10 Best Famous Melodies Poems

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

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A Birthday

by Aleister Crowley
 "Aug." 10, 1911.

Full moon to-night; and six and twenty years
Since my full moon first broke from angel spheres!
A year of infinite love unwearying ---
No circling seasons, but perennial spring!
A year of triumph trampling through defeat,
The first made holy and the last made sweet
By this same love; a year of wealth and woe,
Joy, poverty, health, sickness --- all one glow
In the pure light that filled our firmament
Of supreme silence and unbarred extent,
Wherein one sacrament was ours, one Lord,
One resurrection, one recurrent chord,
One incarnation, one descending dove,
All these being one, and that one being Love!

You sent your spirit into tunes; my soul
Yearned in a thousand melodies to enscroll
Its happiness: I left no flower unplucked
That might have graced your garland. I induct
Tragedy, comedy, farce, fable, song,
Each longing a little, each a little long,
But each aspiring only to express
Your excellence and my unworthiness --- 
Nay! but my worthiness, since I was sense
And spirit too of that same excellence.

So thus we solved the earth's revolving riddle:
I could write verse, and you could play the fiddle,
While, as for love, the sun went through the signs,
And not a star but told him how love twines
A wreath for every decanate, degree,
Minute and second, linked eternally
In chains of flowers that never fading are,
Each one as sempiternal as a star.

Let me go back to your last birthday. Then
I was already your one man of men
Appointed to complete you, and fulfil
From everlasting the eternal will.
We lay within the flood of crimson light
In my own balcony that August night,
And conjuring the aright and the averse
Created yet another universe.

We worked together; dance and rite and spell
Arousing heaven and constraining hell.
We lived together; every hour of rest
Was honied from your tiger-lily breast.
We --- oh what lingering doubt or fear betrayed
My life to fate! --- we parted. Was I afraid?
I was afraid, afraid to live my love,
Afraid you played the serpent, I the dove,
Afraid of what I know not. I am glad 
Of all the shame and wretchedness I had,
Since those six weeks have taught me not to doubt you,
And also that I cannot live without you.

Then I came back to you; black treasons rear
Their heads, blind hates, deaf agonies of fear,
Cruelty, cowardice, falsehood, broken pledges,
The temple soiled with senseless sacrileges,
Sickness and poverty, a thousand evils,
Concerted malice of a million devils; ---
You never swerved; your high-pooped galleon
Went marvellously, majestically on
Full-sailed, while every other braver bark
Drove on the rocks, or foundered in the dark.

Then Easter, and the days of all delight!
God's sun lit noontide and his moon midnight,
While above all, true centre of our world,
True source of light, our great love passion-pearled
Gave all its life and splendour to the sea
Above whose tides stood our stability.

Then sudden and fierce, no monitory moan,
Smote the mad mischief of the great cyclone.
How far below us all its fury rolled!
How vainly sulphur tries to tarnish gold!
We lived together: all its malice meant
Nothing but freedom of a continent!

It was the forest and the river that knew
The fact that one and one do not make two. 
We worked, we walked, we slept, we were at ease,
We cried, we quarrelled; all the rocks and trees
For twenty miles could tell how lovers played,
And we could count a kiss for every glade.
Worry, starvation, illness and distress?
Each moment was a mine of happiness.

Then we grew tired of being country mice,
Came up to Paris, lived our sacrifice
There, giving holy berries to the moon,
July's thanksgiving for the joys of June.

And you are gone away --- and how shall I
Make August sing the raptures of July?
And you are gone away --- what evil star
Makes you so competent and popular?
How have I raised this harpy-hag of Hell's
Malice --- that you are wanted somewhere else?
I wish you were like me a man forbid,
Banned, outcast, nice society well rid
Of the pair of us --- then who would interfere
With us? --- my darling, you would now be here!

But no! we must fight on, win through, succeed,
Earn the grudged praise that never comes to meed,
Lash dogs to kennel, trample snakes, put bit
In the mule-mouths that have such need of it,
Until the world there's so much to forgive in
Becomes a little possible to live in.

God alone knows if battle or surrender
Be the true courage; either has its splendour. 
But since we chose the first, God aid the right,
And damn me if I fail you in the fight!
God join again the ways that lie apart,
And bless the love of loyal heart to heart!
God keep us every hour in every thought,
And bring the vessel of our love to port!

These are my birthday wishes. Dawn's at hand,
And you're an exile in a lonely land.
But what were magic if it could not give
My thought enough vitality to live?
Do not then dream this night has been a loss!
All night I have hung, a god, upon the cross;
All night I have offered incense at the shrine;
All night you have been unutterably mine,
Miner in the memory of the first wild hour
When my rough grasp tore the unwilling flower
From your closed garden, mine in every mood,
In every tense, in every attitude,
In every possibility, still mine
While the sun's pomp and pageant, sign to sign,
Stately proceeded, mine not only so
In the glamour of memory and austral glow
Of ardour, but by image of my brow
Stronger than sense, you are even here and now
Miner, utterly mine, my sister and my wife,
Mother of my children, mistress of my life!

O wild swan winging through the morning mist!
The thousand thousand kisses that we kissed, 
The infinite device our love devised
If by some chance its truth might be surprised,
Are these all past? Are these to come? Believe me,
There is no parting; they can never leave me.
I have built you up into my heart and brain
So fast that we can never part again.
Why should I sing you these fantastic psalms
When all the time I have you in my arms?
Why? 'tis the murmur of our love that swells
Earth's dithyrambs and ocean's oracles.

But this is dawn; my soul shall make its nest
Where your sighs swing from rapture into rest
Love's thurible, your tiger-lily breast.

The Day is Done

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
THE DAY is done and the darkness 
Falls from the wings of Night  
As a feather is wafted downward 
From an eagle in his flight. 

I see the lights of the village 5 
Gleam through the rain and the mist  
And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me 
That my soul cannot resist: 

A feeling of sadness and longing  
That is not akin to pain 10 
And resembles sorrow only 
As the mist resembles the rain. 

Come read to me some poem  
Some simple and heartfelt lay  
That shall soothe this restless feeling 15 
And banish the thoughts of day. 

Not from the grand old masters  
Not from the bards sublime  
Whose distant footsteps echo 
Through the corridors of Time. 20 

For like strains of martial music  
Their mighty thoughts suggest 
Life's endless toil and endeavor; 
And to-night I long for rest. 

Read from some humbler poet 25 
Whose songs gushed from his heart  
As showers from the clouds of summer  
Or tears from the eyelids start; 

Who through long days of labor  
And nights devoid of ease 30 
Still heard in his soul the music 
Of wonderful melodies. 

Such songs have power to quiet 
The restless pulse of care  
And come like the benediction 35 
That follows after prayer. 

Then read from the treasured volume 
The poem of thy choice  
And lend to the rhyme of the poet 
The beauty of thy voice. 40 

And the night shall be filled with music  
And the cares that infest the day  
Shall fold their tents like the Arabs  
And as silently steal away.

Ode on a Grecian Urn

by John Keats
THOU still unravish'd bride of quietness  
Thou foster-child of Silence and slow Time  
Sylvan historian who canst thus express 
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme: 
What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape 5 
Of deities or mortals or of both  
In Tempe or the dales of Arcady? 
What men or gods are these? What maidens loth? 
What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape? 
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy? 10 

Heard melodies are sweet but those unheard 
Are sweeter; therefore ye soft pipes play on; 
Not to the sensual ear but more endear'd  
Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone: 
Fair youth beneath the trees thou canst not leave 15 
Thy song nor ever can those trees be bare; 
Bold Lover never never canst thou kiss  
Though winning near the goal¡ªyet do not grieve; 
She cannot fade though thou hast not thy bliss  
For ever wilt thou love and she be fair! 20 

Ah happy happy boughs! that cannot shed 
Your leaves nor ever bid the Spring adieu; 
And happy melodist unweari¨¨d  
For ever piping songs for ever new; 
More happy love! more happy happy love! 25 
For ever warm and still to be enjoy'd  
For ever panting and for ever young; 
All breathing human passion far above  
That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloy'd  
A burning forehead and a parching tongue. 30 

Who are these coming to the sacrifice? 
To what green altar O mysterious priest  
Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies  
And all her silken flanks with garlands drest? 
What little town by river or sea-shore 35 
Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel  
Is emptied of its folk this pious morn? 
And little town thy streets for evermore 
Will silent be; and not a soul to tell 
Why thou art desolate can e'er return. 40 

O Attic shape! fair attitude! with brede 
Of marble men and maidens overwrought  
With forest branches and the trodden weed; 
Thou silent form! dost tease us out of thought 
As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral! 45 
When old age shall this generation waste  
Thou shalt remain in midst of other woe 
Than ours a friend to man to whom thou say'st  
'Beauty is truth truth beauty ¡ªthat is all 
Ye know on earth and all ye need to know.' 50 

To a Lady with a Guitar

by Percy Bysshe Shelley
ARIEL to Miranda:¡ªTake 
This slave of music for the sake 
Of him who is the slave of thee; 
And teach it all the harmony 
In which thou canst and only thou 5 
Make the delighted spirit glow  
Till joy denies itself again 
And too intense is turn'd to pain.
For by permission and command 
Of thine own Prince Ferdinand 10 
Poor Ariel sends this silent token 
Of more than ever can be spoken; 
Your guardian spirit Ariel who 
From life to life must still pursue 
Your happiness for thus alone 15 
Can Ariel ever find his own. 
From Prospero's enchanted cell  
As the mighty verses tell  
To the throne of Naples he 
Lit you o'er the trackless sea 20 
Flitting on your prow before  
Like a living meteor. 
When you die the silent Moon 
In her interlunar swoon 
Is not sadder in her cell 25 
Than deserted Ariel:¡ª 
When you live again on earth  
Like an unseen Star of birth 
Ariel guides you o'er the sea 
Of life from your nativity:¡ª 30 
Many changes have been run 
Since Ferdinand and you begun 
Your course of love and Ariel still 
Has track'd your steps and served your will. 
Now in humbler happier lot 35 
This is all remember'd not; 
And now alas the poor Sprite is 
Imprison'd for some fault of his 
In a body like a grave¡ª 
From you he only dares to crave 40 
For his service and his sorrow 
A smile to-day a song to-morrow. 

The artist who this viol wrought 
To echo all harmonious thought  
Fell'd a tree while on the steep 45 
The woods were in their winter sleep  
Rock'd in that repose divine 
On the wind-swept Apennine; 
And dreaming some of autumn past  
And some of spring approaching fast 50 
And some of April buds and showers  
And some of songs in July bowers  
And all of love; and so this tree ¡ª 
Oh that such our death may be!¡ª 
Died in sleep and felt no pain 55 
To live in happier form again: 
From which beneath heaven's fairest star  
The artist wrought this loved guitar; 
And taught it justly to reply 
To all who question skilfully 60 
In language gentle as thine own; 
Whispering in enamour'd tone 
Sweet oracles of woods and dells  
And summer winds in sylvan cells. 
For it had learnt all harmonies 65 
Of the plains and of the skies  
Of the forests and the mountains  
And the many-voic¨¨d fountains; 
The clearest echoes of the hills  
The softest notes of falling rills 70 
The melodies of birds and bees  
The murmuring of summer seas  
And pattering rain and breathing dew  
And airs of evening; and it knew 
That seldom-heard mysterious sound 75 
Which driven on its diurnal round  
As it floats through boundless day  
Our world enkindles on its way:¡ª 
All this it knows but will not tell 
To those who cannot question well 80 
The spirit that inhabits it: 
It talks according to the wit 
Of its companions; and no more 
Is heard than has been felt before 
By those who tempt it to betray 85 
These secrets of an elder day. 
But sweetly as its answers will 
Flatter hands of perfect skill  
It keeps its highest holiest tone 
For one beloved Friend alone. 90 

Chopin

by Emma Lazarus
 I

A dream of interlinking hands, of feet 
Tireless to spin the unseen, fairy woof 
Of the entangling waltz. Bright eyebeams meet, 
Gay laughter echoes from the vaulted roof. 
Warm perfumes rise; the soft unflickering glow 
Of branching lights sets off the changeful charms 
Of glancing gems, rich stuffs, the dazzling snow 
Of necks unkerchieft, and bare, clinging arms. 
Hark to the music! How beneath the strain 
Of reckless revelry, vibrates and sobs 
One fundamental chord of constant pain, 
The pulse-beat of the poet's heart that throbs. 
So yearns, though all the dancing waves rejoice, 
The troubled sea's disconsolate, deep voice. 


II

Who shall proclaim the golden fable false 
Of Orpheus' miracles? This subtle strain 
Above our prose-world's sordid loss and gain 
Lightly uplifts us. With the rhythmic waltz, 
The lyric prelude, the nocturnal song 
Of love and languor, varied visions rise, 
That melt and blend to our enchanted eyes. 
The Polish poet who sleeps silenced long, 
The seraph-souled musician, breathes again 
Eternal eloquence, immortal pain. 
Revived the exalted face we know so well, 
The illuminated eyes, the fragile frame, 
Slowly consuming with its inward flame, 
We stir not, speak not, lest we break the spell. 


III

A voice was needed, sweet and true and fine 
As the sad spirit of the evening breeze, 
Throbbing with human passion, yet devine 
As the wild bird's untutored melodies. 
A voice for him 'neath twilight heavens dim, 
Who mourneth for his dead, while round him fall 
The wan and noiseless leaves. A voice for him 
Who sees the first green sprout, who hears the call 
Of the first robin on the first spring day. 
A voice for all whom Fate hath set apart, 
Who, still misprized, must perish by the way, 
Longing with love, for that they lack the art 
Of their own soul's expression. For all these 
Sing the unspoken hope, the vague, sad reveries. 


IV

Then Nature shaped a poet's heart--a lyre 
From out whose chords the lightest breeze that blows 
Drew trembling music, wakening sweet desire. 
How shall she cherish him? Behold! she throws 
This precious, fragile treasure in the whirl 
Of seething passions; he is scourged and stung, 
Must dive in storm-vext seas, if but one pearl 
Of art or beauty therefrom may be wrung. 
No pure-browed pensive nymph his Muse shall be, 
An amazon of thought with sovereign eyes, 
Whose kiss was poison, man-brained, worldy-wise, 
Inspired that elfin, delicate harmony. 
Rich gain for us! But with him is it well? 
The poet who must sound earth, heaven, and hell!

Hanging Fire

by Audre Lorde
 I am fourteen
and my skin has betrayed me
the boy I cannot live without 
still sucks his tumb 
in secret
how come my knees are 
always so ashy
what if I die
before the morning comes
and momma's in the bedroom
with the door closed.

I have to learn how to dance
in time for the next party 
my room is too small for me
suppose I de before graduation
they will sing sad melodies
but finally
tell the truth aout me
There is nothing I want to do 
and too much
that has to be done
and momma's in the bedroom
with the door closed.

Nobody even stops to think
about my side of it
I should have been on Math Team
my marks were better than his
why do I have to be
the one 
wearing braces
I have nothing to wear tomorrow
will I live long enough
to grow up
and momma's in the bedroom
with the door closed.

I am bound to this Land by blood

by Olu Oguibe
I am bound to this land by blood
That's why my vision is blurred
I am rooted in its soil
And its streams flood my veins
I smell the sweat of its men
And the million feet that plod
The dust of its streets
Leave their prints on my soul
I have walked the footpaths of this land
Climbed the snake-routes of its hills
I have known the heat of its noon
And that in the fields where men toil till dusk
I have known the faces their creases
I have seen pain engraved on the foreheads of many
I have heard their agony

I have cried so often with broken men
And peered into a million faces blank
Faces without bodies bodies without faces
The owners of nothing breakers of stone
The owners who are owned I have known them all

I have heard the wailing of a million
I have stood in the crowd where men
Mixed their sweat and wiped blood
From their brows cursing silently
I have stood in the middle of silent whirlwinds
And their heat has left its mark
I bear the mark of the masses on my brow
And if I curse
If I raise this single voice
In the midst of dust and curse
If I lend a tiny voice to
The rustle of this crowd
It's because I am bound to this land

I am bound to the dying mother the widow
The man with a weight on his loins
I am tethered to their moan they are my own
I belong with they who have no voice
They who trudge outside the gate
Those who sigh in their hearts
Who only shake their heads

And if I sing not of roses and rivers
It's because I see rivers of blood
I look through the holler of the crowd
And I see blood on the ground
I see blood on the rockslabs
I look over the mangrove swamp
And I walk through fields of groundnut
And I see nothing but blood
I see blood in the face of the farmer
On the palm of the school child
I see blood on the statue
Of the Immaculate Mother

I walk through the streets and I see puddles of blood
I see blood on your shoes on your underwear
I see blood on the hands of men
And if I raise my voice to holler
It is because the grasses wither in this deluge of blood
Fishes float on their bellies with their eyes covered
By the sanguine flood

My verse spreads ungathered
In this spill of purple
Mine is the cry of a ram tethered
To the slaughterslab

There are no petals soft
No yellow centres
No polished pebble melodies
Piled into song
My words are rough-hewn from
These rocks where men toil
The plaintive voices of children
The plod of prisoners feet
The curses of the peasant woman
Are the wattle of my song

My pictures are the colour of dust
And I sing only of rust
I have swum in the flood
And I know better
For I am bound to this land
By blood. 

Closed Path

by Rabindranath Tagore
 I thought that my voyage had come to its end 
at the last limit of my power,---that the path before me was closed, 
that provisions were exhausted 
and the time come to take shelter in a silent obscurity. 

But I find that thy will knows no end in me. 
And when old words die out on the tongue, 
new melodies break forth from the heart; 
and where the old tracks are lost, 
new country is revealed with its wonders.

Lullaby

by Louise Gluck
 Sleep, pretty lady, the night is enfolding you;
Drift, and so lightly, on crystalline streams.
Wrapped in its perfumes, the darkness is holding you;
Starlight bespangles the way of your dreams.
Chorus the nightingales, wistfully amorous;
Blessedly quiet, the blare of the day.
All the sweet hours may your visions be glamorous-
Sleep, pretty lady, as long as you may.

Sleep, pretty lady, the night shall be still for you;
Silvered and silent, it watches you rest.
Each little breeze, in its eagerness, will for you
Murmur the melodies ancient and blest.
So in the midnight does happiness capture us;
Morning is dim with another day's tears.
Give yourself sweetly to images rapturous-
Sleep, pretty lady, a couple of years.

Sleep, pretty lady, the world awaits day with you;
Girlish and golden, the slender young moon.
Grant the fond darkness its mystical way with you;
Morning returns to us ever too soon.
Roses unfold, in their loveliness, all for you;
Blossom the lilies for hope of your glance.
When you're awake, all the men go and fall for you-
Sleep, pretty lady, and give me a chance.

Songs Eternity

by John Clare
 What is song's eternity?
Come and see.
Can it noise and bustle be?
Come and see.
Praises sung or praises said
Can it be?
Wait awhile and these are dead— 
Sigh, sigh;
Be they high or lowly bred
They die.

What is song's eternity?
Come and see.
Melodies of earth and sky,
Here they be.
Song once sung to Adam's ears
Can it be?
Ballads of six thousand years
Thrive, thrive;
Songs awaken with the spheres
Alive.

Mighty songs that miss decay,
What are they?
Crowds and cities pass away
Like a day.
Books are out and books are read;
What are they?
Years will lay them with the dead— 
Sigh, sigh;
Trifles unto nothing wed,
They die.

Dreamers, mark the honey bee;
Mark the tree
Where the blue cap "tootle tee"
Sings a glee
Sung to Adam and to Eve— 
Here they be.
When floods covered every bough,
Noah's ark
Heard that ballad singing now;
Hark, hark,

"Tootle tootle tootle tee"— 
Can it be
Pride and fame must shadows be?
Come and see— 
Every season owns her own;
Bird and bee
Sing creation's music on;
Nature's glee
Is in every mood and tone
Eternity.
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