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      'Poem for a Birthday' and Other Poetry by Sally Cook

      The Society
      June 28, 2017
      Beauty, Culture, Humor, Poetry
      6 Comments
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    • ‘Six’: A Poem by Patricia Rogers Crozier

      The Society
      June 23, 2025
    • ‘Archaic Torso of Apollo’ by Rilke and ‘Reconciliation’ by Goethe, Translated by Josh Olson

      The Society
      June 22, 2025
      6
    • ‘The Prayer Blanket’: A Poem Based on the Real Experience of Tim Cassar

      The Society
      June 22, 2025
      9
    • The Society of Classical Poets 2025 Haiku Competition

      The Society
      June 21, 2025
      5
    • ‘Together’: A Poem by Margaret Coats

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      June 21, 2025
      14
    • ‘I Would Say Yes’ and Other Poetry by Gigi Ryan

      The Society
      June 20, 2025
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    • Winners of the First-Liners Poetry Contest

      The Society
      July 25, 2021
      Beauty, Culture, Humor, Poetry, Poetry Contests
      30 Comments
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    • The Society of Classical Poets 2025 Haiku Competition

      The Society
      June 21, 2025
      5
    • Winners of Friends of Falun Gong 2025 Poetry Competition Announced

      The Society
      May 13, 2025
      1
    • 2025 Friends of Falun Gong Poetry Competition

      The Society
      March 31, 2025
    • The Best Poems of 2024: Winners of SCP International Poetry Competition

      The Society
      February 1, 2025
      28
    • Winners of 2024 SCP International High School Poetry Competition Announced

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      February 1, 2025
      2
    • The Best Haiku of 2024: Winners of the 2024 SCP Haiku Competition

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      September 29, 2024
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Author The Society

The Society

The Society of Classical Poets was founded in New York in July, 2012.

Ode to the Confederate Dead

The Society
August 20, 2017
Culture, Poetry
23 Comments
by Cause Bewilder for Joshua Philipp Grave statue after statue falls with strict impunity. Memorials and monuments yield to community. The wind whips up no recollection; it cannot forget; the soldiers...

‘Higher Purpose’ and Other Poetry by David Watt

The Society
August 20, 2017
Beauty, Humor, Poetry
8 Comments
Higher Purpose Is there any higher purpose As they walk with faces down? Are they sure of destination As they shuffle through the town; With eyes grown unaccustomed To a world beyond their...

‘Passing of the Seasons’ and Other Poetry by Wandi Zhu

The Society
August 19, 2017
Beauty, High School Submissions, Poetry
7 Comments
Passing of the Seasons When snow has melted, chill has gone, and winter turns to spring, The tender buds grow on the branches where the robins sing. The earth once brown is green again, blessed by the April...

‘Nesting Season’ and Other Poetry by Michael Angel Martín

The Society
August 18, 2017
Beauty, Humor, Poetry
Nesting Season Little sleep. The night heat did not relent. You startle me up as day breaks over the tent to show me the sea-turtle tracks you found through the bluestems behind the campground. I hardly...

‘He viewed the world with perfect form’ by Alec Ream

The Society
August 17, 2017
Beauty, Poetry
5 Comments
. He viewed the world with perfect form But upside down, not as the norm He lifted those who’d been down - trod And doing so, he followed God . . Alec Ream is a writer living in Virginia. His poetic work...

‘Concession’ by Charles Joseph Albert

The Society
August 15, 2017
Beauty, Poetry
14 Comments
  I used to find it hard to lose at chess. I'd watch in disbelief the check and mate, think through the game and curse to find too late— I'd bought disaster with the bishop's press. In school,...

‘George and the Dragon’ and Other Poetry by Sue Vincent

The Society
August 14, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Humor, Poetry, Villanelle
6 Comments
George and the Dragon In the Yorkshire dialect “Nah, sithee,” said Granny, “Just set thee dahn ‘ere, An’ I’ll tell thee a tale old and true, Of ‘ow good Saint George slew a dragon one...

‘The Journal’ and Other Poetry by Amy Foreman

The Society
August 13, 2017
Beauty, Deconstructing Communism, Poetry, Short Stories
12 Comments
The Journal It sat upon his bedside table, closed, And waiting to keep record of each day: The silent pages still and unexposed, A diary to come, his dossier. He saw it every evening as he bent To turn...

‘Meadows of Corn’ and Other Poetry by Satyananda Sarangi

The Society
August 12, 2017
Art, Beauty, Poetry
44 Comments
Meadows of Corn It seems but bland to every passing eye, These regal meadows dressed in ripened corn; They dance and few can such effects deny, The brows of greener grass their touch adorn. As dismal...

‘The Plaint of Aunegild’ by Joseph S. Salemi

The Society
August 11, 2017
Culture, Poetry
7 Comments
Argument The following poem is a dramatic monologue in four sections, based on a brief passage in a barbarian legal text. In the sixth-century law code Lex Burgundiorum, an account is given of the widow...

Rhyming Riddle Contest Winners Announced

The Society
August 10, 2017
Culture, Poetry, Poetry Contests, Riddles
1 Comment
Thank you to everyone who participated! Judges Dusty Grein, Michael Curtis, and Damian Robin have selected the below winners for the first Rhyming Riddle Contest. Judge Curtis said meter was...

‘To Solitude’ and Other Poetry by Morgan Downs

The Society
August 9, 2017
Beauty, Poetry
4 Comments
  To Solitude Come, Solitude, my first and truest friend! Long hours of careless converse burden me, And I have need of hospitality Such as art thou alone meet with to lend. What synthesis my past...

‘What Heights Within My Mind Descend’ by David Hollywood

The Society
August 8, 2017
Poetry
6 Comments
  What heights within my mind descend? To fall on peaks where faith shall end, As summits fail to comprehend, That lands beneath cannot ascend, The pinnacles my thoughts transcend. As...

‘Windmill Song’ and Other Poetry by Don Shook

The Society
August 7, 2017
Beauty, Humor, Poetry, Short Stories
8 Comments
  Windmill Song Alone it shudders on a hill, Defiant in the wind. A strong south gale could topple it, A hard rain do it in. Too many years its silver blades Whirled in the morning breeze While...

‘The Tea Garden: A Crown of Sonnets’ and Other Poetry by Evan Mantyk

The Society
August 6, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
16 Comments
On Visiting the Tea Garden in Middletown, New York I. A harried daddy with two kids in tow, Maneuvering through city streets and cars, I look around quite nervously for crows Whose filthy bombs my head...

How to Write an Alexandroid

The Society
August 5, 2017
Alexandroid, Education, Poetry, Poetry Forms
14 Comments
By C.B. Anderson Anyone writing formal poetry today has to be grateful for the arsenal of fixed forms—most of them bequeathed to us from masters of the past—that is available to lend structure to poetic...

‘Gazing above Daily Cares’ by Daniel Magdalen

The Society
August 4, 2017
Beauty, Poetry, Villanelle
10 Comments
A Villanelle To breathe the beaming silence of the sky I long, when dawn’s chill wakes my eyes, and see The oft-unseen yet boundless peace on high. When slumber’s velvety dim moments die, Pale...

‘Untitled’ and Other Poetry by Phillip Whidden

The Society
August 3, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
5 Comments
  Untitled All older statues want to come alive, Those Greek and Roman ones, and Christian, too. Their skeletons and veins and muscles strive To break through marble skin.  They want their...

Three Poems on the Brainwashing of America by Joe Tessitore

The Society
August 2, 2017
Culture, Deconstructing Communism, Humor, Poetry
8 Comments
I. My brain just came back from the laundry they tell me it's perfectly clean and it's thinking the way it's supposed to though I'm not really sure what they mean They tell me I shouldn't be...

‘A Lifetime’ and Other Poetry by Ann Christine Tabaka

The Society
July 31, 2017
Beauty, Poetry
8 Comments
A Lifetime Day drifts into evening Evening into night All around me darkness With only stars for light Dawn awakes the morning The morning burst into day The cycle never ceasing Black to white to...

‘Again’ by Jane Blanchard

The Society
July 30, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
7 Comments
Upon the release of the Society’s How to Write Classical Poetry   When feeling some compulsion to compose, One wonders which of many forms to choose, Then tends to favor what one really...

“Though You Behold Me Silent in This Room…” By Joseph Charles MacKenzie

The Society
July 29, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Love Poems, Poetry, Popular Poetry Archives
81 Comments
For Elizabeth On the Poet’s Eleventh Wedding Anniversary   Though you behold me silent in this room, Know that I walk in fields of fresh-cut hay; Though I be still, my thoughts like roses...

‘The Devil’s New Mission’ and Other Poetry by Troy Camplin

The Society
July 28, 2017
Culture, Humor, Poetry
4 Comments
  The Devil's New Mission The Devil went to every single school Across America to find a Faust— But no one wanted knowledge. Each dim fool Stared at a phone—the Devil could not roust A one to...

Essay: Leo Yankevich: un Coup d’œil (A Glance)

The Society
July 27, 2017
Deconstructing Communism, Essays, Reviews
48 Comments
This essay was written in 2007 and has remained unpublished until now. by Ludiew E. Sarceb Few of the contemporary poets with whom I am familiar have any profound sense of history (and, therefore, of our...

A Translation of Catullus’s ‘Ad Sirmium Insulam’ by Douglas Thornton

The Society
July 25, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Poetry, Translation
7 Comments
The important events in the life of Gaius Valerius Catullus (84-54 B.C.) are recounted through the poems he has left. The particular poem below was written on his return from Asia Minor, where he had attempted...

‘Inside the Dragon’s Teeth, Maui, Hawaii’ and Other Poetry by Ron L. Hodges

The Society
July 24, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
6 Comments
Inside the Dragon’s Teeth Maui, Hawaii From inside, you get a new perspective ___Of the tourist spot known as Dragon’s Teeth. The people who write about such things give ___This place, which lies on...

‘After the Peloponnesian Wars: a Microcosm’ and Other Poetry by James B. Nicola

The Society
July 23, 2017
Poetry, Villanelle
1 Comment
After the Peloponnesian Wars: a Microcosm A Villanelle At last I grasp what I could never get: As long as man has heart, hope can exist. Doom’s not your only master, then. And yet for years I...

Essay: ‘Poetry and the Muses Part 3’ by James Sale

The Society
July 22, 2017
Beauty, Essays, Poetry
18 Comments
It has long been observed that whilst the ego is useful in making daily and ordinary decisions in our life, it is less effective when it comes to more important issues; it is by nature competitive, and it...

‘When All the World Seems New’ by Father Richard Libby

The Society
July 21, 2017
Beauty, Poetry
11 Comments
  When, late in May, Memorial Day ____Inaugurates the season Of summer sun and summer fun ____(Much welcomed, with good reason), Then nature’s crowned with sight and sound: ____The sky is bright...

‘Unshaken Faith’ and Other Poetry by Joshua Philipp

The Society
July 20, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Deconstructing Communism, Human Rights in China, Poetry
1 Comment
Unshaken Faith Forward Alliterative verse dedicated to Falun Gong practitioners who have faced persecution in China since July 20, 1999   The ground was broken, crusty, cracked for miles and...

‘On a Bodegón of Zurbarán’ and Other Poetry by Joseph Charles MacKenzie (with Audio)

The Society
July 19, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Ekphrastic, Poetry, Readings
18 Comments
LVII. On a Bodegón of Zurbarán From carbon darkness, splendor! Light comes forth. A painter knew the warm fidelity Of lemons pointing east and west and north, And praised the Thornless Rose’s...

‘To the Orient. An Elegy’ by T. Bothwell

The Society
July 18, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Poetry, Terrorism
2 Comments
  At last, the sunset’s knell forebodes the ceasing day— The merchants in their silken garments trudge their way Along, with Turkish camels and Koranic tunes. Diurnal light retreats from...

‘And What Of Art’ and Other Poetry by Sally Cook

The Society
July 16, 2017
Art, Beauty, Deconstructing Communism, Poetry
14 Comments
  And What Of Art? It used to be that there was a division Between the arts, and each had segments, too. A poem was just a poem, required revision, A painter mixed his colors – blue was...

Translation of Dante’s Inferno, Canto I and Poetry by J. Simon Harris

The Society
July 14, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Dante, Epic, Poetry, Terza Rima, Translation
10 Comments
Dante’s Inferno, Canto I (Poem by Dante Alighieri / translation by J. Simon Harris in terza rima) In the middle of the journey of our life I found myself again in a dark forest, for I had lost the pathway...

Poems on the Death of Liu Xiaobo, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate

The Society
July 13, 2017
Human Rights in China, Poetry
2 Comments
To Liu Xiaobo by Morgan Downs Xiaobo—you are from hence forever gone. Meanwhile, your executioners remain. Even now, they overcast where you have lain And scrape as best they can your measure on An...

‘Manchester Remembers’ by Damian Robin

The Society
July 12, 2017
Poetry, Terrorism
6 Comments
On the Special Meeting of the Manchester City Council (Wed. 12th of July, 2017) to reflect on the terrible events that took place at the Manchester Arena on the 22nd of May   Amendments and agendas...

‘Golden Gate’ by Daniel Rattelle

The Society
July 11, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
2 Comments
  A wind blew through the almond trees. The blossoms shook, the petals floated down Past where I sat on the cliffs above the sea. The waves reminded me a bit of the mounds Of snow I’d left...

‘Why Live This Long?’ by Michael Charles Maibach

The Society
July 10, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
6 Comments
Why Live This Long? The thought presents - Why live this long? What more to do, Once sung my song? The arch of life Made sense to me. With work in hand - While serving Thee. Great tasks complete, Hills have...

‘Potpourri’ and Other Poetry by Joseph S. Salemi

The Society
July 8, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Humor, Poetry
15 Comments
  Potpourri Take leaves at first, curled crisp by autumn’s cold— Crush them to crumbly powder in a tray To make a simple palette of decay In varied tints of brown and red and gold. Next flower...

‘Epistle to a Celt’ and Other Poetry by Morgan Downs

The Society
July 7, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Poetry
7 Comments
Epistle to a Celt Where, o Celt, mayst thou be found Upon what all was once thy ground? Art thou of thy majestic race The last to bear a mortal face? Thy speech and runes thou scornst to learn, Which...
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