Famous Betray Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Sonnets 12: Cherish You Then The Hope I Shall Forget

by Edna St. Vincent Millay
 Cherish you then the hope I shall forget
At length, my lord, Pieria?—put away
For your so passing sake, this mouth of clay
These mortal bones against my body set,
For all the puny fever and frail sweat
Of human love,—renounce for these, I say,
The Singing Mountain's memory, and betray
The silent lyre that hangs upon me yet?
Ah, but indeed, some day shall you awake,
Rather,...Read more of this...

Prothalamion

by Delmore Schwartz
 "little soul, little flirting,
 little perverse one
 where are you off to now?
 little wan one, firm one
 little exposed one...
 and never make fun of me again."


Now I must betray myself.
The feast of bondage and unity is near,
And none engaged in that great piety
When each bows to the other, kneels, and takes
Hand in hand, glance and glance, care...Read more of this...

Sonnet 96: Some say thy fault is youth some wantonness

by William Shakespeare
 Some say thy fault is youth, some wantonness;
Some say thy grace is youth and gentle sport;
Both grace and faults are loved of more and less;
Thou mak'st faults graces that to thee resort.
As on the finger of a thronèd queen,
The basest jewel will be well esteemed.
So are those errors that in thee are seen
To truths translated, and for true things...Read more of this...

Sonnet 151: Love is too young to know what conscience is

by William Shakespeare
 Love is too young to know what conscience is;
Yet who knows not conscience is born of love?
Then, gentle cheater, urge not my amiss,
Lest guilty of my faults thy sweet self prove.
For thou betraying me, I do betray
My nobler part to my gross body's treason;
My soul doth tell my body that he may
Triumph in love; flesh stays no farther reason,
But,...Read more of this...

Picture-Writing

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
 In those days said Hiawatha,
"Lo! how all things fade and perish!
From the memory of the old men
Pass away the great traditions,
The achievements of the warriors,
The adventures of the hunters,
All the wisdom of the Medas,
All the craft of the Wabenos,
All the marvellous dreams and visions
Of the Jossakeeds, the Prophets!
"Great men die and are forgotten,
Wise men speak; their words of wisdom
Perish...Read more of this...

The Complaint Of Ceres

by Friedrich von Schiller
 Does pleasant spring return once more?
Does earth her happy youth regain?
Sweet suns green hills are shining o'er;
Soft brooklets burst their icy chain:
Upon the blue translucent river
Laughs down an all-unclouded day,
The winged west winds gently quiver,
The buds are bursting from the spray;
While birds are blithe on every tree;
The Oread from the mountain-shore
Sighs, "Lo! thy flowers come back to thee--
Thy child,...Read more of this...

Landscapes

by John Burnside
 Behind faces and gestures 
We remain mute 
And spoken words heavy 
With what we ignore or keep silent 
Betray us 

I dare not speak for mankind 
I know so little of myself 

But the Landscape 

I see as a reflection 
Is also a lie stealing into 
My words I speak without remorse 
Of this image of myself 
And mankind...Read more of this...

Affliction

by George Herbert
 When thou didst entice to thee my heart, 
I thought the service brave: 
So many joys I writ down for my part, 
Besides what I might have
Out of my stock of natural delights, 
Augmented with thy gracious benefits.

I looked on thy furniture so fine, 
And made it fine to me: 
Thy glorious household-stuff did me entwine, 
And 'tice me...Read more of this...

A Red Flower

by Claude McKay
 Your lips are like a southern lily red, 
Wet with the soft rain-kisses of the night, 
In which the brown bee buries deep its head, 
When still the dawn's a silver sea of light. 

Your lips betray the secret of your soul, 
The dark delicious essence that is you, 
A mystery of life, the flaming goal 
I seek through...Read more of this...

Initial Love

by Ralph Waldo Emerson
 Venus, when her son was lost,
Cried him up and down the coast,
In hamlets, palaces, and parks,
And told the truant by his marks,
Golden curls, and quiver, and bow;—
This befell long ago.
Time and tide are strangely changed,
Men and manners much deranged;
None will now find Cupid latent
By this foolish antique patent.
He came late along the waste,
Shod like a traveller for haste,
With malice...Read more of this...

Sonnet CL

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET CL. Se 'l dolce sguardo di costei m' ancide. HE IS CONTINUALLY IN FEAR OF DISPLEASING HER.  If thus the dear glance of my lady slay,On her sweet sprightly speech if dangers wait,If o'er me Love usurp a power so great,Oft as she speaks, or when her sun-smiles play;Alas! what...Read more of this...

Stanzas Written under an Oak in Windsor Forest

by Mary Darby Robinson
 "HERE POPE FIRST SUNG!" O, hallow'd Tree !
Such is the boast thy bark displays;
Thy branches, like thy Patron's lays,
Shall ever, ever, sacred be; 
Nor with'ring storm, nor woodman's stroke, 
Shall harm the POET'S favourite Oak. 

'Twas HERE, he woo'd his MUSE of fire,
While Inspiration's wond'rous art,
Sublimely stealing thro' his heart
Did Fancy's proudest themes inspire: 
'Twas HERE he wisely learnt...Read more of this...

The Victory of Patience

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 Armed of the gods! Divinest conqueror! 
What soundless hosts are thine! Nor pomp, nor state, 
Nor token, to betray where thou dost wait. 
All Nature stands, for thee, ambassador; 
Her forces all thy serfs, for peace or war. 
greatest and least alike, thou rul'st their fate,-- 
The avalanch chained until its century's date, 
The mulberry leaf made robe for...Read more of this...

Afternoon Poem

by Billy Jno Hope
 a lion at the door
swallowed the day
broken with spite
at the inevitable chorus of pop songs
sutured for soft light

i burdened siesta
with a thousand little earthquakes
i listened where you suffered vertigo

flowers have faded
bellies betray
caught the wistful eye
that curved beneath my eyelids

something slime
and panic strewn
we gather the remnants of democracy

silence herds mad laughter
cumulus scorn
haunted horizons running
running to weep...Read more of this...

Verses on Sir Joshua Reynolds Painted Window at New College Oxford

by Thomas Warton
 Ah, stay thy treacherous hand, forbear to trace
Those faultless forms of elegance and grace!
Ah, cease to spread the bright transparent mass,
With Titian's pencil, o'er the speaking glass!
Nor steal, by strokes of art with truth combin'd,
The fond illusions of my wayward mind!
For long, enamour'd of a barbarous age,
A faithless truant to the classic page;
Long have I lov'd to catch the...Read more of this...

The Meaning Of The Look

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
 I think that look of Christ might seem to say--
'Thou Peter ! art thou then a common stone
Which I at last must break my heart upon
For all God's charge to his high angels may
Guard my foot better ? Did I yesterday
Wash thy feet, my beloved, that they should run
Quick to deny me 'neath the morning sun ?
And do thy...Read more of this...

I Only Am Escaped Alone to Tell Thee

by Howard Nemerov
 I tell you that I see her still
At the dark entrance of the hall.
One gas lamp burning near her shoulder 
Shone also from her other side
Where hung the long inaccurate glass
Whose pictures were as troubled water.
An immense shadow had its hand
Between us on the floor, and seemed 
To hump the knuckles nervously, 
A giant crab readying to walk, 
Or...Read more of this...

Sonnet XCVI

by William Shakespeare
 Some say thy fault is youth, some wantonness;
Some say thy grace is youth and gentle sport;
Both grace and faults are loved of more and less;
Thou makest faults graces that to thee resort.
As on the finger of a throned queen
The basest jewel will be well esteem'd,
So are those errors that in thee are seen
To truths translated and for true things...Read more of this...

The Rape of the Lock: Canto 2

by Alexander Pope
 Not with more glories, in th' etherial plain, 
The sun first rises o'er the purpled main,
Than, issuing forth, the rival of his beams
Launch'd on the bosom of the silver Thames.
Fair nymphs, and well-dress'd youths around her shone,
But ev'ry eye was fix'd on her alone.
On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore,
Which Jews might kiss, and infidels adore.
Her lively...Read more of this...

392. Song—Poortith cauld and restless love

by Robert Burns
 O POORTITH cauld, and restless love,
 Ye wrack my peace between ye;
Yet poortith a’ I could forgive,
 An ’twere na for my Jeanie.


Chorus.—O why should Fate sic pleasure have,
 Life’s dearest bands untwining?
Or why sae sweet a flower as love
 Depend on Fortune’s shining?


The warld’s wealth, when I think on,
 It’s pride and a’ the lave o’t;
O fie on...Read more of this...

The Hound of Heaven

by Francis Thompson
 I fled Him down the nights and down the days
I fled Him down the arches of the years
I fled Him down the labyrinthine ways
Of my own mind, and in the midst of tears
I hid from him, and under running laughter.
Up vistaed hopes I sped and shot precipitated
Adown titanic glooms of chasme d hears
From those strong feet that followed, followed...Read more of this...

The Simple Truth

by Philip Levine
 I bought a dollar and a half's worth of small red potatoes,
took them home, boiled them in their jackets
and ate them for dinner with a little butter and salt.
Then I walked through the dried fields 
on the edge of town. In middle June the light
hung on in the dark furrows at my feet,
and in the mountain oaks overhead the...Read more of this...

White

by Charles Simic
 A New Version: 1980

 What is that little black thing I see there
 in the white?
 Walt Whitman


One

Out of poverty
To begin again: 

With the color of the bride
And that of blindness,

Touch what I can
Of the quick,

Speak and then wait,
As if this light

Will continue to linger
On the threshold.



All that is near,
I no longer give it a name.

Once a stone hard...Read more of this...

A Ramble in St. Jamess Park

by John Wilmot
 Much wine had passed, with grave discourse
Of who fucks who, and who does worse
(Such as you usually do hear
From those that diet at the Bear),
When I, who still take care to see
Drunkenness relieved by lechery,
Went out into St. James's Park
To cool my head and fire my heart.
But though St. James has th' honor on 't,
'Tis consecrate to prick and...Read more of this...

The Torture of Cuauhtemoc

by Alan Seeger
 Their strength had fed on this when Death's white arms 
Came sleeved in vapors and miasmal dew, 
Curling across the jungle's ferny floor, 
Becking each fevered brain. On bleak divides, 
Where Sleep grew niggardly for nipping cold 
That twinged blue lips into a mouthed curse, 
Not back to Seville and its sunny plains 
Winged their brief-biding dreams, but once...Read more of this...

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