Famous Rhyme Poems by Famous Poets

These are examples of famous Rhyme poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous rhyme poems. These examples illustrate what a famous rhyme poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).

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All Roads That Lead To God Are Good

by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
 All roads that lead to God are good.
What matters it, your faith, or mine?
Both centre at the goal divine
Of love’s eternal Brotherhood.

The kindly life in house or street –
The life of prayer and mystic rite –
The student’s search for truth and light –
These paths at one great Junction meet.

Before the oldest book was writ,
Full many a prehistoric soul
Arrived at...Read more of this...

The Old Woman And The Pedlar

by Mother Goose
There was an old woman, as I've heard tell,
She went to market her eggs for to sell;
She went to market all on a market-day,
And she fell asleep on the King's highway.

There came by a pedlar whose name was Stout,
He cut her petticoats all round about;
He cut her petticoats up to the knees,
Which made the old woman to shiver and freeze.

When...Read more of this...

A Little Man

by Mother Goose
There was a little man, and he had a little gun,
  And his bullets were made of lead, lead, lead;
He went to the brook, and saw a little duck,
  And shot it right through the head, head, head.

He carried it home to his old wife Joan,
  And bade her a fire to make, make, make.
To roast the...Read more of this...

Days Too Short

by William Henry Davies
 When primroses are out in Spring, 
And small, blue violets come between; 
When merry birds sing on boughs green, 
And rills, as soon as born, must sing; 

When butterflies will make side-leaps, 
As though escaped from Nature's hand 
Ere perfect quite; and bees will stand 
Upon their heads in fragrant deeps; 

When small clouds are so silvery white 
Each...Read more of this...

To L. H. B. (1894-1915 )

by Katherine Mansfield
 Last night for the first time since you were dead
I walked with you, my brother, in a dream.
We were at home again beside the stream
Fringed with tall berry bushes, white and red.
"Don't touch them: they are poisonous," I said.
But your hand hovered, and I saw a beam
Of strange, bright laughter flying round your head
And as you stooped I saw...Read more of this...

In Memoriam A. H. H.: 2. Old Yew which graspest at the sto

by Alfred Lord Tennyson
 Old Yew, which graspest at the stones 
That name the under-lying dead,
Thy fibres net the dreamless head,
Thy roots are wrapt about the bones.
The seasons bring the flower again,
And bring the firstling to the flock;
And in the dusk of thee, the clock
Beats out the little lives of men.
O not for thee the glow, the bloom,
Who changest not in any gale,
Nor...Read more of this...

Dapple-Gray

by Mother Goose
I had a little pony,
    His name was Dapple-Gray,
I lent him to a lady,
    To ride a mile away.
She whipped him, she slashed him,
    She rode him through the mire;
I would not lend my pony now
    For all the lady's hire....Read more of this...

The Rhyme of the Three Captains

by Rudyard Kipling
 This ballad appears to refer to one of the exploits of the notorious
Paul Jones, the American pirate. It is founded on fact.


 . . . At the close of a winter day,
Their anchors down, by London town, the Three Great Captains lay;
And one was Admiral of the North from Solway Firth to Skye,
And one was Lord of the Wessex...Read more of this...

In Memoriam A. H. H.: 78. Again at Christmas did we weave

by Alfred Lord Tennyson
 Again at Christmas did we weave 
The holly round the Christmas hearth;
The silent snow possess'd the earth,
And calmly fell our Christmas-eve:

The yule-log sparkled keen with frost,
No wing of wind the region swept,
But over all things brooding slept
The quiet sense of something lost.

As in the winters left behind,
Again our ancient games had place,
The mimic picture's breathing grace,
And dance and song...Read more of this...

Attraction

by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
 The meadow and the mountain with desire
Gazed on each other, till a fierce unrest
Surged ‘neath the meadow’s seemingly calm breast,
And all the mountain’s fissures ran with fire.

A mighty river rolled between them there.
What could the mountain do but gaze and burn?
What could the meadow do but look and yearn,
And gem its bosom to conceal despair?

Their seething passion agitated space,
Till...Read more of this...

Le Jardin

by Oscar Wilde
 The lily's withered chalice falls
Around its rod of dusty gold,
And from the beech-trees on the wold
The last wood-pigeon coos and calls.

The gaudy leonine sunflower
Hangs black and barren on its stalk,
And down the windy garden walk
The dead leaves scatter, - hour by hour.

Pale privet-petals white as milk
Are blown into a snowy mass:
The roses lie upon the grass
Like little shreds of...Read more of this...

Little Polly Flinders

by Mother Goose
Little Polly Flinders
Sat among the cinders
    Warming her pretty little toes;
Her mother came and caught her,
Whipped her little daughter
    For spoiling her nice new clothes....Read more of this...

The King Of France

by Mother Goose
The King of France went up the hill,
    With twenty thousand men;
The King of France came down the hill,
    And ne'er went up again....Read more of this...

The Clock

by Mother Goose
There's a neat little clock,--
  In the schoolroom it stands,--
And it points to the time
  With its two little hands.

And may we, like the clock,
  Keep a face clean and bright,
With hands ever ready
  To do what is right....Read more of this...

Arraignment Of The Men

by Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz
Males perverse, schooled to condemn
Women by your witless laws,
Though forsooth you are prime cause
Of that which you blame in them:

If with unexampled care
You solicit their disdain,
Will your fair words ease their pain,
When you ruthless set the snare?

Their resistance you impugn,
Then maintain with gravity
That it was mere levity
Made you dare to importune.

What more elevating sight
Than of man with logic crass,
Who with...Read more of this...

The Old Woman Of Leeds

by Mother Goose
There was an old woman of Leeds,
Who spent all her time in good deeds;
    She worked for the poor
    Till her fingers were sore,
This pious old woman of Leeds!...Read more of this...

The Traveller And The Farm~maiden

by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
 HE.

CANST thou give, oh fair and matchless maiden,

'Neath the shadow of the lindens yonder,--

Where I'd fain one moment cease to wander,--
Food and drink to one so heavy laden?

SHE.

Wouldst thou find refreshment, traveller weary,

Bread, ripe fruit and cream to meet thy wishes,--

None but Nature's plain and homely dishes,--
Near the spring may soothe thy wanderings dreary.

HE.

Dreams of old acquaintance now pass...Read more of this...

Caesar's Song

by Mother Goose
  Bow-wow-wow!
Whose dog art thou?
Little Tom Tinker's dog,
  Bow-wow-wow!...Read more of this...

Y was a Youth who kicked

by Edward Lear
Y  was a Youth, who kickedAnd screamed and cried like mad; Papa he said, "Your conduct isAbominably bad!" ...Read more of this...

See, See

by Mother Goose
See, see! What shall I see?
A horse's head where his tail should be....Read more of this...

The Vernal Age

by Philip Freneau
 WHERE the pheasant roosts at night,
Lonely, drowsy, out of sight,
Where the evening breezes sigh
Solitary, there stray I.

Close along the shaded stream,
Source of many a youthful dream,
Where branchy cedars dim the day
There I muse, and there I stray.

Yet, what can please amid this bower,
That charmed the eye for many an hour!
The budding leaf is lost to me,
And dead the bloom...Read more of this...

On The Morning Of Christ's Nativity

by John Milton
 I

This is the Month, and this the happy morn
Wherin the Son of Heav'ns eternal King,
Of wedded Maid, and Virgin Mother born,
Our great redemption from above did bring;
For so the holy sages once did sing,
That he our deadly forfeit should release,
And with his Father work us a perpetual peace.

II

That glorious Form, that Light unsufferable,
And that far-beaming blaze of Majesty,
Wherwith he...Read more of this...

Comfort To A Youth That Had Lost His Love

by Robert Herrick
 What needs complaints,
When she a place
Has with the race
Of saints?
In endless mirth,
She thinks not on
What's said or done
In earth:
She sees no tears,
Or any tone
Of thy deep groan
She hears;
Nor does she mind,
Or think on't now,
That ever thou
Wast kind:--
But changed above,
She likes not there,
As she did here,
Thy love.
--Forbear, therefore,
And lull asleep
Thy woes, and weep
No more....Read more of this...

Memoriam A. H. H.: 44. How fares it with the happy dead?

by Alfred Lord Tennyson
 How fares it with the happy dead?
For here the man is more and more;
But he forgets the days before
God shut the doorways of his head.
The days have vanish'd, tone and tint,
And yet perhaps the hoarding sense
Gives out at times (he knows not whence)
A little flash, a mystic hint;
And in the long harmonious years
(If Death so taste Lethean springs),
May some...Read more of this...

Sepulchre

by George Herbert
 O blessed body! Whither are thou thrown? 
No lodging for thee, but a cold hard stone? 
So many hearts on earth, and yet not one
Receive thee? 
Sure there is room within our hearts' good store; 
For they can lodge transgressions by the score: 
Thousands of toys dwell there, yet out of door
They leave thee.
But that which shows them large,...Read more of this...

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