i need to recite a poem tomorrow. with at least 20 lines. any suggestions? I just wanted to know everyone's favorites.
I would like to stay away from love poems though.
maybe something witty? or fun? or sarcastic?

thanks. Em.

Devin, if you mean reciting from memory, and you have to memorise something by tomorrow, you had better pick a poem that has rhythm and rhyme and some humour, to make it easier to remember. The Australian bush balladeer 'Banjo' Paterson wrote lots like that. Here's a 24-line one:

Been There Before

There came a stranger to Walgett town,
To Walgett town when the sun was low,
And he carried a thirst that was worth a crown,
Yet how to quench it he did not know;
But he thought he might take those yokels down,
The guileless yokels of Walgett town.

They made him a bet in a private bar,
In a private bar when the talk was high,
And they bet him some pounds no matter how far
He could pelt a stone, yet he could not shy
A stone right over the river so brown,
The Darling river at Walgett town.

He knew that the river from bank to bank
Was fifty yards, and he smiled a smile
As he trundled down, but his hopes they sank
For there wasn’t a stone within fifty mile;
For the saltbush plain and the open down
Produce no quarries in Walgett town.

The yokels laughed at his hopes o’erthrown,
And he stood awhile like a man in a dream;
Then out of his pocket he fetched a stone,
And pelted it over the silent stream —
He had been there before: he had wandered down
On a previous visit to Walgett town.

[www.cs.rice.edu]

Devin, go through the first 20, or so, poems in their top 500 list here: [www.poemhunter.com]

Les