Famous Aforetime Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Arcturus is his other name

...s --
A monster with a glass
Computes the stamens in a breath --
And has her in a "class"!

Whereas I took the Butterfly
Aforetime in my hat --
He sits erect in "Cabinets" --
The Clover bells forgot.

What once was "Heaven"
Is "Zenith" now --
Where I proposed to go
When Time's brief masquerade was done
Is mapped and charted too.

What if the poles should frisk about
And stand upon their heads!
I hope I'm ready for "the worst" --
Whatever prank betides!

Perhaps the "Kingdom of...Read more of this...
by Dickinson, Emily


My Cicely

...Love
To whom Mother Church had just murmured
A last lullaby.

--"Then, where dwells the Canon's kinswoman,
My friend of aforetime?"--
('Twas hard to repress my heart-heavings
And new ecstasy.)

"She wedded."--"Ah!"--"Wedded beneath her--
She keeps the stage-hostel
Ten miles hence, beside the great Highway--
The famed Lions-Three.

"Her spouse was her lackey--no option
'Twixt wedlock and worse things;
A lapse over-sad for a lady
Of her pedigree!"

I shuddered, said nothing, an...Read more of this...
by Hardy, Thomas

Rembrandt to Rembrandt

...ld give me gold, and laugh… before she died. 

And if I see the road that you are going, 
You that are not so jaunty as aforetime, 
God knows if she were not appointed well
To die. She might have wearied of it all 
Before the worst was over, or begun. 
A woman waiting on a man’s avouch 
Of the invisible, may not wait always 
Without a word betweenwhiles, or a dash
Of poison on his faith. Yes, even she. 
She might have come to see at last with others, 
And then to say with oth...Read more of this...
by Robinson, Edwin Arlington

The Contretemps

...it stayed.
"One pairing is as good as another
Where is all venture! Take each other,
And scrap the oaths that you have aforetime made." 

- Of the four involved there walks but one
On earth at this late day.
And what of the chapter so begun?
In that odd complex what was done?
Well; happiness comes in full to none:
Let peace lie on lulled lips: I will not say....Read more of this...
by Hardy, Thomas

The Old Issue

...unproven," say the Trumpets,
 "Many feet have worn it and the road is old indeed.
"It is the King--the King we schooled aforetime! "
 (Trumpets in the marshes-in the eyot at Runnymede!)

"Here is neither haste, nor hate, nor anger," peal the Trumpets,
 "Pardon for his penitence or pity for his fall.
"It is the King!"--inexorable Trumpets--
 (Trumpets round the scaffold af the dawning by Whitehall!)

 . . . . . . .


"He hath veiled the Crown And hid the Scepter," warn (he Tru...Read more of this...
by Kipling, Rudyard


The Story of Sigurd the Volsung (excerpt)

...and the house that cherished me!
There dwelleth mine earthly sister and the king that she hath wed;
There morn by morn aforetime I woke on the golden bed;
There eve by eve I tarried mid the speech and the lays of kings;
There noon by noon I wandered and plucked the blossoming things;
The little land of Lymdale by the swirling river's side,
Where Brynhild once was I called in the days ere my father died; 
The little land of Lymdale 'twixt the woodland and the sea,
Where on th...Read more of this...
by Morris, William

The Story of Ung

...im the shame that they spoke.

And the father of Ung gave answer, that was old and wise in the craft,
Maker of pictures aforetime, he leaned on his lance and laughed:
"If they could see as thou seest they would do what thou hast done,
And each man would make him a picture, and -- what would become of my son?

"There would be no pelts of the reindeer, flung down at thy cave for a gift,
Nor dole of the oily timber that comes on the Baltic drift;
No store of well-drilled needles...Read more of this...
by Kipling, Rudyard

The world will last long after Khayyam's fame

...The world will last long after Khayyam's fame
Has passed away, yea, and his very name;
Aforetime we were not, and none did heed.
When we are dead and gone, 'twill be the same....Read more of this...
by Khayyam, Omar

What the Moon Saw

...moonlight.
Their ease was partly feigned.
They glanced about the prairie.
Their faces were constrained.
In various ways aforetime
They had misled the state,
Yet did it so politely
Their henchmen thought them great.
They sat beneath a hedge and spake
No word, but had a smoke.
A satchel passed from hand to hand.
Next day, the deadlock broke....Read more of this...
by Lindsay, Vachel

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