Famous Amazement Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Amazement poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous amazement poems. These examples illustrate what a famous amazement poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Carver, Raymond
...s own. Even after
you said, "What is it? What's wrong?"
it stayed put -- deaf, unmoved
by any expression of fear or amazement.
We shouted at it, and grew afraid
when it didn't answer. "It's gone to sleep,"
I said, and hearing those words
knew how absurd this was. But
I couldn't laugh. Somehow,
between the two of us, we managed
to raise it. This can't be my arm
is what I kept thinking as
we thumped it, squeezed it, and
prodded it back to life. Shook...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...ow,
Or 'gainst the rugged bark of some broad elm
Leans her unpillowed head, fraught with sad fears.
What if in wild amazement and affright,
Or, while we speak, within the direful grasp
Of savage hunger, or of savage heat!
ELD. BRO. Peace, brother: be not over-exquisite
To cast the fashion of uncertain evils;
For, grant they be so, while they rest unknown,
What need a man forestall his date of grief,
And run to meet what he would most avoid?
Or, if they be but fal...Read more of this...
by
Abercrombie, Lascelles
...loved, we must know
Our love is perfect here,—that not as holds
The common dullard thought, we are things lost
In an amazement that is all unware;
But wonderfully knowing what we are!
Lo, now that body is the song whereof
Spirit is mood, knoweth not our delight?
Knoweth not beautifully now our love,
That Life, here to this festival bid come
Clad in his splendour of worldly day and night,
Filled and empower’d by heavenly lust, is all
The glad imagination of the Spir...Read more of this...
by
Keats, John
...diamond, set to fray
Old darkness from his throne: 'twas like the sun
Uprisen o'er chaos: and with such a stun
Came the amazement, that, absorb'd in it,
He saw not fiercer wonders--past the wit
Of any spirit to tell, but one of those
Who, when this planet's sphering time doth close,
Will be its high remembrancers: who they?
The mighty ones who have made eternal day
For Greece and England. While astonishment
With deep-drawn sighs was quieting, he went
Into a marble gallery...Read more of this...
by
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
...rden
Saw he the forms of the priest and the maiden advancing to meet him.
Suddenly down from his horse he sprang in amazement, and forward
Rushed with extended arms and exclamations of wonder;
When they beheld his face, they recognized Basil the blacksmith.
Hearty his welcome was, as he led his guests to the garden.
There in an arbor of roses with endless question and answer
Gave they vent to their hearts, and renewed their friendly embraces,
Laughing and weeping ...Read more of this...
by
Byron, George (Lord)
...Kaled, whom their meaning reach'd alone;
And he replied, though faintly, to their sound,
While gazed the rest in dumb amazement round:
They seem'd even then — that twain — unto the last
To half forget the present in the past;
To share between themselves some separate fate,
Whose darkness none beside should penetrate.
XIX.
Their words though faint were many — from the tone
Their import those who heard could judge alone;
From this, you might have deem'd youn...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...ing carcases
And broken chariot-wheels. So thick bestrown,
Abject and lost, lay these, covering the flood,
Under amazement of their hideous change.
He called so loud that all the hollow deep
Of Hell resounded:--"Princes, Potentates,
Warriors, the Flower of Heaven--once yours; now lost,
If such astonishment as this can seize
Eternal Spirits! Or have ye chosen this place
After the toil of battle to repose
Your wearied virtue, for the ease you find
To slumber ...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...t to thee in shape and countenance bright,
Then shining heavenly fair, a goddess armed,
Out of thy head I sprung. Amazement seized
All th' host of Heaven; back they recoiled afraid
At first, and called me Sin, and for a sign
Portentous held me; but, familiar grown,
I pleased, and with attractive graces won
The most averse--thee chiefly, who, full oft
Thyself in me thy perfect image viewing,
Becam'st enamoured; and such joy thou took'st
With me in secret that my ...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...e way found prosperous once
Induces best to hope of like success."
He ended, and his words impression left
Of much amazement to the infernal crew,
Distracted and surprised with deep dismay
At these sad tidings. But no time was then
For long indulgence to their fears or grief:
Unanimous they all commit the care
And management of this man enterprise
To him, their great Dictator, whose attempt
At first against mankind so well had thrived
In Adam's overthrow, and led th...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...o whom thus Jesus: "Also it is written,
'Tempt not the Lord thy God.'" He said, and stood;
But Satan, smitten with amazement, fell.
As when Earth's son, Antaeus (to compare
Small things with greatest), in Irassa strove
With Jove's Alcides, and, oft foiled, still rose,
Receiving from his mother Earth new strength,
Fresh from his fall, and fiercer grapple joined,
Throttled at length in the air expired and fell,
So, after many a foil, the Tempter proud,
Renewing fresh a...Read more of this...
by
Ashbery, John
...amine the subtleties of art
In a detached, scientific spirit: he wished through them
To impart the sense of novelty and amazement to the spectator"
(Freedberg). Later portraits such as the Uffizi
"Gentleman," the Borghese "Young Prelate" and
The Naples "Antea" issue from Mannerist
Tensions, but here, as Freedberg points out,
The surprise, the tension are in the concept
Rather than its realization.
The consonance of the High Renaissance
Is present, though distorted by ...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...e,
Her step was free and elastic, and her voice sounded exquisitely as she spoke.
My mother look’d in delight and amazement at the stranger,
She look’d at the freshness of her tall-borne face, and full and pliant limbs,
The more she look’d upon her, she loved her,
Never before had she seen such wonderful beauty and purity,
She made her sit on a bench by the jamb of the fireplace—she cook’d food for
her,
She had no work to give her, but she gave her remembrance and ...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...strong trunks—with branches and leaves!
(Surely there is something more in each of the tree—some living Soul.)
O amazement of things! even the least particle!
O spirituality of things!
O strain musical, flowing through ages and continents—now reaching me and America!
I take your strong chords—I intersperse them, and cheerfully pass them forward.
I too carol the sun, usher’d, or at noon, or, as now, setting,
I too throb to the brain and beauty of the earth, and...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...y become
bullion;
You shall watch how the printer sets type, and learn what a composing stick is;
You shall mark, in amazement, the Hoe press whirling its cylinders, shedding the printed
leaves
steady and fast:
The photograph, model, watch, pin, nail, shall be created before you.
In large calm halls, a stately Museum shall teach you the infinite, solemn lessons of
Minerals;
In another, woods, plants, Vegetation shall be illustrated—in another Animals, animal life...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...my lovers, faithful and true,
After what they have done to me, suggesting themes.
O such themes! Equalities!
O amazement of things! O divine average!
O warblings under the sun—usher’d, as now, or at noon, or setting!
O strain, musical, flowing through ages—now reaching hither!
I take to your reckless and composite chords—I add to them, and cheerfully
pass them forward.
12As I have walk’d in Alabama my morning walk,
I have seen where the she-bird, the mockin...Read more of this...
by
Lowell, Amy
...y and by
A log on the fire broke in two.
He looked up quickly, "Sir, and you?"
I groped for something I should say;
Amazement held me numb. "To-day
You sweated at a fruitless task."
He spoke for me, "What do you ask?
How can I serve you?" "My kind host,
My penniless state was not a boast;
I have no money with me." He smiled.
"Not for that money I beguiled
You here; you paid me in advance."
Again I felt as though a trance
Had dimmed my faculties. Ag...Read more of this...
by
Hood, Thomas
...s quiver
So far in the river,
With many a light
From window and casement,
From garret to basement,
She stood, with amazement,
Houseless by night.
The bleak wind of March
Made her tremble and shiver;
But not the dark arch,
Or the black flowing river:
Mad from life's history,
Glad to death's mystery,
Swift to be hurl'd—
Anywhere, anywhere
Out of the world!
In she plunged boldly—
No matter how coldly
The rough river ran—
Over the brink of it,
Picture it...Read more of this...
by
Browning, Robert
...ement,
How could I keep at any vast distance?
And so, as I say, on the lady's persistence,
The Duke, dumb-stricken with amazement,
Stood for a while in a sultry smother,
And then, with a smile that partook of the awful,
Turned her over to his yellow mother
To learn what was held decorous and lawful;
And the mother smelt blood with a cat-like instinct,
As her cheek quick whitened thro' all its quince-tinct.
Oh, but the lady heard the whole truth at once!
What meant she?--W...Read more of this...
by
Browning, Robert
...e barrier, they reached and they rested
On space that might stand him in best stead:
For who knew, he thought, what the amazement,
The eruption of clatter and blaze meant,
And if, in this minute of wonder,
No outlet, 'mid lightning and thunder,
Lay broad, and, his shackles all shivered,
The lion at last was delivered?
Ay, that was the open sky o'erhead!
And you saw by the flash on his forehead,
By the hope in those eyes wide and steady,
He was leagues in the desert already,
D...Read more of this...
by
Tagore, Rabindranath
...k.
My brother would say, "Is it possible? I always thought he was
so delicate!"
Our village people would all say in amazement, "Was it not
lucky that the boy was with his mother?"...Read more of this...
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