10 Best Famous Earls Poems

Here is a collection of the top 10 all-time best famous Earls poems. This is a select list of the best famous Earls poetry. Reading, writing, and enjoying famous Earls poetry (as well as classical and contemporary poems) is a great past time. These top poems are the best examples of earls poems.

• All Famous Earls Poems

 Athelstan King,
Lord among Earls,
Bracelet-bestower and
Baron of Barons,
He with his brother,
Edmund Atheling,
Gaining a lifelong
Glory in battle,
Slew with the sword-edge
There by Brunanburh,
Brake the shield-wall,
Hew'd the lindenwood,
Hack'd the battleshield,
Sons of Edward with hammer'd brands. 

Theirs was a greatness
Got from their Grandsires--
Theirs that so often in
Strife with their enemies
Struck for their hoards and their hearths and their homes. 

Bow'd the spoiler,
Bent the Scotsman,
Fell the shipcrews
Doom'd to the death.
All the field with blood of the fighters
Flow'd, from when first the great
Sun-star of morningtide,
Lamp of the Lord God
Lord everlasting,
Glode over earth till the glorious creature
Sank to his setting.
There lay many a man
Marr'd by the javelin,
Men of the Northland
Shot over shield.
There was the Scotsman
Weary of war. 

We the West-Saxons,
Long as the daylight
Lasted, in companies
Troubled the track of the host that we hated;
Grimly with swords that were sharp from the grindstone
Fiercely we hack'd at the flyers before us. 

Mighty the Mercian,
Hard was his hand-play,
Sparing not any of
Those that with Anlaf,
Warriors over the
Weltering waters
Borne in the bark's-bosom,
Drew to this island:
Doom'd to the death. 

Five young kings put asleep by the sword-stroke,
Seven strong earls of the army of Anlaf
Fell on the war-field, numberless numbers,
Shipmen and Scotsmen. 

Then the Norse leader,
Dire was his need of it,
Few were his following,
Fled to his warship;
Fleeted his vessel to sea with the king in it,
Saving his life on the fallow flood. 

Also the crafty one,
Constantinus,
Crept to his north again,
Hoar-headed hero! 

Slender warrant had
He to be proud of
The welcome of war-knives--
He that was reft of his
Folk and his friends that had
Fallen in conflict,
Leaving his son too
Lost in the carnage,
Mangled to morsels,
A youngster in war! 

Slender reason had
He to be glad of
The clash of the war-glaive--
Traitor and trickster
And spurner of treaties--
He nor had Anlaf
With armies so broken
A reason for bragging
That they had the better
In perils of battle
On places of slaughter--
The struggle of standards,
The rush of the javelins,
The crash of the charges,
The wielding of weapons--
The play that they play'd with
The children of Edward. 

Then with their nail'd prows
Parted the Norsemen, a
Blood-redden'd relic of
Javelins over
The jarring breaker, the deep-sea billow,
Shaping their way toward Dyflen again,
Shamed in their souls. 

Also the brethren,
King and Atheling,
Each in his glory,
Went to his own in his own West-Saxonland,
Glad of the war. 

Many a carcase they left to be carrion,
Many a livid one, many a sallow-skin--
Left for the white-tail'd eagle to tear it, and
Left for the horny-nibb'd raven to rend it, and
Gave to the garbaging war-hawk to gorge it, and
That gray beast, the wolf of the weald. 

Never had huger
Slaughter of heroes
Slain by the sword-edge--
Such as old writers
Have writ of in histories--
Hapt in this isle, since
Up from the East hither
Saxon and Angle from
Over the broad billow
Broke into Britain with
Haughty war-workers who
Harried the Welshman, when
Earls that were lured by the
Hunger of glory gat
Hold of the land.

 The Lives and Times of John Keats,
Percy Bysshe Shelley, and
George Gordon Noel, Lord Byron

Byron and Shelley and Keats
Were a trio of Lyrical treats.
The forehead of Shelley was cluttered with curls,
And Keats never was a descendant of earls,
And Byron walked out with a number of girls,
But it didn't impair the poetical feats
Of Byron and Shelley,
Of Byron and Shelley,
Of Byron and Shelley and Keats.

 From Woolwich and Brentford and Stamford Hill, from Richmond into the Strand, 
Oh, the Cockney soul is a silent soul – as it is in every land! 
But out on the sand with a broken band it's sarcasm spurs them through; 
And, with never a laugh, in a gale and a half, 'tis the Cockney cheers the crew. 

Oh, send them a tune from the music-halls with a chorus to shake the sky! 
Oh, give them a deep-sea chanty now – and a star to steer them by! 

Now this is a song of the great untrained, a song of the Unprepared, 
Who had never the brains to plead unfit, or think of the things they dared; 
Of the grocer-souled and the draper-souled, and the clerks of the four o'clock, 
Who stood for London and died for home in the nineteen-fourteen shock. 

Oh, this is a pork-shop warrior's chant – come back from it, maimed and blind, 
To a little old counter in Grey's Inn-road and a tiny parlour behind; 
And the bedroom above, where the wife and he go silently mourning yet 
For a son-in-law who shall never come back and a dead son's room "To Let". 

(But they have a boy "in the fried-fish line" in a shop across the "wye", 
Who will take them "aht" and "abaht" to-night and cheer their old eyes dry.) 

And this is a song of the draper's clerk (what have you all to say?) – 
He'd a tall top-hat and a walking-coat in the city every day – 
He wears no flesh on his broken bones that lie in the shell-churned loam; 
For he went over the top and struck with his cheating yard-wand – home. 

(Oh, touch your hat to the tailor-made before you are aware, 
And lilt us a lay of Bank-holiday and the lights of Leicester-square!) 

Hats off to the dowager lady at home in her house in Russell-square! 
Like the pork-shop back and the Brixton flat, they are silently mourning there; 
For one lay out ahead of the rest in the slush 'neath a darkening sky, 
With the blood of a hundred earls congealed and his eye-glass to his eye. 

(He gave me a cheque in an envelope on a distant gloomy day; 
He gave me his hand at the mansion door and he said: "Good-luck! Good-bai!")

 So here's your Empire. No more wine, then?
Good.
We'll clear the Aides and khitmatgars away.
(You'll know that fat old fellow with the knife --
He keeps the Name Book, talks in English too,
And almost thinks himself the Government.)
O Youth, Youth, Youth! Forgive me, you're so young.
Forty from sixty -- twenty years of work
And power to back the working. Ay def mi!
You want to know, you want to see, to touch,
And, by your lights, to act. It's natural.
I wonder can I help you. Let me try.
You saw -- what did you see from Bombay east?
Enough to frighten any one but me?
Neat that! It frightened Me in Eighty-Four!
You shouldn't take a man from Canada
And bid him smoke in powder-magazines;
Nor with a Reputation such as -- Bah!
That ghost has haunted me for twenty years,
My Reputation now full blown -- Your fault --
Yours, with your stories of the strife at Home,
Who's up, who's down, who leads and who is led --
One reads so much, one hears so little here.
Well, now's your turn of exile. I go back
To Rome and leisure. All roads lead to Rome,

Or books -- the refuge of the destitute.
When you ... that brings me back to India. See!
 Start clear. I couldn't. Egypt served my turn.
You'll never plumb the Oriental mind,
And if you did it isn't worth the toil.
Think of a sleek French priest in Canada;
Divide by twenty half-breeds. Multiply
By twice the Sphinx's silence. There's your East,
And you're as wise as ever. So am I.
 Accept on trust and work in darkness, strike
At venture, stumble forward, make your mark,
(It's chalk on granite), then thank God no flame
Leaps from the rock to shrivel mark and man.
I'm clear -- my mark is made. Three months of drought
Had ruined much. It rained and washed away
The specks that might have gathered on my Name.
I took a country twice the size of France,
And shuttered up one doorway in the North.
I stand by those. You'll find that both will pay,
I pledged my Name on both -- they're yours to-night.
Hold to them -- they hold fame enough for two.
I'm old, but I shall live till Burma pays.
Men there -- not German traders -- Crsthw-te knows --
You'll find it in my papers. For the North
Guns always -- quietly -- but always guns.
You've seen your Council? Yes, they'll try to rule,
And prize their Reputations. Have you met
A grim lay-reader with a taste for coins,
And faith in Sin most men withhold from God?
He's gone to England. R-p-n knew his grip
And kicked. A Council always has its H-pes.
They look for nothing from the West but Death
Or Bath or Bournemouth. Here's their ground.
    They fight
Until the middle classes take them back,
One of ten millions plus a C.S.I.
Or drop in harness. Legion of the Lost?
Not altogether -- earnest, narrow men,
But chiefly earnest, and they'll do your work,
And end by writing letters to the Times,
(Shall I write letters, answering H-nt-r -- fawn
With R-p-n on the Yorkshire grocers? Ugh!)
They have their Reputations. Look to one --
I work with him -- the smallest of them all,
White-haired, red-faced, who sat the plunging horse
Out in the garden. He's your right-hand man,
And dreams of tilting W-ls-y from the throne,
But while he dreams gives work we cannot buy;
He has his Reputation -- wants the Lords
By way of Frontier Roads. Meantime, I think,
He values very much the hand that falls
Upon his shoulder at the Council table --
Hates cats and knows his business; which is yours.
 Your business! twice a hundered million souls.
Your business! I could tell you what I did
Some nights of Eighty-Five, at Simla, worth
A Kingdom's ransom. When a big ship drives,
God knows to what new reef the man at the whee!
Prays with the passengers. They lose their lives,
Or rescued go their way; but he's no man
To take his trick at the wheel again -- that's worse
Than drowning. Well, a galled Mashobra mule
(You'll see Mashobra) passed me on the Mall,
And I was -- some fool's wife and ducked and bowed
To show the others I would stop and speak.
Then the mule fell -- three galls, a hund-breadth each,
Behind the withers. Mrs. Whatsisname
Leers at the mule and me by turns, thweet thoul!
"How could they make him carry such a load!"
I saw -- it isn't often I dream dreams --
More than the mule that minute -- smoke and flame
From Simla to the haze below. That's weak.
You're younger. You'll dream dreams before you've done.
You've youth, that's one -- good workmen -- that means two
Fair chances in your favor. Fate's the third.
I know what I did. Do you ask me, "Preach"?
I answer by my past or else go back
To platitudes of rule -- or take you thus
In confidence and say: "You know the trick:
You've governed Canada. You know. You know!"
And all the while commend you to Fate's hand
(Here at the top on loses sight o' God),
Commend you, then, to something more than you --
The Other People's blunders and
 . . . that's all.
I'd agonize to serve you if I could.
It's incommunicable, like the cast
That drops the tackle with the gut adry.
Too much -- too little -- there's your salmon lost!
And so I tell you nothing --with you luck,
And wonder -- how I wonder! -- for your sake
And triumph for my own. You're young, you're young,
You hold to half a hundred Shibboleths.
I'm old. I followed Power to the last,
Gave her my best, and Power followed Me.
It's worth it -- on my sould I'm speaking plain,
Here by the claret glasses! -- worth it all.
I gave -- no matter what I gave -- I win.
I know I win. Mine's work, good work that lives!
A country twice the size of France -- the North
Safeguarded. That's my record: sink the rest
And better if you can. The Rains may serve,
Rupees may rise -- three pence will give you Fame --
It's rash to hope for sixpence -- If they rise
Get guns, more guns, and lift the salt-tax.
     Oh!
I told you what the Congress meant or thought?
I'll answer nothing. Half a year will prove
The full extent of time and thought you'll spare
To Congress. Ask a Lady Doctor once
How little Begums see the light -- deduce
Thence how the True Reformer's child is born.
It's interesting, curious . . . and vile.
I told the Turk he was a gentlman.
I told the Russian that his Tartar veins
Bled pure Parisian ichor; and he purred.
The Congress doesn't purr. I think it swears.
You're young -- you'll swear to ere you've reached the end.
The End! God help you, if there be a God.
(There must be one to startle Gl-dst-ne's soul
In that new land where all the wires are cut.
And Cr-ss snores anthems on the asphodel.)
God help you! And I'd help you if I could,
But that's beyond me. Yes, your speech was crude.
Sound claret after olives -- yours and mine;
But Medoc slips into vin ordinaire.
(I'll drink my first at Genoa to your health.)
Raise it to Hock. You'll never catch my style.
And, after all, the middle-classes grip
The middle-class -- for Brompton talk Earl's Court.
Perhaps you're right. I'll see you in the Times --
A quarter-column of eye-searing print,
A leader once a quarter -- then a war;
The Strand abellow through the fog: "Defeat!"
"'Orrible slaughter!" While you lie awake
And wonder. Oh, you'll wonder ere you're free!
I wonder now. The four years slide away
So fast, so fast, and leave me here alone.
R-y, C-lv-n, L-l, R-b-rts, B-ck, the rest,
Princes and Powers of Darkness troops and trains,
 (I cannot sleep in trains), land piled on land,
Whitewash and weariness, red rockets, dust,
White snows that mocked me, palaces -- with draughts,
And W-stl-nd with the drafts he couldn't pay,
Poor W-ls-n reading his obituary.
Before he died, and H-pe, the man with bones,
And A-tch-s-n a dripping mackintosh
At Council in the Rains, his grating "Sirrr"
Half drowned by H-nt-r's silky: "Bat my lahnd."
Hunterian always: M-rsh-l spinning plates
Or standing on his head; the Rent Bill's roar,
A hundred thousand speeches, must red cloth,
And Smiths thrice happy if I call them Jones,
(I can't remember half their names) or reined
My pony on the Mall to greet their wives.
More trains, more troops, more dust, and then all's done.
Four years, and I forget. If I forget
How will they bear me in their minds? The North
Safeguarded -- nearly (R-b-rts knows the rest),
A country twice the size of France annexed.
That stays at least. The rest may pass -- may pass --
Your heritage -- and I can teach you nought.
"High trust," "vast honor," "interests twice as vast,"
"Due reverence to your Council" -- keep to those.
I envy you the twenty years you've gained,
But not the five to follow. What's that? One?
Two! -- Surely not so late. Good-night. Don't dream.

 THIS 1 wot ye all whom it concerns,
I, Rhymer Robin, alias Burns,
 October twenty-third,
A ne’er-to-be-forgotten day,
Sae far I sprackl’d up the brae,
 I dinner’d wi’ a Lord.


I’ve been at drucken writers’ feasts,
Nay, been *****-fou ’mang godly priests—
 Wi’ rev’rence be it spoken!—
I’ve even join’d the honour’d jorum,
When mighty Squireships of the quorum,
 Their hydra drouth did sloken.


But wi’ a Lord!—stand out my shin,
A Lord—a Peer—an Earl’s son!
 Up higher yet, my bonnet
An’ sic a Lord!—lang Scoth ells twa,
Our Peerage he o’erlooks them a’,
 As I look o’er my sonnet.


But O for Hogarth’s magic pow’r!
To show Sir Bardie’s willyart glow’r,
 An’ how he star’d and stammer’d,
When, goavin, as if led wi’ branks,
An’ stumpin on his ploughman shanks,
 He in the parlour hammer’d.


I sidying shelter’d in a nook,
An’ at his Lordship steal’t a look,
 Like some portentous omen;
Except good sense and social glee,
An’ (what surpris’d me) modesty,
 I markèd nought uncommon.


I watch’d the symptoms o’ the Great,
The gentle pride, the lordly state,
 The arrogant assuming;
The fient a pride, nae pride had he,
Nor sauce, nor state, that I could see,
 Mair than an honest ploughman.


Then from his Lordship I shall learn,
Henceforth to meet with unconcern
 One rank as weel’s another;
Nae honest, worthy man need care
To meet with noble youthful Daer,
 For he but meets a brother.


 Note 1. At the house of Professor Dugald Stewart. [back]

 This rich Marble doth enterr
The honour'd Wife of Winchester,
A Vicounts daughter, an Earls heir,
Besides what her vertues fair
Added to her noble birth,
More then she could own from Earth.
Summers three times eight save one
She had told, alas too soon,
After so short time of breath,
To house with darknes, and with death. 
Yet had the number of her days
Bin as compleat as was her praise,
Nature and fate had had no strife
In giving limit to her life.
Her high birth, and her graces sweet,
Quickly found a lover meet;
The Virgin quire for her request
The God that sits at marriage feast;
He at their invoking came
But with a scarce-wel-lighted flame; 
And in his Garland as he stood,
Ye might discern a Cipress bud.
Once had the early Matrons run
To greet her of a lovely son,
And now with second hope she goes,
And calls Lucina to her throws;
But whether by mischance or blame
Atropos for Lucina came;
And with remorsles cruelty,
Spoil'd at once both fruit and tree: 
The haples Babe before his birth
Had burial, yet not laid in earth,
And the languisht Mothers Womb
Was not long a living Tomb.
So have I seen som tender slip
Sav'd with care from Winters nip,
The pride of her carnation train,
Pluck't up by som unheedy swain,
Who onely thought to crop the flowr
New shot up from vernall showr; 
But the fair blossom hangs the head
Side-ways as on a dying bed,
And those Pearls of dew she wears,
Prove to be presaging tears
Which the sad morn had let fall
On her hast'ning funerall.
Gentle Lady may thy grave
Peace and quiet ever have;
After this thy travail sore
Sweet rest sease thee evermore, 
That to give the world encrease,
Shortned hast thy own lives lease;
Here besides the sorrowing
That thy noble House doth bring,
Here be tears of perfect moan
Weept for thee in Helicon,
And som Flowers, and som Bays,
For thy Hears to strew the ways,
Sent thee from the banks of Came,
Devoted to thy vertuous name; 
Whilst thou bright Saint high sit'st in glory,
Next her much like to thee in story,
That fair Syrian Shepherdess,
Who after yeers of barrennes,
The highly favour'd Joseph bore
To him that serv'd for her before,
And at her next birth much like thee,
Through pangs fled to felicity,
Far within the boosom bright
of blazing Majesty and Light, 
There with thee, new welcom Saint,
Like fortunes may her soul acquaint,
With thee there clad in radiant sheen,
No Marchioness, but now a Queen.

 Bring down the moon for genteel Janet;
She's too refined for this gross planet.
She wears garments and you wear clothes,
You buy stockings, she purchases hose.
She say That is correct, and you say Yes,
And she disrobes and you undress.
Confronted by a mouse or moose,
You turn green, she turns chartroose.
Her speech is new-minted, freshly quarried;
She has a fore-head, you have a forehead.
Nor snake nor slowworm draweth nigh her;
You go to bed, she doth retire.
To Janet, births are blessed events,
And odors that you smell she scents.
Replete she feels, when her food is yummy,
Not in the stomach but the tummy.
If urged some novel step to show,
You say Like this, she says Like so.
Her dear ones don't die, but pass away;
Beneath her formal is lonjeray.
Of refinement she's a fount, or fountess,
And that is why she's now a countess.
She was asking for the little girls' room
And a flunky though she said the earl's room.

 The big teetotum twirls,
And epochs wax and wane
As chance subsides or swirls;
But of the loss and gain
The sum is always plain.
Read on the mighty pall,
The weed of funeral
That covers praise and blame,
The -isms and the -anities,
Magnificence and shame:--
"O Vanity of Vanities!"

The Fates are subtle girls!
They give us chaff for grain.
And Time, the Thunderer, hurls,
Like bolted death, disdain
At all that heart and brain
Conceive, or great or small,
Upon this earthly ball.
Would you be knight and dame?
Or woo the sweet humanities?
Or illustrate a name?
O Vanity of Vanities!

We sound the sea for pearls,
Or drown them in a drain;
We flute it with the merles,
Or tug and sweat and strain;
We grovel, or we reign;
We saunter, or we brawl;
We search the stars for Fame,
Or sink her subterranities;
The legend's still the same:--
"O Vanity of Vanities!"

Here at the wine one birls,
There some one clanks a chain.
The flag that this man furls
That man to float is fain.
Pleasure gives place to pain:
These in the kennel crawl,
While others take the wall.
She has a glorious aim,
He lives for the inanities.
What come of every claim?
O Vanity of Vanities!

Alike are clods and earls.
For sot, and seer, and swain,
For emperors and for churls,
For antidote and bane,
There is but one refrain:
But one for king and thrall,
For David and for Saul,
For fleet of foot and lame,
For pieties and profanities,
The picture and the frame:--
"O Vanity of Vanities!"

Life is a smoke that curls--
Curls in a flickering skein,
That winds and whisks and whirls,
A figment thin and vain,
Into the vast Inane.
One end for hut and hall!
One end for cell and stall!
Burned in one common flame
Are wisdoms and insanities.
For this alone we came:--
"O Vanity of Vanities!"

Envoy
Prince, pride must have a fall.
What is the worth of all
Your state's supreme urbanities?
Bad at the best's the game.
Well might the Sage exclaim:--
"O Vanity of Vanities!"

 Bring the bowl which you boast, 
Fill it up to the brim; 
’Tis to him we love most, 
And to all who love him. 
Brave gallants, stand up, 
And avaunt ye, base carles! 
Were there death in the cup, 
Here’s a health to King Charles. 

Though he wanders through dangers, 
Unaided, unknown, 
Dependent on strangers, 
Estranged from his own; 
Though ’tis under our breath, 
Amidst forfeits and perils, 
Here’s to honor and faith, 
And a health to King Charles! 

Let such honors abound 
As the time can afford, 
The knee on the ground, 
And the hand on the sword; 
But the time shall come round 
When, ’mid Lords, Dukes, and Earls, 
The loud trumpet shall sound, 
Here’s a health to King Charles!

IT was the time when lilies blow, 
And clouds are highest up in air, 
Lord Ronald brought a lily-white doe 
To give his cousin, Lady Clare. 

I trow they did not part in scorn- 
Lovers long-betroth'd were they: 
They too will wed the morrow morn: 
God's blessing on the day! 

'He does not love me for my birth, 
Nor for my lands so broad and fair; 
He loves me for my own true worth, 
And that is well,' said Lady Clare. 

In there came old Alice the nurse, 
Said, 'Who was this that went from thee?' 
'It was my cousin,' said Lady Clare, 
'To-morrow he weds vith me.' 

'O God be thank'd!' said Alice the nurse, 
' That all comes round so just and fair: 
Lord Ronald is heir of all your lands, 
And you are not the Lady Clare.' 

'Are ye out of your mind, my nurse, my nurse?' 
Said Lady Clare, 'that ye speak so wild?' 
'As God's above,' said Alice the nurse, 
' I speak the truth: you are my child. 

'The old Earl's daughter died at my breast; 
I speak the truth, as I live by bread! 
I buried her like my own sweet child, 
And put my child in her stead.' 

'Falsely, falsely have ye done, 
O mother,' she said, 'if this be true, 
To keep the best man under the sun 
So many years from his due.' 

'Nay now, my child,' said Alice the nurse, 
'But keep the secret for your life, 
And all you have will be Lord Ronald's, 
When you are man and wife.' 

' If I'm a beggar born,' she said, 
'I will speak out, for I dare not lie. 
Pull off, pull off, the brooch of gold, 
And fling the diamond necklace by.' 

'Nay now, my child,' said Alice the nurse, 
'But keep the secret all ye can.' 
She said, 'Not so: but I will know 
If there be any faith in man.' 

'Nay now, what faith?' said Alice the nurse, 
'The man will cleave unto his right.' 
'And he shall have it,' the lady replied, 
'Tho' I should die to-night.' 

'Yet give one kiss to your mother dear ! 
Alas, my child, I sinn'd for thee.' 
'O mother, mother, mother,' she said, 
'So strange it seems to me. 

'Yet here's a kiss for my mother dear, 
My mother dear, if this be so, 
And lay your hand upon my head, 
And bless me, mother, ere I go.' 

She clad herself in a russet gown, 
She was no longer Lady Clare: 
She went by dale, and she went by down, 
With a single rose in her hair. 

The lily-white doe Lord Ronald had brought 
Leapt up from where she lay, 
Dropt her head in the maiden's hand, 
And follow'd her all the way. 

Down stept Lord Ronald from his tower: 
'O Lady Clare, you shame your worth! 
Why come you drest like a village maid, 
That are the flower of the earth?' 

'If I come drest like a village maid, 
I am but as my fortunes are: 
I am a beggar born,' she said, 
'And not the Lady Clare.' 

'Play me no tricks,' said Lord Ronald, 
'For I am yours in word and in deed. 
Play me no tricks,' said Lord Ronald, 
'Your riddle is hard to read.' 

O and proudly stood she up! 
Her heart within her did not fail: 
She look'd into Lord Ronald's eyes, 
And told him all her nurse's tale. 

He laugh'd a laugh of merry scorn: 
He turn'd and kiss'd her where she stood: 
'If you are not the heiress born, 
And I,' said he, 'the next in blood-- 

'If you are not the heiress born, 
And I,' said he, 'the lawful heir, 
We two will wed to-morrow morn, 
And you shall still be Lady Clare.'