less of today! I certainly remember, but my affections are intact. This thread is for people to recall those long-ago doggerels, so please post!

I'll open with a poem I learned verbatim from my father: From Robert Service, _The Shooting of Dan McGrew_. This Alaska-based tale is fairly long, so I'll only quote the opening stanzas:

A bunch of the boys were whooping it up in the Malamute saloon;
The kid that handles the music-box was hitting a rag-time tune;
Back of the bar, in a solo game, sat Dangerous Dan McGrew,
And watching his luck was his light-o'-love, the lady that's known as Lou.

When out of the night, which was fifty below, and into the din and glare,
There stumbled a miner fresh from the creeks, dog-dirty, and loaded for bear.
He looked like a man with a foot in the grave and scarcely the strength of a louse,
Yet he tilted a poke of dust on the bar, and he called for drinks for the house.
There was none could place the stranger's face, though we searched ourselves for a clue;
But we drank his health, and the last to drink was Dangerous Dan McGrew.

The Beatles obviously knew this poem and referred to it in _Rocky Raccoon_. Here's the whole poem. It's a bit grim. You've been warned!

http://freemasonry.bcy.ca/biography/service_r_w/dan_mcgrew.html


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## Judith (Nov 11, 2015)

I have a poetry book that is from my Aunty when she was at school. Had it since I was a child. Has all the famous poems by Robert Burns, Wiiliam Blake etc. Bit dilapidated and even has "War Emergency Binding" around it. Love it.

Think my favourite is

Tiger Tiger burning bright William Blake


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## Dr Johnson (Jun 26, 2015)

I think this was the first poem I had to learn at school:

The Burial of Sir John Moore after Corunna by Charles Wolfe:

Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero was buried.

We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning,
By the struggling moonbeam's misty light
And the lantern dimly burning.

etc, the rest is *here.*


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

An epic battle of sword and sneer! Some may remember this 1877 poem, which was popular when I was quite young.

The sons of the Prophet are brave men and bold
And quite unaccustomed to fear,
But the bravest by far in the ranks of the Shah,
Was Abdul Abulbul Amir.

If you wanted a man to encourage the van,
Or harass the foe from the rear,
Storm fort or redoubt, you had only to shout
For Abdul Abulbul Amir.

Now the heroes were plenty and well known to fame
In the troops that were led by the Czar,
And the bravest of these was a man by the name
Of Ivan Skavinsky Skavar.

One day this bold Russian, he shouldered his gun
And donned his most truculent sneer,
Downtown he did go where he trod on the toe
Of Abdul Abulbul Amir.

(Thus begins an altercation which can have only one outcome.)

Full poem: https://allpoetry.com/Abdul-Abulbul-Amir

As a song:


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