Famous Counsel Poems by Famous Poets

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

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I pray thee to my counsel lend thine ear,

by Omar Khayyam
I pray thee to my counsel lend thine ear,
Cast off this false hypocrisy's veneer;
This life a moment is, the next all time,
Sell not eternity for earthly gear!...Read more of this...

The Marble Faun

by Victor Hugo
 ("Il semblait grelotter.") 
 
 {XXXVI., December, 1837.} 


 He seemed to shiver, for the wind was keen. 
 'Twas a poor statue underneath a mass 
 Of leafless branches, with a blackened back 
 And a green foot—an isolated Faun 
 In old deserted park, who, bending forward, 
 Half-merged himself in the entangled boughs, 
 Half in...Read more of this...

Come with slow steps

by Emile Verhaeren
Come with slow steps and sit near the gardenbed, whose flowers of tranquil light are shut by evening; let the great night filter through you: we are too happy for our prayer to be disturbed by its sea of dread.
Above, the pure crystal of the stars is lit up; behold the firmament clearer and more translucent than a blue pond...Read more of this...

Frederick Douglass

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
 A hush is over all the teeming lists,
And there is pause, a breath-space in the strife;
A spirit brave has passed beyond the mists
And vapors that obscure the sun of life.
And Ethiopia, with bosom torn,
Laments the passing of her noblest born.

She weeps for him a mother's burning tears--
She loved him with a mother's deepest love
He was her champion thro' direful...Read more of this...

Preaching Vs Practice

by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
 It is easy to sit in the sunshine
And talk to the man in the shade; 
It is easy to float in a well-trimmed boat, 
And point out the places to wade.

But once we pass into the shadows, 
We murmur and fret and frown, 
And, our length from the bank, we shout for a plank, 
Or throw up our hands...Read more of this...

Place for a Third

by Robert Frost
 Nothing to say to all those marriages!
She had made three herself to three of his.
The score was even for them, three to three.
But come to die she found she cared so much:
She thought of children in a burial row;
Three children in a burial row were sad.
One man's three women in a burial row
Somehow made her impatient with the man.
And...Read more of this...

Good Precepts Or Counsel

by Robert Herrick
 In all thy need, be thou possest
Still with a well prepared breast;
Nor let the shackles make thee sad;
Thou canst but have what others had.
And this for comfort thou must know,
Times that are ill won't still be so:
Clouds will not ever pour down rain;
A sullen day will clear again.
First, peals of thunder we must hear;
When lutes and harps shall stroke...Read more of this...

Sonnet XVII

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET XVII. Nè mai pietosa madre al caro figlio. HER COUNSEL ALONE AFFORDS HIM RELIEF.  Ne'er did fond mother to her darling son,Or zealous spouse to her belovèd mate,Sage counsel give, in perilous estate,With such kind caution, in such tender tone,As gives that fair one, who, oft looking downOn my...Read more of this...

Hiawathas Friends

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
 Two good friends had Hiawatha, 
Singled out from all the others, 
Bound to him in closest union, 
And to whom he gave the right hand 
Of his heart, in joy and sorrow; 
Chibiabos, the musician,
And the very strong man, Kwasind.
Straight between them ran the pathway, 
Never grew the grass upon it; 
Singing birds, that utter falsehoods, 
Story-tellers, mischief-makers, 
Found...Read more of this...

A Last Counsel

by George William Russell
 COULD you not in silence borrow
Strength to go from us ungrieving?
All these hours of loving sorrow
Only make more bitter leaving.


You will go forth lonely, thinking
Of the pain you leave behind you;
From the golden sunlight shrinking
For the earthly tears will blind you.


Better, ah, if now we parted
For the little while remaining;
You would seek when broken-hearted
For the mighty heart’s sustaining.


You would...Read more of this...

Remember

by Christina Rossetti
 Remember me when I am gone away,
 Gone far away into the silent land;
 When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
 You tell me of our future that you plann'd:
 Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then...Read more of this...

The Good Man

by Gwendolyn Brooks
 The good man.
He is still enhancer, renouncer.
In the time of detachment,
in the time of the vivid heather and affectionate evil,
in the time of oral
grave grave legalities of hate - all real
walks our prime registered reproach and seal.
Our successful moral.
The good man.

Watches our bogus roses, our rank wreath, our
love's unreliable cement, the gray
jubilees of our demondom.
Coherent
Counsel! Good man.
Require of us...Read more of this...

Song. Good Counsel to a Young Maid

by Thomas Carew
 GAZE not on thy beauty's pride, 
Tender maid, in the false tide 
That from lovers' eyes doth slide. 
Let thy faithful crystal show 
How thy colours come and go : 
Beauty takes a foil from woe. 

Love, that in those smooth streams lies 
Under pity's fair disguise, 
Will thy melting heart surprise. 

Nets of passion's finest thread, 
Snaring poems,...Read more of this...

Canzone VI

by Francesco Petrarch
CANZONE VI. Spirto gentil che quelle membra reggi. TO RIENZI, BESEECHING HIM TO RESTORE TO ROME HER ANCIENT LIBERTY.  Spirit heroic! who with fire divineKindlest those limbs, awhile which pilgrim holdOn earth a Chieftain, gracious, wise, and bold;Since, rightly, now the rod of state is thineRome and her wandering children to...Read more of this...

Lancelot

by Edwin Arlington Robinson
 Gawaine, aware again of Lancelot 
In the King’s garden, coughed and followed him; 
Whereat he turned and stood with folded arms 
And weary-waiting eyes, cold and half-closed— 
Hard eyes, where doubts at war with memories
Fanned a sad wrath. “Why frown upon a friend? 
Few live that have too many,” Gawaine said, 
And wished unsaid, so thinly came the light...Read more of this...

One And Twenty

by Samuel Johnson
 LONG-EXPECTED one and twenty 
Ling'ring year at last has flown, 
Pomp and pleasure, pride and plenty 
Great Sir John, are all your own. 

Loosen'd from the minor's tether, 
Free to mortgage or to sell, 
Wild as wind, and light as feather 
Bid the slaves of thrift farewell. 

Call the Bettys, Kates, and Jenneys 
Ev'ry name that laughs at care,...Read more of this...

Tithonus

by Alan Seeger
 So when the verdure of his life was shed, 
With all the grace of ripened manlihead, 
And on his locks, but now so lovable, 
Old age like desolating winter fell, 
Leaving them white and flowerless and forlorn: 
Then from his bed the Goddess of the Morn 
Softly withheld, yet cherished him no less 
With pious works of pitying tenderness;...Read more of this...

Extemporary Counsel given to a Young Gallant in a Frolick

by Anne Killigrew
 AS you are Young, if you'l be also Wise, 
Danger with Honour court, Quarrels despise; 
Believe you then are truly Brave and Bold, 
To Beauty when no Slave, and less to Gold; 
When Vertue you dare own, not think it odd, 
Or ungenteel to say, I fear a God....Read more of this...

Mesopotamia

by Rudyard Kipling
  1917

They shall not return to us, the resolute, the young,
 The eager and whole-hearted whom we gave:
But the men who left them thriftily to die in their own dung,
 Shall they come with years and honour to the grave?

They shall not return to us; the strong men coldly slain
 In sight of help denied from day to day:
But...Read more of this...

The Robe of Christ

by Joyce Kilmer
 (For Cecil Chesterton)

At the foot of the Cross on Calvary
Three soldiers sat and diced,
And one of them was the Devil
And he won the Robe of Christ.
When the Devil comes in his proper form
To the chamber where I dwell,
I know him and make the Sign of the Cross
Which drives him back to Hell.
And when he comes like a friendly man
And...Read more of this...

The Ballad of the Kings Jest

by Rudyard Kipling
 When spring-time flushes the desert grass,
Our kafilas wind through the Khyber Pass.
Lean are the camels but fat the frails,
Light are the purses but heavy the bales,
As the snowbound trade of the North comes down
To the market-square of Peshawur town.

In a turquoise twilight, crisp and chill,
A kafila camped at the foot of the hill.
Then blue smoke-haze of the cooking rose,
And...Read more of this...

What Counsel Has the Hooded Moon

by James Joyce
 What counsel has the hooded moon 
Put in thy heart, my shyly sweet, 
Of Love in ancient plenilune, 
Glory and stars beneath his feet -- - 
A sage that is but kith and kin 
With the comedian Capuchin? 

Believe me rather that am wise 
In disregard of the divine, 
A glory kindles in those eyes 
Trembles to starlight. Mine,...Read more of this...

The Old Issue

by Rudyard Kipling
 Here is nothing new nor aught unproven," say the Trumpets,
 "Many feet have worn it and the road is old indeed.
"It is the King--the King we schooled aforetime! "
 (Trumpets in the marshes-in the eyot at Runnymede!)

"Here is neither haste, nor hate, nor anger," peal the Trumpets,
 "Pardon for his penitence or pity for his fall.
"It is the King!"--inexorable...Read more of this...

Sonnet IX

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET IX. S' Amor novo consiglio non n' apporta. HE DESCRIBES HIS SAD STATE.  If Love to give new counsel still delay,My life must change to other scenes than these;My troubled spirit grief and terror freeze,Desire augments while all my hopes decay.Thus ever grows my life, by night and day,Despondent,...Read more of this...

Last Hill In A Vista

by Louise Bogan
 Come, let us tell the weeds in ditches
How we are poor, who once had riches,
And lie out in the sparse and sodden
Pastures that the cows have trodden,
The while an autumn night seals down
The comforts of the wooden town.

Come, let us counsel some cold stranger
How we sought safety, but loved danger.
So, with stiff walls about us, we
Chose this more fragile...Read more of this...

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