Get Your Premium Membership

Famous At Large Poems by Famous Poets

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

See also:

by Burns, Robert
...umble gains,
And make his cottage-scenes beguile
 His cares and pains.


“Some, bounded to a district-space
Explore at large man’s infant race,
To mark the embryotic trace
 Of rustic bard;
And careful note each opening grace,
 A guide and guard.


“Of these am I—Coila my name:
And this district as mine I claim,
Where once the Campbells, chiefs of fame,
 Held ruling power:
I mark’d thy embryo-tuneful flame,
 Thy natal hour.


“With future hope I oft would gaze
Fond...Read more of this...



by Kipling, Rudyard
...al man."

[At dawn, across the Hurrum Hills, he flashed her counsel wise --
But, howsoever Love be blind, the world at large hath eyes.]
With damnatory dot and dash he heliographed his wife
Some interesting details of the General's private life.

The artless Aide-de-camp was mute, the shining Staff were still,
And red and ever redder grew the General's shaven gill.
And this is what he said at last (his feelings matter not): --
"I think we've tapped a private l...Read more of this...

by Finch, Anne Kingsmill
...ds,
Whose stealing pace, and lengthened shade we fear,
Till torn-up forage in his teeth we hear:
When nibbling sheep at large pursue their food,
And unmolested kine rechew the cud;
When curlews cry beneath the village walls,
And to her straggling brood the partridge calls;
Their shortlived jubilee the creatures keep,
Which but endures, whilst tyrant man does sleep;
When a sedate content the spirit feels,
And no fierce light disturbs, whilst it reveals;
But silent m...Read more of this...

by Smart, Christopher
...e year to his account, 
 With dances and with songs: 

 III 
O Servant of God's holiest charge, 
The minister of praise at large, 
 Which thou may'st now receive; 
From thy blest mansion hail and hear, 
From topmost eminence appear 
 To this the wreath I weave. 

 IV 
Great, valiant, pious, good, and clean, 
Sublime, contemplative, serene, 
 Strong, constant, pleasant, wise! 
Bright effluence of exceeding grace; 
Best man!—the swiftest and the race, 
 The peril, and the p...Read more of this...

by Robinson, Edwin Arlington
...antom; 
And his reality was for me some time 
In its achievement—given that one’s to be 
Convinced that such an incubus at large 
Was ever quite real. The season was upon us
When there are fitter regions in the world— 
Though God knows he would have been safe enough—
Than Rome for strayed Americans to live in, 
And when the whips of their itineraries 
Hurry them north again. I took my time,
Since I was paying for it, and leisurely 
Went where I would—though never agai...Read more of this...



by Arnold, Matthew
...f our life
Pursue with indiscernible flow its way;
And that we should not see
The buried stream, and seem to be
Eddying at large in blind uncertainty,
Though driving on with it eternally.

But often, in the world's most crowded streets,
But often, in the din of strife,
There rises an unspeakable desire
After the knowledge of our buried life;
A thirst to spend our fire and restless force
In tracking out our true, original course;
A longing to inquire
Into the mystery of th...Read more of this...

by Browning, Robert
...hich, the joy-hunger forces us: 
That, stung by straitness of our life, made strait 
On purpose to make prized the life at large-- 
Freed by the throbbing impulse we call death, 
We burst there as the worm into the fly, 
Who, while a worm still, wants his wings. But no! 
Zeus has not yet revealed it; and alas, 
He must have done so, were it possible! 

Live long and happy, and in that thought die: 
Glad for what was! Farewell. And for the rest, 
I cannot tell thy mess...Read more of this...

by Keats, John
...llad of his sad life closes
With sighs, and an alas!--Endymion!
Be rather in the trumpet's mouth,--anon
Among the winds at large--that all may hearken!
Although, before the crystal heavens darken,
I watch and dote upon the silver lakes
Pictur'd in western cloudiness, that takes
The semblance of gold rocks and bright gold sands,
Islands, and creeks, and amber-fretted strands
With horses prancing o'er them, palaces
And towers of amethyst,--would I so tease
My pleasant days, bec...Read more of this...

by Byron, George (Lord)
...
His presence? who had made him disappear, 
If not the man on whom his menaced charge 
Had sate too deeply were he left at large? 
The general rumour ignorantly loud, 
The mystery dearest to the curious crowd; 
The seeming friendlessness of him who strove 
To win no confidence, and wake no love; 
The sweeping fierceness which his soul betray'd, 
The skill with which he wielded his keen blade; 
Where had his arm unwarlike caught that art? 
Where had that fierceness grown upon ...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...; nor ever thence 
Had risen, or heaved his head, but that the will 
And high permission of all-ruling Heaven 
Left him at large to his own dark designs, 
That with reiterated crimes he might 
Heap on himself damnation, while he sought 
Evil to others, and enraged might see 
How all his malice served but to bring forth 
Infinite goodness, grace, and mercy, shewn 
On Man by him seduced, but on himself 
Treble confusion, wrath, and vengeance poured. 
 Forthwith upright he r...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...Though distant far, some small reflection gains 
Of glimmering air less vexed with tempest loud: 
Here walked the Fiend at large in spacious field. 
As when a vultur on Imaus bred, 
Whose snowy ridge the roving Tartar bounds, 
Dislodging from a region scarce of prey 
To gorge the flesh of lambs or yeanling kids, 
On hills where flocks are fed, flies toward the springs 
Of Ganges or Hydaspes, Indian streams; 
But in his way lights on the barren plains 
Of Sericana, where C...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...s to rove 
Unchecked, and of her roving is no end; 
Till warned, or by experience taught, she learn, 
That, not to know at large of things remote 
From use, obscure and subtle; but, to know 
That which before us lies in daily life, 
Is the prime wisdom: What is more, is fume, 
Or emptiness, or fond impertinence: 
And renders us, in things that most concern, 
Unpractised, unprepared, and still to seek. 
Therefore from this high pitch let us descend 
A lower flight, and spe...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...all their fame 
Ignobly, to the trains and to the smiles 
Of these fair atheists; and now swim in joy, 
Erelong to swim at large; and laugh, for which 
The world erelong a world of tears must weep. 
To whom thus Adam, of short joy bereft. 
O pity and shame, that they, who to live well 
Entered so fair, should turn aside to tread 
Paths indirect, or in the mid way faint! 
But still I see the tenour of Man's woe 
Holds on the same, from Woman to begin. 
From Man's e...Read more of this...

by Plath, Sylvia
...t always the ridiculous nude flanks urge
the fabrication of some cloth to cover
such starkness; accuracy must not stalk at large:
each day demands we create our whole world over,
disguising the constant horror in a coat
of many-colored fictions; we mask our past
in the green of Eden, pretend future's shining fruit
can sprout from the navel of this present waste.
In this particular tub, two knees jut up
like icebergs, while minute brown hairs rise
on arms and legs in a fri...Read more of this...

by Arnold, Matthew
...f our life
Pursue with indiscernible flow its way;
And that we should not see
The buried stream, and seem to be
Eddying at large in blind uncertainty,
Though driving on with it eternally.

But often, in the world's most crowded streets,
But often, in the din of strife,
There rises an unspeakable desire
After the knowledge of our buried life;
A thirst to spend our fire and restless force
In tracking out our true, original course;
A longing to inquire
Into the mystery of th...Read more of this...

by Bridges, Robert Seymour
...rsal love, from timeless dream
Waking to thee his joy's interpreter.
I walk around and in the fields confer
Of love at large with tree and flower and stream,
And list the lark descant upon my theme,
Heaven's musical accepted worshipper. 
Thy smile outfaceth ill: and that old feud
'Twixt things and me is quash'd in our new truce;
And nature now dearly with thee endued
No more in shame ponders her old excuse,
But quite forgets her frowns and antics rude,
So kindly hath ...Read more of this...

by Carroll, Lewis
...In one moment I've seen what has hitherto been
 Enveloped in absolute mystery,
And without extra charge I will give you at large
 A Lesson in Natural History."

In his genial way he proceeded to say
 (Forgetting all laws of propriety,
And that giving instruction, without introduction,
 Would have caused quite a thrill in Society),

"As to temper the Jubjub's a desperate bird,
 Since it lives in perpetual passion:
Its taste in costume is entirely absurd--
 It is ages ahead...Read more of this...

by Scott, Sir Walter
...Unfit for arms; and given his charge,
     Nor skiff nor shallop, boat nor barge,
     Upon these lakes shall float at large,
     But all beside the islet moor,
     That such dear pledge may rest secure?'—
     IV.

     ''T is well advised,—the Chieftain's plan
     Bespeaks the father of his clan.
     But wherefore sleeps Sir Roderick Dhu
     Apart from all his followers true?'
     'It is because last evening-tide
     Brian an augury hath tried,
     Of...Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...you spent a stormy time 
With our strange girl: and yet they say that still 
You love her. Give us, then, your mind at large: 
How say you, war or not?' 
'Not war, if possible, 
O king,' I said, 'lest from the abuse of war, 
The desecrated shrine, the trampled year, 
The smouldering homestead, and the household flower 
Torn from the lintel--all the common wrong-- 
A smoke go up through which I loom to her 
Three times a monster: now she lightens scorn 
At him that mars he...Read more of this...

by Pope, Alexander
...uard the wide Circumference around.

Whatever spirit, careless of his Charge,
His Post neglects, or leaves the Fair at large,
Shall feel sharp Vengeance soon o'ertake his Sins,
Be stopt in Vials, or transfixt with Pins.
Or plung'd in Lakes of bitter Washes lie,
Or wedg'd whole Ages in a Bodkin's Eye:
Gums and Pomatums shall his Flight restrain,
While clog'd he beats his silken Wings in vain; 
Or Alom-Stypticks with contracting Power
Shrink his thin Essence like a rive...Read more of this...

Dont forget to view our wonderful member At Large poems.


Book: Shattered Sighs