Famous Aflame Poems by Famous Poets

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

See also:

Emily Sparks

by Edgar Lee Masters
 Where is my boy, my boy --
In what far part of the world?
The boy I loved best of all in the school? --
I, the teacher, the old maid, the virgin heart,
Who made them all my children.
Did I know my boy aright,
Thinking of him as a spirit aflame,
Active, ever aspiring?
Oh, boy, boy, for whom I prayed and prayed
In many a...Read more of this...

Fancies

by Lucy Maud Montgomery
 Surely the flowers of a hundred springs 
Are simply the souls of beautiful things! 

The poppies aflame with gold and red 
Were the kisses of lovers in days that are fled. 

The purple pansies with dew-drops pearled 
Were the rainbow dreams of a youngling world. 

The lily, white as a star apart, 
Was the first pure prayer of a...Read more of this...

The straw parlor

by Eugene Field
 Way up at the top of a big stack of straw
Was the cunningest parlor that ever you saw!
And there could you lie when aweary of play
And gossip or laze in the coziest way;
No matter how careworn or sorry one's mood
No worldly distraction presumed to intrude.
As a refuge from onerous mundane ado
I think I approve of straw parlors, don't you?

A...Read more of this...

The Year of the Rose

by Algernon Charles Swinburne
 From the depths of the green garden-closes
Where the summer in darkness dozes
Till autumn pluck from his hand
An hour-glass that holds not a sand;
From the maze that a flower-belt encloses
To the stones and sea-grass on the strand
How red was the reign of the roses
Over the rose-crowned land!

The year of the rose is brief;
From the first blade blown to the sheaf,
From...Read more of this...

The Quest

by Robert William Service
 I sought Him on the purple seas,
I sought Him on the peaks aflame;
Amid the gloom of giant trees
And canyons lone I called His name;
The wasted ways of earth I trod:
In vain! In vain! I found not God.

I sought Him in the hives of men,
The cities grand, the hamlets gray,
The temples old beyond my ken,
The tabernacles of to-day;
All life that...Read more of this...

The Star of Australasia

by Henry Lawson
 We boast no more of our bloodless flag, that rose from a nation's slime; 
Better a shred of a deep-dyed rag from the storms of the olden time. 
From grander clouds in our `peaceful skies' than ever were there before 
I tell you the Star of the South shall rise -- in the lurid clouds of war. 
It ever...Read more of this...

Pursuit

by Sylvia Plath
 Dans le fond des forêts votre image me suit.
 RACINE


There is a panther stalks me down:
 One day I'll have my death of him;
 His greed has set the woods aflame,
He prowls more lordly than the sun.
Most soft, most suavely glides that step,
 Advancing always at my back;
 From gaunt hemlock, rooks croak havoc:
The hunt is on, and sprung...Read more of this...

La Gitana

by Aleister Crowley
 Your hair was full of roses in the dewfall as we danced, 
The sorceress enchanting and the paladin entranced, 
In the starlight as we wove us in a web of silk and steel 
Immemorial as the marble in the halls of Boabdil, 
In the pleasuance of the roses with the fountains and the yews 
Where the snowy Sierra soothed...Read more of this...

A Minor Poet

by Amy Levy
 "What should such fellows as I do,
Crawling between earth and heaven?"


Here is the phial; here I turn the key
Sharp in the lock. Click!--there's no doubt it turned.
This is the third time; there is luck in threes--
Queen Luck, that rules the world, befriend me now
And freely I'll forgive you many wrongs!
Just as the draught began to work, first time,
Tom Leigh,...Read more of this...

A Hymn

by G K Chesterton
 O God of earth and altar, 
Bow down and hear our cry, 
Our earthly rulers falter, 
Our people drift and die; 
The walls of gold entomb us, 
The swords of scorn divide, 
Take not thy thunder from us, 
But take away our pride. 

From all that terror teaches, 
From lies of tongue and pen, 
From all the easy speeches...Read more of this...

Modern Love V: A Message from Her

by George Meredith
 A message from her set his brain aflame. 
A world of household matters filled her mind, 
Wherein he saw hypocrisy designed: 
She treated him as something that is tame, 
And but at other provocation bites. 
Familiar was her shoulder in the glass, 
Through that dark rain: yet it may come to pass 
That a changed eye finds such familiar...Read more of this...

The bow-leg boy

by Eugene Field
 Who should come up the road one day
But the doctor-man in his two-wheel shay!
And he whoaed his horse and he cried "Ahoy!
I have brought you folks a bow-leg boy!
Such a cute little boy!
Such a funny little boy!
Such a dear little bow-leg boy!"

He took out his box and he opened it wide,
And there was the bow-leg boy inside!
And when they...Read more of this...

An All-Night Sea Fight

by William Topaz McGonagall
 Ye sons of Mars, come list to me,
And I will relate to ye
A great and heroic naval fight,
Which will fill your hearts with delight. 

The fight was between the French Frigate "Pique" and the British Frigate "Blanche,"
But the British crew were bold and staunch;
And the battle was fought in West Indian waters in the year of 1795,
And for to...Read more of this...

The Ballad Of Touch-The-Button Nell

by Robert William Service
 Beyond the Rocking Bridge it lies, the burg of evil fame,
The huts where hive and swarm and thrive the sisterhood of shame.
Through all the night each cabin light goes out and then goes in,
A blood-red heliograph of lust, a semaphore of sin.
From Dawson Town, soft skulking down, each lewdster seeks his mate;
And glad and bad, kimono clad, the wanton...Read more of this...

Step by step, day by day

by Emile Verhaeren
Step by step, day by day, age has come and placed his hands upon the bare forehead of our love, and has looked upon it with his dimmer eyes.
And in the fair garden shrivelled by July, the flowers, the groves and the living leaves have let fall something of their fervid strength on to the pale pond and the gentle...Read more of this...

When Love is Over

by Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
   Song of Khan Zada

   Only in August my heart was aflame,
     Catching the scent of your Wind-stirred hair,
   Now, though you spread it to soften my sleep
     Through the night, I should hardly care.

   Only last August I drank that water
  ...Read more of this...

The Red Retreat

by Robert William Service
 Tramp, tramp, the grim road, the road from Mons to Wipers
 (I've 'ammered out this ditty with me bruised and bleedin' feet);
Tramp, tramp, the dim road -- we didn't 'ave no pipers,
 And bellies that was 'oller was the drums we 'ad to beat.
Tramp, tramp, the bad road, the bits o' kiddies cryin' there,
 The fell birds a-flyin' there,...Read more of this...

If I Could But Forget

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
 If I could but forget 
The fullness of those first sweet days, 
When you burst sun-like thro' the haze 
Of unacquaintance, on my sight, 
And made the wet, gray day seem bright 
While clouds themselves grew fair to see. 
And since, no day is gray or wet 
But all the scene comes back to me, 
If I could but...Read more of this...

Was It You?

by Robert William Service
 "Hullo, young Jones! with your tie so gay
And your pen behind your ear;
Will you mark my cheque in the usual way?
For I'm overdrawn, I fear."
Then you look at me in a manner bland,
As you turn your ledger's leaves,
And you hand it back with a soft white hand,
And the air of a man who grieves. . . .

"Was it you,...Read more of this...

The Song Of Wandering Aengus

by William Butler Yeats
I went out to the hazel wood,
Because a fire was in my head,
And cut and peeled a hazel wand,
And hooked a berry to a thread;
And when white moths were on the wing,
And moth-like stars were flickering out,
I dropped the berry in a stream
And caught a little silver trout.

When I had laid it on the floor
I went to blow the fire...Read more of this...

The Destroying Angel

by William Topaz McGonagall
 I dreamt a dream the other night
That an Angel appeared to me, clothed in white.
Oh! it was a beautiful sight,
Such as filled my heart with delight. 

And in her hand she held a flaming brand,
Which she waved above her head most grand;
And on me she glared with love-beaming eyes,
Then she commanded me from my bed to arise. 

And in...Read more of this...

Down from the Mountain

by Li Po
 As down Mount Emerald at eve I came,
The mountain moon went all the way with me.
Backward I looked, to see the heights aflame
With a pale light that glimmered eerily.

A little lad undid the rustic latch
As hand in hand your cottage we did gain,
Where green limp tendrils at our cloaks did catch,
And dim bamboos o'erhung a shadowy lane.

Gaily I cried,...Read more of this...

Jean Desprez

by Robert William Service
 Oh ye whose hearts are resonant, and ring to War's romance,
Hear ye the story of a boy, a peasant boy of France;
A lad uncouth and warped with toil, yet who, when trial came,
Could feel within his soul upleap and soar the sacred flame;
Could stand upright, and scorn and smite, as only heroes may:
Oh, harken! Let me try to tell...Read more of this...

The Master-player

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
An old, worn harp that had been played
Till all its strings were loose and frayed,
Joy, Hate, and Fear, each one essayed,
To play. But each in turn had found
No sweet responsiveness of sound.
Then Love the Master-Player came
With heaving breast and eyes aflame;
The Harp he took all undismayed,
Smote on its strings, still strange to song,
And brought forth music sweet and strong.
...Read more of this...

The Illinois Village

by Vachel Lindsay
 O you who lose the art of hope, 
Whose temples seem to shrine a lie, 
Whose sidewalks are but stones of fear, 
Who weep that Liberty must die, 
Turn to the little prairie towns, 
Your higher hope shall yet begin. 
On every side awaits you there 
Some gate where glory enters in. 

Yet when I see the flocks of...Read more of this...

Dont forget to view our wonderful member Aflame poems.

Get a Premium Membership
Turn off ads, get more exposure for your poetry, and get more features with a Premium Membership.
Book: Diverse Voices: The Poetry of Human Rights and the Pursuit of Peace