Mimetic Poems – Student
examples
Bohemia
By Dorothy Parker
Authors and actors and artists and such
Never know nothing, and never know
much.
Sculptors and singers and those of their
kidney
Tell their affairs from Seattle to Sydney.
Playwrights and poets and such horses’
necks
Start off from anywhere, end up at sex.
Diarists, critics, and similar roe
Never say nothing, and never say no.
People Who Do Things exceed my
endurance;
God, for a man that solicits insurance!
Homage to My Hips
By Lucille Clifton
these hips are big hips
they need space to
move around in.
they don’t fit into little
petty places, these hips
are free hips.
they don’t like to be held back.
these hips have never been enslaved,
they go where they want to go
they do what they want to do.
these hips are mighty hips.
these hips are magic hips.
i have known them
to put a spell on a man and
spin him like a top!


Generation X
By Hannah _____
Goths and punks, those so sad they bleed
black
Have skewed little views, perspective they
lack.
Geeks and nerds and others with brains,
In class when they’re right, are such
massive
pains;
Drama freaks, people espousing devotion
Have too much time, and too much
emotion;
Cheerleaders and Pep Quad with all their
Perkiset
Are considered by many society’s great
wrecks.
The people I see make me desire to riot.
Oh, for the teenager who knows to be
quiet.
Homage to My Feet
By Emily _____
these feet are strong feet
they like to be bare
they love walking and running
in the grass.
these feet are brown feet
tan from the sun,
not to be trapped.
they like to wear slippers
or what you call flip-flops.
these feet are sly feet
they could juggle a ball
or bend one around a wall;
they could cross from the fifty
and volley into the back of the net.
i have known them
to spin around a goalie and
sleep her like a yo-yo!

Dream Variations
By Langston Hughes
To fling my arms wide
In some place of the sun,
To whirl and to dance
Till the white day is done.
Then rest at cool evening
Beneath a tall tree
While night comes on gently,
Dark like me –
That is my dream!
To fling my arms wide
In the face of the sun,
Dance! Whirl! Whirl!
Till the quick day is done.
Rest at pale evening…
A tall, slim tree…
Night coming tenderly
Black like me.
Eating Alone
By Li-Young Lee
I’ve pulled the last of the year’s young onions
The garden is bare now. The ground is cold,
Brown and old. What is left of the day flames
In the maples at the corner of my
Eye I turn, a cardinal vanishes.
By the cellar door, I wash the onions,
Then drink from the icy metal spigot.
Once, years back, I walked beside my father
Among the windfall pears. I can’t recall
Our words. We may have strolled in silence.
But
I still see him bend that way—left hand braced
On knee, creaky—to lift and hold to my
Eye a rotten pear. In it, a hornet
Spun crazily, glazed in slow, glistening juice.
It was my father I saw this morning
Waving to me from the trees. I almost
Called to him, until I came close enough
To see the shovel, leaning where I had
Left it, in the flickering, deep green shade.
White rice steaming, almost done. Sweet
green
peas
Fried in onions. Shrimp braised in sesame
Oil and garlic. And my own loneliness.
What more could I, a young man, want?
Summer Reverie
By Jon _______
To swim in swift water
On a warm summer day,
To dive and to spin
Pray my mind does not stray.
Then lay by the riverside
Watching the sky,
The clouds shifting sleepily
Strange like me –
That is my dream!
To swim in swift water
As I seize the sweet day,
Spin! Dive! Dive!
Pray my thoughts do not stray.
Rest on the sandy shore,
A mossy gray rock…
Clouds shifting lazily
Strange like me.
Breakfast of Champions
By Brooks _____
I’ve gone out and grabbed the newspaper
The sidewalk’s wet; the sky’s still dark
Outside the window. The heater rumbles
And waterfalls of warmth pour up
From the vent I sit on.
By the kitchen nook, I hold bowl and spoon
Reading things like Doonesbury and The Edge.
It was fourth grade when I started rising early
(before 7:00 am). I can remember
how unnatural it felt; the empty downstairs.
No one at the table or around the corner.
A new vista, this dimly-lit solitude.
In my bowl, alongside the cereal, an ant
Is swimming. Independence.
For some time my brother did the same,
Rising right after me. We squabbled
Over heat vent primacy, newspaper sections,
And who had more Frosted Flakes
(A Delicacy). Now, he sleeps in.
Milk and crunching Cheerios knock-offs
With raspberries afloat. Gas heat.
The solitude of the morning.
What more could I, a young man, want?