Famous Covetous Poems by Famous Poets

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

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To My Book

by Ben Jonson
II. ? TO MY BOOK.      It will be look'd for, BOOK, when some but see Thy title, EPIGRAMS, and named of me, Thou shouldst be bold, licentious, full of gall, Wormwood, and sulphur, sharp, and tooth'd withal ; Become a petulent thing, hurl ink, and wit, As madmen stones ;  not caring whom they hit. Deceive their malice, who could...Read more of this...

On The Death Of The Right Honourable The Lord Viscount Bayning

by William Strode
 Though after Death, Thanks lessen into Praise,
And Worthies be not crown'd with gold, but bayes;
Shall we not thank? To praise Thee all agree;
We Debtors must out doe it, heartily.
Deserved Nobility of True Descent,
Though not so old in Thee grew Ancient:
We number not the Tree of Branched Birth,
But genealogie of Vertue, spreading forth
To many Births in value. Piety,
True Valour, Bounty,...Read more of this...

Threnody

by Ralph Waldo Emerson
 The south-wind brings
Life, sunshine, and desire,
And on every mount and meadow
Breathes aromatic fire,
But over the dead he has no power,
The lost, the lost he cannot restore,
And, looking over the hills, I mourn
The darling who shall not return.

I see my empty house,
I see my trees repair their boughs,
And he, —the wondrous child,
Whose silver warble wild
Outvalued every pulsing sound
Within the air's...Read more of this...

Sonnet CXXXIV

by William Shakespeare
 So, now I have confess'd that he is thine,
And I myself am mortgaged to thy will,
Myself I'll forfeit, so that other mine
Thou wilt restore, to be my comfort still:
But thou wilt not, nor he will not be free,
For thou art covetous and he is kind;
He learn'd but surety-like to write for me
Under that bond that him as fast doth...Read more of this...

The Trail Of Ninety-Eight

by Robert William Service
 Gold! We leapt from our benches. Gold! We sprang from our stools.
Gold! We wheeled in the furrow, fired with the faith of fools.
Fearless, unfound, unfitted, far from the night and the cold,
Heard we the clarion summons, followed the master-lure--Gold!

Men from the sands of the Sunland; men from the woods of the West;
Men from the farms and the cities, into...Read more of this...

The Noble Balm

by Ben Jonson
HIGH-SPIRITED friend  
I send nor balms nor cor'sives to your wound: 
Your fate hath found 
A gentler and more agile hand to tend 
The cure of that which is but corporal; 5 
And doubtful days which were named critical  
Have made their fairest flight 
And now are out of sight. 
Yet doth some wholesome physic for the mind...Read more of this...

Psalm 119 part 11

by Isaac Watts
 Breathing after holiness.

ver. 5,33 

O that the Lord would guide my ways
To keep his statutes still!
O that my God would grant me grace
To know and do his will!

ver. 29 

O send thy Spirit down to write
Thy law upon my heart!
Nor let my tongue indulge deceit,
Nor act the liar's part.

ver. 37,36 

From vanity turn off my eyes;
Let no corrupt design,
Nor...Read more of this...

Invern

by Ezra Pound
 Earth's winter cometh
And I being part of all
And sith the spirit of all moveth in me
I must needs bear earth's winter
Drawn cold and grey with hours
And joying in a momentary sun,
Lo I am withered with waiting till my spring cometh!
Or crouch covetous of warmth
O'er scant-logged ingle blaze,
Must take cramped joy in tomed Longinus
That, read I him first time
The woods...Read more of this...

Sonnet XXXIII: Whilst Yet Mine Eyes

by Michael Drayton
 To Imagination

Whilst yet mine Eyes do surfeit with delight, 
My woeful Heart, imprison'd in my breast, 
Wisheth to be transformed to my sight, 
That it, like these, by looking might be blest. 
But whilst my Eyes thus greedily do gaze, 
Finding their objects over-soon depart, 
These now the other's happiness do praise, 
Wishing themselves that they had been my...Read more of this...

The Golden Verses of Pythagoras

by Pythagoras
1. First worship the Immortal Gods, as they are established and ordained by the Law.
2. Reverence the Oath, and next the Heroes, full of goodness and light.
3. Honour likewise the Terrestrial Daemons by rendering them the worship lawfully due to them.
4. Honour likewise your parents, and those most nearly related to you.
5. Of all the rest of mankind, make him...Read more of this...

An Island

by Edwin Arlington Robinson
 Take it away, and swallow it yourself. 
Ha! Look you, there’s a rat. 
Last night there were a dozen on that shelf, 
And two of them were living in my hat. 
Look! Now he goes, but he’ll come back—
Ha? But he will, I say … 
Il reviendra-z-à Pâques, 
Ou à la Trinité …
Be very sure that he’ll return again;...Read more of this...

Sonnet CVI

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET CVI. L' avara Babilonia ha colmo 'l sacco. HE PREDICTS TO ROME THE ARRIVAL OF SOME GREAT PERSONAGE WHO WILL BRING HER BACK TO HER OLD VIRTUE.  Covetous Babylon of wrath divineBy its worst crimes has drain'd the full cup now,And for its future Gods to whom to bowNot Pow'r nor...Read more of this...

Plutonian Ode

by Allen Ginsberg
 I

What new element before us unborn in nature? Is there
 a new thing under the Sun?
At last inquisitive Whitman a modern epic, detonative,
 Scientific theme
First penned unmindful by Doctor Seaborg with poison-
 ous hand, named for Death's planet through the 
 sea beyond Uranus
whose chthonic ore fathers this magma-teared Lord of 
 Hades, Sire of avenging Furies, billionaire Hell-
...Read more of this...

Sonnet 134: So now I have confessed that he is thine

by William Shakespeare
 So, now I have confessed that he is thine,
And I my self am mortgaged to thy will,
Myself I'll forfeit, so that other mine
Thou wilt restore to be my comfort still.
But thou wilt not, nor he will not be free,
For thou art covetous, and he is kind,
He learned but surety-like to write for me
Under that bond that him as fist...Read more of this...

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