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Famous Short Sad Poems. Short Sad Poetry by Famous Poets

Famous Short Sad Poems. Short Sad Poetry by Famous Poets. A collection of the all-time best Sad short poems

See also: Short Member Poems

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by Amir Khosrow

Why

Why was the king thirsty?
Why was the donkey sad?


by Dorothy Parker

For A Sad Lady

 And let her loves, when she is dead,
Write this above her bones:
"No more she lives to give us bread
Who asked her only stones."


by Emily Dickinson

Are Friends Delight or Pain?

 Are Friends Delight or Pain?
Could Bounty but remain
Riches were good --

But if they only stay
Ampler to fly away
Riches are sad.


by Gelett Burgess

On Digital Extremities

 I'd Rather have Fingers than Toes; 
I'd Rather have Ears than a Nose; 
And As for my Hair, 
I'm Glad it's All There; 
I'll be Awfully Sad, when it Goes!


by Emily Dickinson

The Heart has many Doors --

 The Heart has many Doors --
I can but knock --
For any sweet "Come in"
Impelled to hark --
Not saddened by repulse,
Repast to me
That somewhere, there exists,
Supremacy --


by William Allingham

An Evening

 A sunset's mounded cloud; 
A diamond evening-star; 
Sad blue hills afar; 
Love in his shroud. 

Scarcely a tear to shed; 
Hardly a word to say; 
The end of a summer day; 
Sweet Love dead.


by David Lehman

To William Holden

 (July 15) 

We know who 
the guards are 
in those POW 
movies with brutal 
but easy to 
fool fat Germans 
or sadistic Japanese 
who never smiled 
they're the grown-ups 
we're the kids 
that's the secret


by Spike Milligan

When I Suspected

 There will be a time when it will end. 
Be it parting 
Be it death 
So each passing minute with you 
Pendulummed with sadness. 
So many times 
I looked long into your face. 
I could hear the clock ticking.


by Emily Dickinson

I should not dare to be so sad

 I should not dare to be so sad
So many Years again --
A Load is first impossible
When we have put it down --

The Superhuman then withdraws
And we who never saw
The Giant at the other side
Begin to perish now.


by Vasko Popa

Far Within Us #3

 Unquiet you walk
Along the rims of my eyes

On the invisible grating
Before your lips
My naked words shiver

We steal moments
From the unheeding iron saws

Your hands sadly
Flow into mine
The air is impassable


by Dorothy Parker

A Very Short Song

 Once, when I was young and true,
Someone left me sad-
Broke my brittle heart in two;
And that is very bad.

Love is for unlucky folk,
Love is but a curse.
Once there was a heart I broke;
And that, I think, is worse.


by Federico Garcia Lorca

Weeping

 Weeping,
I go down the street
Grotesque, without solution
With the sadness of Cyrano
And Quixote.

Redeeming
Infinite impossiblities
With the rhythm of the clock.

(The captive voice, far away.
Put on a cricket' clothes.)


by Emily Dickinson

Upon his Saddle sprung a Bird

 Upon his Saddle sprung a Bird
And crossed a thousand Trees
Before a Fence without a Fare
His Fantasy did please
And then he lifted up his Throat
And squandered such a Note
A Universe that overheard
Is stricken by it yet --


by

April Is The Saddest Month

 There they were
stuck
dog and bitch
halving the compass

Then when with his yip
they parted
oh how frolicsome

she grew before him
playful
dancing and
how disconsolate

he retreated
hang-dog
she following
through the shrubbery


by Emily Dickinson

How happy I was if I could forget

 How happy I was if I could forget
To remember how sad I am
Would be an easy adversity
But the recollecting of Bloom

Keeps making November difficult
Till I who was almost bold
Lose my way like a little Child
And perish of the cold.


by Jean Valentine

Elegy For Jane Kenyon

 Jane is big
with death, Don
sad and kind - Jane
though she's dying
is full of mind

We talk about the table
the little walnut one
how it's like
Emily Dickinson's

But Don says No
Dickinson's
was made of iron. No
said Jane
Of flesh.


by Robert Herrick

Discontents In Devon

 More discontents I never had
Since I was born, than here;
Where I have been, and still am, sad,
In this dull Devonshire.
Yet justly too I must confess,
I ne'er invented such
Ennobled numbers for the press,
Than where I loath'd so much.


by James Joyce

Gentle Lady, Do Not Sing

 Gentle lady, do not sing 
Sad songs about the end of love; 
Lay aside sadness and sing 
How love that passes is enough. 

Sing about the long deep sleep 
Of lovers that are dead, and how 
In the grave all love shall sleep: 
Love is aweary now.


by Dorothy Parker

The Small Hours

 No more my little song comes back;
And now of nights I lay
My head on down, to watch the black
And wait the unfailing gray.

Oh, sad are winter nights, and slow;
And sad's a song that's dumb;
And sad it is to lie and know
Another dawn will come.


by Dylan Thomas

Clown In The Moon

 My tears are like the quiet drift
Of petals from some magic rose;
And all my grief flows from the rift
Of unremembered skies and snows.

I think, that if I touched the earth,
It would crumble;
It is so sad and beautiful,
So tremulously like a dream.


by Robert William Service

No Sourdough

 To be a bony feed Sourdough
You must, by Yukon Law,
Have killed a moose,
And robbed a sluice,
AND BUNKED UP WITH A SQUAW. . . .

Alas! Sourdough I'll never be.
Oh, sad is my excuse:
My shooting's so damn bad, you see . . .
I've never killed a moose.


by James Henry Leigh Hunt

Rondeau

 Jenny kiss'd me when we met,
Jumping from the chair she sat in;
Time, you thief, who love to get
Sweets into your list, put that in!
Say I'm weary, say I'm sad,
Say that health and welth have miss'd me,
Say I'm growing old, but add,
Jenny kiss'd me.


by James Henry Leigh Hunt

Jenny kiss'd Me

 Jenny kiss'd me when we met,
Jumping from the chair she sat in;
Time, you thief, who love to get
Sweets into your list, put that in!
Say I'm weary, say I'm sad,
Say that health and welth have miss'd me,
Say I'm growing old, but add,
Jenny kiss'd me.


by James Henry Leigh Hunt

Jenny Kissed Me

 Jenny kissed me when we met,
Jumping from the chair she sat in;
Time, you thief, who love to get
Sweets into your list, put that in!
Say I'm weary, say I'm sad,
Say that health and wealth have missed me,
Say I'm growing old, but add,
Jenny kissed me.


by James Joyce

Be Not Sad

 Be not sad because all men 
Prefer a lying clamour before you: 
Sweetheart, be at peace again -- - 
Can they dishonour you? 

They are sadder than all tears; 
Their lives ascend as a continual sigh. 
Proudly answer to their tears: 
As they deny, deny.


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