Famous Change Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Change poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous change poems. These examples illustrate what a famous change poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
George Meredith
But where began the change; and what's my crime?
The wretch condemned, who has not been arraigned,
Chafes at his sentence. Shall I, unsustained,
Drag on Love's nerveless body thro' all time?
I must have slept, since now I wake. Prepare,
You lovers, to know Love a thing of moods:
Not like hard life, of laws. In Love's deep...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
No Notice gave She, but a Change --
No Message, but a Sigh --
For Whom, the Time did not suffice
That She should specify.
She was not warm, though Summer shone
Nor scrupulous of cold
Though Rime by Rime, the steady Frost
Upon Her Bosom piled --
Of shrinking ways -- she did not fright
Though all the Village looked --
But held Her gravity aloft --
And met...Read more of this...
by
Sara Teasdale
It will not change now
After so many years;
Life has not broken it
With parting or tears;
Death will not alter it,
It will live on
In all my songs for you
When I am gone....Read more of this...
by
Algernon Charles Swinburne
But now life's face beholden
Seemed bright as heaven's bare brow
With hope of gifts withholden
But now.
From time's full-flowering bough
Each bud spake bloom to embolden
Love's heart, and seal his vow.
Joy's eyes grew deep with olden
Dreams, born he wist not how;
Thought's meanest garb was golden;
But now!...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Me, change! Me, alter!
Then I will, when on the Everlasting Hill
A Smaller Purple grows --
At sunset, or a lesser glow
Flickers upon Cordillera --
At Day's superior close!...Read more of this...
by
John Wilmot
I cannot change, as others do,
Though you unjustly scorn;
Since that poor swain that sighs for you,
For you alone was born.
No, Phyllis, no, your heart to move
A surer way I'll try:
And to revenge my slighted love,
Will still love on, will still love on, and die.
When, killed with grief, Amintas lies
And you to mind shall call,
The sighs that now unpitied rise,
The...Read more of this...
by
William Cowper
How bless'd Thy creature is, O God,
When with a single eye,
He views the lustre of Thy Word,
The dayspring from on high!
Through all the storms that veil the skies
And frown on earthly things,
The Sun of Righteousness he eyes,
With healing on His wings.
Struck by that light, the human heart,
A barren soil no more,
Sends the sweet smell of grace abroad,
Where serpents lurk'd...Read more of this...
by
John Donne
Although thy hand and faith, and good works too,
Have sealed thy love which nothing should undo,
Yea though thou fall back, that apostasy
Confirm thy love; yet much, much I fear thee.
Women are like the Arts, forced unto to none,
Open to all searchers, unprized if unknown.
If I have caught a bird, and let him fly,
Another fowler using these means, as I,
May...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
My country need not change her gown,
Her triple suit as sweet
As when 'twas cut at Lexington,
And first pronounced "a fit."
Great Britain disapproves, "the stars";
Disparagement discreet, --
There's something in their attitude
That taunts her bayonet....Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
Love used to carry a bow, you know,
But now he carries a taper;
It is either a length of wax aglow,
Or a twist of lighted paper.
I pondered a little about the scamp,
And then I decided to follow
His wandering journey to field and camp,
Up hill, down dale or hollow.
I dogged the rollicking, gay, young blade
In every species of weather;
Till, leading me straight...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
I saw a Priest in beetle black
Come to our golden beach,
And I was taken sore aback
Lest he should choose to preach
And chide me for my only wear,
A "Gee" string and a brassière.
And then I saw him shyly doff
And fold his grim soutane,
And one by one his clothes take off,
Until like any man
He stood in bathing trunks, a sight
To thrill...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
No, Time, thou shalt not boast that I do change.
Thy pyramids built up with newer might
To me are nothing novel, nothing strange;
They are but dressings of a former sight.
Our dates are brief, and therefore we admire
What thou dost foist upon us that is old,
And rather make them born to our desire
Than think that we before have heard them told.
Thy...Read more of this...
by
Kathleen Raine
Change
Said the sun to the moon,
You cannot stay.
Change
Says the moon to the waters,
All is flowing.
Change
Says the fields to the grass,
Seed-time and harvest,
Chaff and grain.
You must change said,
Said the worm to the bud,
Though not to a rose,
Petals fade
That wings may rise
Borne on the wind.
You...Read more of this...
by
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Changed? Yes, I will confess it – I have changed.
I do not love you in the old fond way.
I am your friend still – time has not estranged
One kindly feeling of that vanished day.
But the bright glamour which made life a dream,
The rapture of that time, its sweet content,
Like visions of a sleeper’s brain they seem –
And...Read more of this...
by
Barry Tebb
As milled silver I was welcome
In every gutter, tinkling over cobbles
I rang the truth loudly on solid-oak counters
And tills tolled for me clear as bells.
Boldly I gave myself to many,
Slipped from moist palm to pocket,
Pirouetting without points, jingling
With dull coppers and important keys.
First I was lost in a hundred
Children’s essays, found myself
With pearls in secret pockets,
Counterfeit and shiny.
Then I...Read more of this...
by
Anne Kingsmill Finch
POOR River, now thou'rt almost dry,
What Nymph, or Swain, will near thee lie?
Since brought, alas! to sad Decay,
What Flocks, or Herds, will near thee stay?
The Swans, that sought thee in thy Pride,
Now on new Streams forgetful ride:
And Fish, that in thy Bosom lay,
Chuse in more prosp'rous Floods to play.
All leave thee,...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Facts will not change to humour man's caprice,
So vaunt not human powers, but hold your peace;
Here must we stay, weighed down with grief for this,
That we were born so late, so soon decease....Read more of this...
by
Robert Herrick
These fresh beauties, we can prove,
Once were virgins, sick of love,
Turn'd to flowers: still in some,
Colours go and colours come....Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
The change has come, and Helen sleeps—
Not sleeps; but wakes to greater deeps
Of wisdom, glory, truth, and light,
Than ever blessed her seeking sight,
In this low, long, lethargic night,
Worn out with strife
Which men call life.
The change has come, and who would say
"I would it were not come to-day"?
What were the respite till to-morrow?
Postponement of a certain sorrow,
From which each passing day...Read more of this...
by
John Masefield
"Goneys an' gullies an' all o' the birds o' the sea
They ain't no birds, not really", said Billy the Dane.
"Not mollies, nor gullies, nor goneys at all", said he,
"But simply the sperrits of mariners livin' again.
"Them birds goin' fishin' is nothin' but the souls o' the drowned,
Souls o' the drowned, an' the kicked as are never no more
An' that...Read more of this...
by
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Five months ago the stream did flow,
The lilies bloomed within the sedge,
And we were lingering to and fro,
Where none will track thee in this snow,
Along the stream, beside the hedge.
Ah, Sweet, be free to love and go!
For if I do not hear thy foot,
The frozen river is as mute,
The flowers have dried down to the root:
And why, since these...Read more of this...
by
Edwin Arlington Robinson
Since Persia fell at Marathon,
The yellow years have gathered fast:
Long centuries have come and gone.
And yet (they say) the place will don
A phantom fury of the past,
Since Persia fell at Marathon;
And as of old, when Helicon
Trembled and swayed with rapture vast
(Long centuries have come and gone),
This ancient plain, when night comes on,
Shakes to...Read more of this...
by
Andrew Barton Paterson
Now the new chum loaded his three-nought-three,
It's a small-bore gun, but his hopes were big.
"I am fed to the teeth with old ewe," said he,
"And I might be able to shoot a pig."
And he trusted more to his nose than ear
To give him warning when pigs were near.
Out of his lair in the...Read more of this...
by
Marilyn L Taylor
A reflection on my students
They are so beautiful, and so very young
they seem almost to glitter with perfection,
these creatures that I briefly move among.
I never get to stay with them for long,
but even so, I view them with affection:
they are so beautiful, and so very young.
Poised or clumsy, placid or high-strung,
they’re expert in the art of introspection,
these creatures...Read more of this...
by
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
COULD this early bliss but rest
Constant for one single hour!
But e'en now the humid West
Scatters many a vernal shower.
Should the verdure give me joy?
'Tis to it I owe the shade;
Soon will storms its bloom destroy,
Soon will Autumn bid it fade.
Eagerly thy portion seize,
If thou wouldst possess the fruit!
Fast begin to ripen these,
And the rest already shoot.
With each heavy storm...Read more of this...
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