Ballad Poems | Poemist

Popular Ballad Poems

The Ballad Of Father Gilligan

by William Butler Yeats

The old priest Peter Gilligan
Was weary night and day
For half his flock were in their beds
Or under green sods lay.

Once, while he nodded in a chair
At the moth-hour of the eve
Another poor man sent for him,
And he began to grieve.

......

Waltzing Matilda

by Banjo Paterson

OH! there once was a swagman camped in the Billabong,
Under the shade of a Coolabah tree;
And he sang as he looked at his old billy boiling,
“Who’ll come a-waltzing Matilda with me.”

Who’ll come a-waltzing Matilda, my darling,
Who’ll come a-waltzing Matilda with me?
Waltzing Matilda and leading a water-bag—
Who’ll come a-waltzing Matilda with me?
Down came a jumbuck to drink at the water-hole,

......

Mulga Bill's Bicycle

by Banjo Paterson

'Twas Mulga Bill, from Eaglehawk, that caught the cycling craze;
He turned away the good old horse that served him many days;
He dressed himself in cycling clothes, resplendent to be seen;
He hurried off to town and bought a shining new machine;
And as he wheeled it through the door, with air of lordly pride,
The grinning shop assistant said, "Excuse me, can you ride?"
"See here, young man," said Mulga Bill, "from Walgett to the sea,
From Conroy's Gap to Castlereagh, there's none can ride like me.
I'm good all round at everything, as everybody knows,
Although I'm not the one to talk - I hate a man that blows.

......

Clancy Of The Overflow

by Banjo Paterson

I had written him a letter which I had, for want of better
Knowledge, sent to where I met him down the Lachlan, years ago,
He was shearing when I knew him, so I sent the letter to him,
Just 'on spec', addressed as follows, 'Clancy, of The Overflow'.
And an answer came directed in a writing unexpected,
(And I think the same was written with a thumb-nail dipped in tar)
Twas his shearing mate who wrote it, and verbatim I will quote it:
'Clancy's gone to Queensland droving, and we don't know where he are.'

In my wild erratic fancy visions come to me of Clancy

......

The Man From Iron Bark

by Banjo Paterson

It was the man from Ironbark who struck the Sydney town,
He wandered over street and park, he wandered up and down.
He loitered here he loitered there, till he was like to drop,
Until at last in sheer despair he sought a barber's shop.
'Ere! shave my beard and whiskers off, I'll be a man of mark,
I'll go and do the Sydney toff up home in Ironbark.'
The barber man was small and flash, as barbers mostly are,
He wore a strike-your-fancy sash he smoked a huge cigar;
He was a humorist of note and keen at repartee,
He laid the odds and kept a 'tote', whatever that may be,

......

Recent Ballad Poems

Requiem~~an Ode To Time

by Besa Dede

Time moves forward, without stopping
And fastened on her shoulders, bind our existence.
Aged and tired slowly we saunter her
Most are left behind, diminishing in the distance.

Weary, withered, and forgotten
We try to helplessly hinder our steps
But the cruel bitch, the time
Will not rest into one place.

......

The Revenuer

by Tammy Darby

It was a cold clear Ozark night.
The stars were bold and shining bright
When the fiddle playing
Caught up with the echoes of the hounds

The full moon was beaming high.
The fog was heavy, wispy, and white
When the revenuer came sneaking around

He had followed the sweet smell.

......

Blue Roses

by Yoko Fushigina

Long-long ago, as the ballad recalls,
In the castle with ivy woven in walls,
Under dark velvet skies, in the eye of the Moon
With sweet-scented fragrance blue roses bloomed.
Dare not to come close to the sharp spikes of white
For vermilion potion is kept in inside.
In those azure bushes, with hearts in a hand
A couple of lovers had found their end.
This story is ancient, as old as can be,
But the roses bore it for you and for me...

......

A Ballad Of The Two Knights

by Sara Teasdale

Two knights rode forth at early dawn
A-seeking maids to wed,
Said one, "My lady must be fair,
With gold hair on her head."

Then spake the other knight-at-arms:
"I care not for her face,
But she I love must be a dove
For purity and grace."

......

The Ballad Of Reading Gaol

by Oscar Wilde

(In memoriam
C. T. W.
Sometime trooper of the Royal Horse Guards
obiit H.M. prison, Reading, Berkshire
July 7, 1896)

I

He did not wear his scarlet coat,
For blood and wine are red,

......