Adventure poems take the reader to different times, places, and into surprising situations. A reader might find themselves exploring an unknown region or learning about an incredible, romantic quest. These poems might be entirely realistic or include supernatural or surrealistic elements.
‘La Belle Dame sans Merci’ is a poignant reflection of Keats’ own life and emotions, encapsulating themes of unrequited love, illness, and social barriers.
O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has withered from the lake,
And no birds sing.
‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ is a lyrical ballad about a mysterious sea-faring wedding guest who tells a long story of a dangerous journey. It was written between 1797 and 1798.
He holds him with his glittering eye—
The Wedding-Guest stood still,
And listens like a three years' child:
The Mariner hath his will.
‘Far over the misty mountains cold’ by J.R.R. Tolkien depicts the destruction of Thorin Oakenshield’s home and his desire to win it back from Smaug.
Far over the misty mountains cold
To dungeons deep and caverns old
We must away ere break of day
To seek the pale enchanted gold.
‘The Shadow Bride’ conceptualizes the contrast between light and darkness, as well as stillness and movement through personification.
There was a man who dwelt alone
Beneath the moon in shadow.
He sat as long as lasting stone,
And yet he had no shadow.
‘Star-Fix’ by Marilyn Nelson is a poem that lionizes the noble role of the navigator onboard an aircraft.
At his cramped desk under the astrodome, the navigator looks
thousands of light-years everywhere but down. He gets a celestial fix,
measuring head-winds; checking the log; plotting wind-speed,
altitude, drift in a circle of protractors, slide-rules, and pencils.
‘To Beachey, 1912‘ by Carl Sandburg is a poem that expresses the author’s appreciation for aviation. The main character of the poem is flying in an airplane, and from high up, he is able to really appreciate the beauty of the blue sky.
Riding against the east,
A veering, steady shadow
Purrs the motor-call
Of the man-bird
Charles Bukowski’s ‘Friendly advice to a lot of young men’ is an unforgettable poem that lays out the things the poet thinks men should and should not do in life.
‘How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix’ by Robert Browning depicts three riders’ attempting to gallop from Ghent to Aix. The speaker makes it there, delivering a critical, although unknown, piece of news.
I sprang to the stirrup, and Joris, and he;
I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three;
‘Good speed!'’ cried the watch, as the gate-bolts undrew;
‘Speed!’ echoed the wall to us galloping through;
‘Monuments’ by Kamala Wijeratne describes the depressed state of a Sri Lankan community in the midst of the Civil War which lasted from 1983 to 2009.
This poem captures John Keats’ awe upon reading George Chapman’s English translation of Homer, likening the experience to discovering “realms of gold.”
Much have I travell'd in the realms of gold,
And many goodly states and kingdoms seen;
Round many western islands have I been
Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold.
‘The Express’ is an enthralling and uncanny poem which explores the feelings of awe and concern after a new train leaves the station.
‘The Maldive Shark’ is a poem that describes the relationship between sharks and the pilot-fish that swim along beside them.
‘Travel’ by Edna St. Vincent Millay speaks of one narrator’s unquenchable longing for the opportunity to escape from her everyday life.
The railroad track is miles away,
And the day is loud with voices speaking,
Yet there isn't a train goes by all day
But I hear its whistle shrieking.
The dramatic monologue ‘Ulysses’ by Alfred Lord Tennyson presents the indomitable courage and adventurous zeal of old Ulysses: a man of adventure.
It little profits that an idle king,
By this still hearth, among these barren crags,
Match'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole
Unequal laws unto a savage race,
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