Famous Anticipation Poems by Famous Poets

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

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83. The Cotter's Saturday Night

...t-wing’d, unnotic’d fleet:
 Each tells the uncos that he sees or hears.
 The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years;
Anticipation forward points the view;
 The mother, wi’ her needle and her shears,
Gars auld claes look amaist as weel’s the new;
The father mixes a’ wi’ admonition due.


Their master’s and their mistress’ command,
 The younkers a’ are warned to obey;
And mind their labours wi’ an eydent hand,
 And ne’er, tho’ out o’ sight, to jauk or play;
 “And O! be sure ...Read more of this...
by Burns, Robert


Alan Dugan Telling Me I Have A Problem With Time

...d a man named Buzz
that there was a bunch of guys turning blue
down here on Earth, and now I can understand
it was with anticipation, not sickness. Next,
Dugan says, Let's move on. The attempted poem
was about butterflies and my recurring desire
to return to a place I've never been.
It was inspired by reading this
in a National Geographic: monarchs
stream northward from winter roosts in Mexico,
laying their eggs atop milkweed
to foster new generations along the way.
With the ...Read more of this...
by Flynn, Nick

All Night

...All night the knot in the shoelace 
waits for its liberation, 
and the match on the table packs its head 
with anticipation of light. 
The faucet sweats out a bead of water, 
which gathers strength for the free fall, 
while the lettuce in the refrigerator 
succumbs to its brown killer. 
And in the novel I put down 
before I fall asleep, 
the paneled walls of a room 
are condemned to stand and wait 
for tomorrow, when I'll get to the page 
where the prisoner finds the...Read more of this...
by Mueller, Lisel

Anticipation

...I have been temperate always,
But I am like to be very drunk
With your coming.
There have been times
I feared to walk down the street
Lest I should reel with the wine of you,
And jerk against my neighbours
As they go by.
I am parched now, and my tongue is horrible in my mouth,
But my brain is noisy
With the clash and gurgle of filling wine-cups....Read more of this...
by Lowell, Amy

Anticipation

...How beautiful the earth is still, 
To thee - how full of happiness!
How little fraught with real ill,
Or unreal phantoms of distress!
How spring can bring thee glory, yet,
And summer win thee to forget
December's sullen time!
Why dost thou hold the treasure fast,
Of youth's delight, when youth is past,
And thou art near thy prime? 

When those who were thy...Read more of this...
by Brontë, Emily


Anticipation

...I hold her letter as I stand,
 Nor break the seal; no need to guess
What dainty little female hand
 Penned this most delicate address.

The scented seal—I break it not,
 But stand in stormy revery;
I tremble as I wonder what
 She who penned this will say to me.

I wonder what my wife will say
 If so it be she e’er shall know
I only mailed her note today—
 ...Read more of this...
by Butler, Ellis Parker

Craving for Spring

...anising itself, heralding itself with the violets,
stirring of new seasons.

Ah, do not let me die on the brink of such anticipation!
Worse, let me not deceive myself....Read more of this...
by Lawrence, D. H.

Morning

...ping. 
His wake-up message on the stand— 
Her smile on his face—awaken bliss. 

Remembrance; 
Memory box opened; 
Anticipation; 
Future opened and saved. 

Back and forth 
Through memory and experience, 
She recognizes this morning 
In her awakened spirit. 

She recognizes the mist, 
The rose, the moist grass; 
She recognizes his enlightened face 
And goes into the new morning with a smile.
...Read more of this...
by Stojanovic, Dejan

My Friends Light

...gate's unlocked. 
 The banisters are lit so he can walk. 

 I'm waiting for my friend. The times are dull and tough. 
 Anticipation lightens our life. 

 He's driving down the Ring Road, at full speed, 
 the way I did it when he was in need. 

 He will arrive to find the spot at once, 
 the pine is lit well in advance. 

 There is a dog. His eyes are phosphorescent. 
 Are you a friend? I see you're not complacent... 

 Some headlights push the darkness off the drive. 
 My fr...Read more of this...
by Voznesensky, Andrei

Peter Anderson And Co

...ueeze o' lemon, Pete,' he sighed. 
And, while Peter went to fetch it, Joseph went to sleep -- and died 
With a smile -- anticipation, maybe, of the peace to come, 
Or a joke to try on Peter -- or, perhaps, it was the rum. 

. . . . . 

Peter staggered, gripped the table, swerved as some old drunkard swerves -- 
At a gulp he drank the toddy, just to brace his shattered nerves. 
It was awful, if you like. But then he hadn't time to think -- 
All is nothing! Nothing matters! Fil...Read more of this...
by Lawson, Henry

Prelude To "the Songs Of Twilight."

...e span? 
 One constant twilight in the heaven appears— 
 One constant twilight in the mind of man! 
 
 Creed, hope, anticipation and despair, 
 Are but a mingling, as of day and night; 
 The globe, surrounded by deceptive air, 
 Is all enveloped in the same half-light. 
 
 And voice is deadened by the evening breeze, 
 The shepherd's song, or maiden's in her bower, 
 Mix with the rustling of the neighboring trees, 
 Within whose foliage is lulled the power. 
 
 ...Read more of this...
by Hugo, Victor

Refuted

...‘Anticipation is sweeter than realisation.’

It may be, yet I have not found it so.
In those first golden dreams of future fame
I did not find such happiness as came
When toil was crowned with triumph. Now I know
My words have recognition, and will go
Straight to some listening heart, my early aim, 
To win the idle glory of a name, 
Pales like a candle in the...Read more of this...
by Wilcox, Ella Wheeler

Shadblow

...r with their
tarnished silvery fins,

heading upstream
straight for our tables
where already

knives and forks gleam
in anticipation, these trees
in the woods break

into flower--small, white
flags surrendering
to the season....Read more of this...
by Pastan, Linda

The Embrace

...You weren't well or really ill yet either;
just a little tired, your handsomeness
tinged by grief or anticipation, which brought
to your face a thoughtful, deepening grace.

I didn't for a moment doubt you were dead.
I knew that to be true still, even in the dream.
You'd been out—at work maybe?—
having a good day, almost energetic.

We seemed to be moving from some old house
where we'd lived, boxes everywhere, things
in disarray: that was the story of my dr...Read more of this...
by Doty, Mark

The Guardian Angel Of The Little Utopia

...being numerous, mouths submitting to air, lips

 to protocol,
and dreams of sense, tongues, hinges, forceps clicking
in anticipation ofas if the moment, freeze-burned by accuracies--of
could be thawed open into life again
by gladnesses, by rectitude -- no, no -- by the sinewy efforts at
sincerity -- can't you feel it gliding round you,
mutating, yielding the effort-filled phrases of your talk to air,
compounding, stemming them, honeying-open the sheerest

 innuendoes till
the...Read more of this...
by Graham, Jorie

The Uses Of Poetry

...I've fond anticipation of a day
O'erfilled with pure diversion presently,
For I must read a lady poesy
The while we glide by many a leafy bay,

Hid deep in rushes, where at random play
The glossy black winged May-flies, or whence flee
Hush-throated nestlings in alarm,
Whom we have idly frighted with our boat's long sway.

For, lest o'ersaddened by such woes as spring
...Read more of this...
by Williams, William Carlos (WCW)

These tested Our Horizon --

...r Horizon --
Then disappeared
As Birds before achieving
A Latitude.

Our Retrospection of Them
A fixed Delight,
But our Anticipation
A Dice -- a Doubt --...Read more of this...
by Dickinson, Emily

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