Get Your Premium Membership

Famous Circuit Poems by Famous Poets

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

See also:

by Yeats, William Butler
...hat transfigured me
And left me but a lout,
Maundering here, and maundering there,
Emptier of thought
Than the heavenly circuit of its stars
When the moon sails out....Read more of this...



by Dickinson, Emily
...a sound -- at first --
Nor ever now -- so sweet --

As plashing in the Pools --
When Memory was a Boy --
But a Demurer Circuit --
A Geometric Joy --

The Posture of the Key
That interrupt the Day
To Our Endeavor -- Not so real
The Check of Liberty --

As this Phantasm Steel --
Whose features -- Day and Night --
Are present to us -- as Our Own --
And as escapeless -- quite --

The narrow Round -- the Stint --
The slow exchange of Hope --
For something passiver -- Content
Too ...Read more of this...

by Hugo, Victor
...e as the swarthy boatman at his side 
 Chants Tasso's lays to Virgil's pleased shade, 
 Ever he sees, throughout that circuit wide, 
 From shaded nook or sunny lawn espied, 
 From rocky headland viewed, or flow'ry shore, 
 From sea, and spreading mead alike descried, 
 The Giant Mount, tow'ring all objects o'er, 
 And black'ning with its breath th' horizon evermore! 
 
 Fraser's Magazine 


 




...Read more of this...

by Robinson, Edwin Arlington
...es 
The sun. Behold it. We go round and round, 
And wisdom comes to us with every whirl
We count throughout the circuit. We may say 
The child is born, the boy becomes a man, 
The man does this and that, and the man goes,— 
But having said it we have not said much, 
Not very much. Do I fancy, or you think,
That it will be the end of anything 
When I am gone? There was a soldier once 
Who fought one fight and in that fight fell dead. 
Sad friends went after...Read more of this...

by Dickinson, Emily
...miserable a sound—at first—
Nor ever now—so sweet—

As plashing in the Pools—
When Memory was a Boy—
But a Demurer Circuit—
A Geometric Joy—

The Posture of the Key
That interrupt the Day
To Our Endeavor—Not so real
The Cheek of Liberty—

As this Phantasm Steel—
Whose features—Day and Night—
Are present to us—as Our Own—
And as escapeless—quite—

The narrow Round—the Stint—
The slow exchange of Hope—
For something passiver—Content
Too steep for looking up...Read more of this...



by Schiller, Friedrich von
...tis in that narrow place,
Deep the slumbers of the buried one!
Brother! Ah, in ever-slackening race
All thy hopes their circuit cease to run!
Sunbeams oft thy native hill still lave,
But their glow thou never more canst feel;
O'er its flowers the zephyr's pinions wave,
O'er thine ear its murmur ne'er can steal;
Love will never tinge thine eye with gold,
Never wilt thou embrace thy blooming bride,
Not e'en though our tears in torrents rolled--
Death must now thine eye forever ...Read more of this...

by Carman, Bliss
...
And its unique appointed orbit trace. 

There is no near nor far, 
Where glorious Algebar 
Swings round his mighty circuit through the night, 
Yet where without a sound 
The winged seed comes to ground, 
And the red leaf seems hardly to alight. 

One force, one lore, one need 
For satellite and seed, 
In the serene benignity for all. 
Letting her time-glass run 
With star-dust, sun by sun, 
In Nature’s thought there is no great nor small. 

There is no far no...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...r waste, resembling air, 
Weighs his spread wings, at leisure to behold 
Far off th' empyreal Heaven, extended wide 
In circuit, undetermined square or round, 
With opal towers and battlements adorned 
Of living sapphire, once his native seat; 
And, fast by, hanging in a golden chain, 
This pendent World, in bigness as a star 
Of smallest magnitude close by the moon. 
Thither, full fraught with mischievous revenge, 
Accursed, and in a cursed hour, he hies....Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...ed to stars 
Numberless, as thou seest, and how they move; 
Each had his place appointed, each his course; 
The rest in circuit walls this universe. 
Look downward on that globe, whose hither side 
With light from hence, though but reflected, shines; 
That place is Earth, the seat of Man; that light 
His day, which else, as the other hemisphere, 
Night would invade; but there the neighbouring moon 
So call that opposite fair star) her aid 
Timely interposes, and her month...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...hly bounds 
On purpose, hard thou knowest it to exclude 
Spiritual substance with corporeal bar. 
But if within the circuit of these walks, 
In whatsoever shape he lurk, of whom 
Thou tellest, by morrow dawning I shall know. 
So promised he; and Uriel to his charge 
Returned on that bright beam, whose point now raised 
Bore him slope downward to the sun now fallen 
Beneath the Azores; whether the prime orb, 
Incredible how swift, had thither rolled 
Diurnal, or this l...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...ed mail, 
Sky-tinctured grain. Like Maia's son he stood, 
And shook his plumes, that heavenly fragrance filled 
The circuit wide. Straight knew him all the bands 
Of Angels under watch; and to his state, 
And to his message high, in honour rise; 
For on some message high they guessed him bound. 
Their glittering tents he passed, and now is come 
Into the blissful field, through groves of myrrh, 
And flowering odours, cassia, nard, and balm; 
A wilderness of sweets...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...waters from the waters; and God made 
The firmament, expanse of liquid, pure, 
Transparent, elemental air, diffused 
In circuit to the uttermost convex 
Of this great round; partition firm and sure, 
The waters underneath from those above 
Dividing: for as earth, so he the world 
Built on circumfluous waters calm, in wide 
Crystalline ocean, and the loud misrule 
Of Chaos far removed; lest fierce extremes 
Contiguous might distemper the whole frame: 
And Heaven he named the F...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...
Yet not to Earth are those bright luminaries 
Officious; but to thee, Earth's habitant. 
And for the Heaven's wide circuit, let it speak 
The Maker's high magnificence, who built 
So spacious, and his line stretched out so far; 
That Man may know he dwells not in his own; 
An edifice too large for him to fill, 
Lodged in a small partition; and the rest 
Ordained for uses to his Lord best known. 
The swiftness of those circles attribute, 
Though numberless, to his Omn...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...o her faith sincere, 
Thus her reply with accent sweet renewed. 
If this be our condition, thus to dwell 
In narrow circuit straitened by a foe, 
Subtle or violent, we not endued 
Single with like defence, wherever met; 
How are we happy, still in fear of harm? 
But harm precedes not sin: only our foe, 
Tempting, affronts us with his foul esteem 
Of our integrity: his foul esteem 
Sticks no dishonour on our front, but turns 
Foul on himself; then wherefore shunned or fear...Read more of this...

by Whittier, John Greenleaf
...reat logs, crumbling low, 
Sent out a dull and duller glow, 
The bull's-eye watch that hung in view, 
Ticking its weary circuit through, 
Pointed with mutely warning sign 
Its black hand to the hour of nine. 
That sign the pleasant circle. broke: 
My uncle ceased his pipe to smoke, 
Knocked from its bowl the refuse gray 
And laid it tenderly away; 
Then roused himself to safely cover 
The dull red brands with ashes over, 
And while, with care, our mother laid 
The wor...Read more of this...

by Chaucer, Geoffrey
...e listes royally,
That such a noble theatre as it was,
I dare well say, in all this world there n'as*. *was not
The circuit a mile was about,
Walled of stone, and ditched all without.
*Round was the shape, in manner of compass,
Full of degrees, the height of sixty pas* *see note *
That when a man was set on one degree
He letted* not his fellow for to see. *hindered
Eastward there stood a gate of marble white,
Westward right such another opposite.
And, shor...Read more of this...

by Scott, Sir Walter
...nows how dear,
     How excellent!—but that is by,
     And now my business is—to die.—
     Ye towers! within whose circuit dread
     A Douglas by his sovereign bled;
     And thou, O sad and fatal mound!
     That oft hast heard the death-axe sound.
     As on the noblest of the land
     Fell the stern headsmen's bloody hand,—
     The dungeon, block, and nameless tomb
     Prepare—for Douglas seeks his doom!
     But hark! what blithe and jolly peal
     Make...Read more of this...

by Walcott, Derek
...tightened their fists in the name of thrift, 
the porcelain lamps of ripe cocoa, the magnolia's jet 
dimmed on the one circuit with the ginger lilies 
and left a lonely bulb on the verandah, 
and, had his mandate extended to that ceiling 
of star-apple candelabra, he would have ordered 
the sky to sleep, saying, I'm tired, 
save the starlight for victories, we can't afford it, 
leave the moon on for one more hour,and that's it. 
But though his power, the given mandate, e...Read more of this...

by Schiller, Friedrich von
...freedom,
Thou and thy pastures with joy share in the limited law;
Bounded thy wishes all are by the harvest's peaceable circuit,
And thy lifetime is spent e'en as the task of the day!

But what suddenly hides the beauteous view? A strange spirit
Over the still-stranger plain spreads itself quickly afar--
Coyly separates now, what scarce had lovingly mingled,
And 'tis the like that alone joins itself on to the like.
Orders I see depicted; the haughty tribes of the poplars
...Read more of this...

by Trumbull, John
...ingling colours sweetly fade,
And justly temper light and shade.


He look'd; the swelling Cloud on high
With wider circuit spread the sky,
Stretch'd to the sun an ampler train,
And pour'd new glories on the main.
As quick, effacing every ground,
His pencil swept the canvas round,
And o'er its field, with magic art,
Call'd forth new forms in every part.


But now the sun, with rising ray,
Advanced with speed his early way;
Each colour takes a differing die,
The or...Read more of this...

Dont forget to view our wonderful member Circuit poems.


Book: Reflection on the Important Things