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Famous Asks Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Wilmot, John
...friend, yours is a cheat,
Hunger calls out, my reason bids me eat;
Perversely. yours your appetite does mock:
This asks for food, that answers, 'what's o'clock'
This plain distinction, sir, your doubt secures,
'Tis not true reason I despise, but yours.
Thus I think reason righted, but for man,
I'll ne'er recant, defend him if you can:
For all his pride, and his philosophy,
'Tis evident: beasts are in their own degree
As wise at least, and better far than he.

Tho...Read more of this...



by Smart, Christopher
...y leisure to disturb, 
With fear concupiscence to curb, 
 And rapture to transport. 

 XLV 
Act simply, as occasion asks; 
Put mellow wine in season'd casks; 
 Till not with ass and bull: 
Remember thy baptismal bond; 
Keep from commixtures foul and fond,
 Nor work thy flax with wool. 

 XLVI 
Distribute: pay the Lord His tithe, 
And make the widow's heart-strings blythe; 
 Resort with those that weep: 
As you from all and each expect, 
For all and each thy love direc...Read more of this...

by Kipling, Rudyard
...ut the Merchant risked the perils of the Plain
 For his gain.
Now the resting-place of Charnock, 'neath the palms,
 Asks an alms,
And the burden of its lamentation is, Briefly, this:
"Because for certain months, we boil and stew,
 So should you.
Cast the Viceroy and his Council, to perspire
 In our fire!"
And for answer to the argument, in vain
 We explain
That an amateur Saint Lawrence cannot fry:
 "All must fry!"
That the Merchant risks the perils of the Plain
 For ...Read more of this...

by Browning, Robert
...tgrown the shame of being fools. 
What are the laws of nature, not to bend 
If the Church bid them?--brother Newman asks. 
Up with the Immaculate Conception, then-- 
On to the rack with faith!--is my advice. 
Will not that hurry us upon our knees, 
Knocking our breasts, "It can't be--yet it shall! 
"Who am I, the worm, to argue with my Pope? 
"Low things confound the high things!" and so forth. 
That's better than acquitting God with grace 
As some folk do.Read more of this...

by Rich, Adrienne
...
have talked till dawn. 


6.

The scream
of an illegitimate voice 

It has ceased to hear itself, therefore
it asks itself 

How do I exist? 

This was the silence I wanted to break in you
I had questions but you would not answer 

I had answers but you could not use them
The is useless to you and perhaps to others 


7.

It was an old theme even for me:
Language cannot do everything- 

chalk it on the walls where the dead poets
lie in their mausoleums 

If at th...Read more of this...



by Wilcox, Ella Wheeler
...'Fair are the White Chief's promises and words, 
But dark his deeds who robs us of our herds.
He talks of treaties, asks the right to buy, 
Then takes by force, not waiting our reply.
He grants us lands for pastures and abodes
To devastate them by his iron roads.
But now from happy Spirit Lands, a friend
Draws near the hunted Sioux, to strengthen and defend.


XI.
'While walking in the fields I saw a star; 
Unconsciously I followed it afar-
It led me on to...Read more of this...

by Dickinson, Emily
...had not been so far—
And any one I knew
Were going—I had often thought
How noteless—I could die—

536

The Heart asks Pleasure—first—
And then—Excuse from Pain—
And then—those little Adonynes
That deaden suffering—

And then—to go to sleep—
And then—if it should be
The will of its Inquisitor
The privilege to die—

601

A still—Volcano—Life—
That flickered in the night—
When it was dark enough to do
Without erasing sight—

A quiet—Earthquake Style—
Too...Read more of this...

by Pope, Alexander
...e their native land behold, 
No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold! 
To Be, contents his natural desire, 
He asks no Angel's wing, no Seraph's(8) fire; 
But thinks, admitted to that equal sky, 
His faithful dog shall bear him company.

IV. Go, wiser thou! and in thy scale of sense 
Weigh thy Opinion against Providence; 
Call Imperfection what thou fancy'st such, 
Say, here he gives too little, there too much; 
Destroy all creatures for thy sport or gust,(9)...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...clearing the way,
I hear victorious drums. 

This face is a life-boat; 
This is the face commanding and bearded, it asks no odds of the rest; 
This face is flavor’d fruit, ready for eating; 
This face of a healthy honest boy is the programme of all good.

These faces bear testimony, slumbering or awake; 
They show their descent from the Master himself. 

Off the word I have spoken, I except not one—red, white, black, are all deific; 
In each house is the ovum—it c...Read more of this...

by Marvell, Andrew
...him in France to play at cards and treat. 
Draw no commission lest the court should lie, 
That, disavowing treaty, asks supply. 
He needs no seal but to St James's lease, 
Whose breeches wear the instrument of peace; 
Who, if the French dispute his power, from thence 
Can straight produce them a plenipotence.. 
Nor fears he the Most Christian should trepan 
Two saints at once, St Germain, St Alban, 
But thought the Golden Age was now restored, 
When men and w...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...sentinels, 
They see so many strange faces, they do not know whom to trust.

Our frigate takes fire; 
The other asks if we demand quarter? 
If our colors are struck, and the fighting is done? 

Now I laugh content, for I hear the voice of my little captain, 
We have not struck, he composedly cries, we have just begun our part
 of the fighting.

Only three guns are in use; 
One is directed by the captain himself against the enemy’s mainmast; 
Two, well ser...Read more of this...

by Chesterton, G K
...abouring cart,
And Eldred's great and foolish heart
Stood open like his door.

A mighty man was Eldred,
A bulk for casks to fill,
His face a dreaming furnace,
His body a walking hill.

In the old wars of Wessex
His sword had sunken deep,
But all his friends, he signed and said,
Were broken about Ethelred;
And between the deep drink and the dead
He had fallen upon sleep.

"Come not to me, King Alfred, Save always for the ale:
Why should my harmless hinds be slain
B...Read more of this...

by Lowell, Amy
...> She joyed in her confining;
Her eyes put out her looking-glass with shining.
Charlotta was so gay that old, dull tasks
Were furbished up to seem like rituals.
She baked and brewed as one who only asks
The right to serve. Her daily manuals
Of prayer were duties, and her festivals
When Theodore praised some dish, or frankly said
She had a knack in making up a bed.
So Autumn went, and all the mountains round
The city glittered white with fallen snow,
For it was...Read more of this...

by Goldsmith, Oliver
...h obtain,
The toiling pleasure sickens into pain;
And, even while fashion's brightest arts decoy,
The heart distrusting asks, if this be joy.

Ye friends to truth, ye statesmen, who survey
The rich man's joys increase, the poor's decay,
'Tis yours to judge how wide the limits stand
Between a splendid and a happy land.
Proud swells the tide with loads of freighted ore,
And shouting Folly hails them from her shore;
Hoards even beyond the miser's wish abound,
And rich me...Read more of this...

by Lowell, Amy
...waterline
And above is a blue like the sky when the weather is fine.
The inner bulwarks are painted red.
"Why?" asks Miss Jessie. "'Tis a horrid note."
Mr. Nichols clears his throat,
And tells her the launching day is set.
He says, "Be careful, the paint is wet."
But Miss Jessie has touched it, her sprigged muslin gown
Has a blood-red streak from the shoulder down.
"It looks like blood," says Miss Jessie with a frown.
Tap! Tap! Rap!
An Octo...Read more of this...

by Blake, William
...of air, the mouth of water, the
beard of earth.

The weak in courage is strong in cunning.
The apple tree never asks the beech how he shall grow, nor the
lion. the horse; how he shall take his prey. 
The thankful reciever bears a plentiful harvest.

If others bad not been foolish. we should be so.
The soul of sweet delight. can never be defil'd,

When thou seest an Eagle, thou seest a portion of Genius. lift up
thy head!

As the catterpille...Read more of this...

by Miller, Alice Duer
...dukes, prime ministers and earls, 
In bonnets, berthas, bustles, buttoned basques, 
Hiding behind their pure Victorian masks 
Hearts just as hot - hotter perhaps than those 
Whose owners now abandon hats and hose? 
Who has not wept for Lady Joan or Jill 
Loving against her noble parent's will 
A handsome guardsman, who to her alarm 
Feels her hand kissed behind a potted palm 
At Lady Ivry's ball the dreadful night 
Before his regiment goes off to fight;
And see him the next m...Read more of this...

by Tebb, Barry
...es I throw myself into the drowning

Tide of Friday to be rescued by sheer normality.

The mill girl with her mates asks anxiously

"Are you on your own? Come and join us

What’s your name?" Age has driven my shyness away 

As I join the crowd beneath the turning purple screens 

Bannered ‘****** lasts for ever’ and sip unending 

Halves of bitter, as I circulate among the crowd, 

Being complete in itself and out for a good night out,

A relief from factory, shop floor a...Read more of this...

by Sandburg, Carl
...
Lurks in the dusk
Of the wild red leaves,
Love, with little hands,
Comes and touches you
With a thousand memories,
And asks you
Beautiful, unanswerable questions....Read more of this...

by Shakur, Tupac
...without possessions
The message I stress
To make you stop study your lessons
Don't settle for less
Even the genius asks his questions
Be grateful for blessings
Don't ever change, keep your essense
The power is in the people and politics we address
Always do your best
Don't let the pressure make you panic
And when you get stranded and things don't go the way you planned it
Dreaming of riches in the position of making a difference
Politicians is hypocrites
They do...Read more of this...

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Book: Shattered Sighs