I want my teenage grandchildren to appreciate poetry. Name me one riveting poem that would capture their interest please?

I discovered poetry at the age of 8. I was supposed to learn by heart what to me at that age was a sloppy nature poem about croci: "The crocus while the days are dark unfolds its saffron sheen..." But on the opposite page was Byron's Destruction of Senacharib: "The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold / His cohorts were gleaming in silver and gold". I was enthralled. After class I was given detention for not knowing "The crocus", but by then I knew the whole of Byron's exciting poem. But that I had found for myself, and by defying authority. You are a very lucky grandparent if you can offer your grandchildren a poem and get them to like it. However, if they are boys they might like John Skelton's ribald "Tunning of Eleanor Rumming", about a slovenly medieval alewife and her exploitation of her elderly (female) alcoholic customers.

La Belle Dame sans merci

You should read them something by Langston Hughes or Maya Angelou. They are both great poets.

Any of yours! Your poetry was what got me hooked! Honestly truly...x

Well...Ahem....I would read them some of your own poetry while walking through those dreary winters and colorful falls and flowery springtimes that YOU write so well about WITH THEM NOW! Then,Dear Pal O'er the POND, if they look bored,jump up on anything you can find and recite from memory Jabberwocky or Father William... I am positive they will remember this way way after your death.

The Poet and the Pearly Gates by Cheese Whisperer I hear it's very riveting.

Daffodils by William Wordsworth. It is a classic and about nature.

Green Eggs and Ham.

I would like to think they would be enamored by time travel. Now, you may be talking

about the pros Cassie, but even writing this and some of the following ones, I felt like

I was riding The Time Machine:

The Time Machine

After years of thorough research

Total secret from Christian Church

Friends and family have no idea

I invented the perfect panacea

Crafted a malleable Time Machine

No one on Earth could have foreseen

Anneal and temper machine was built

To facilitate life -- lived to the hilt

You want to go back in time with me

Listen to the rules and then you’ll see

Can’t change the past, nor save Lincoln

Not the purpose if that’s your thinking

The warp of time is one of the heart

Let me tell more before we depart

Enclosure fits two, in fact two must go

Amend one self won’t work dontcha know

Now press the button, pull on my Vandyke

On that brave moment super nova shall strike

Abscond, attempt to destroy temporal might

Your angst will build walls no more, in flight

____________________________________________

I actually know about your situation from many discussions

in the past, so this question is important to you, and a solution

would or might help you catch your breath, as I know you work

so hard and are a great grandmother.

Thomas Bri

Get them some contemporary poetry. Try No Matter The Wreckage by Sara Kay. Check out Write Bloody publishing, everything they turn out is incredible. They're not going to care about anything that isn't relatable to their life.

"The riveter hammered the rivet in

To the cold, hard plate

Of the metal tin".

...... What do you think?