Famous Cycles Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Cycles poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous cycles poems. These examples illustrate what a famous cycles poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
See also:
by
Anne Sexton
A woman who writes feels too much,
those trances and portents!
As if cycles and children and islands
weren't enough; as if mourners and gossips
and vegetables were never enough.
She thinks she can warn the stars.
A writer is essentially a spy.
Dear love, I am that girl.
A man who writes knows too much,
such spells and fetiches!
As if erections and congresses and products
weren't enough; as...Read more of this...
by
George William Russell
FAINT grew the yellow buds of light
Far flickering beyond the snows,
As leaning o’er the shadowy white
Morn glimmered like a pale primrose.
Within an Indian vale below
A child said “OM” with tender heart,
Watching with loving eyes the glow
In dayshine fade and night depart.
The word which Brahma at his dawn
Outbreathes and endeth at his night,
Whose tide of sound so rolling on
Gives birth...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
TO the garden, the world, anew ascending,
Potent mates, daughters, sons, preluding,
The love, the life of their bodies, meaning and being,
Curious, here behold my resurrection, after slumber;
The revolving cycles, in their wide sweep, have brought me again,
Amorous, mature—all beautiful to me—all wondrous;
My limbs, and the quivering fire that ever plays through them, for reasons, most...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Just lost, when I was saved!
Just felt the world go by!
Just girt me for the onset with Eternity,
When breath blew back,
And on the other side
I heard recede the disappointed tide!
Therefore, as One returned, I feel
Odd secrets of the line to tell!
Some Sailor, skirting foreign shores --
Some pale Reporter, from the awful doors
Before the Seal!
Next time, to stay!
Next time, the...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
THERE was a child went forth every day;
And the first object he look’d upon, that object he became;
And that object became part of him for the day, or a certain part of the day, or for many
years, or
stretching cycles of years.
The early lilacs became part of this child,
And grass, and white and red...Read more of this...
by
Richard Crashaw
LET us leave our island woods grown dim and blue;
O’er the waters creeping the pearl dust of the eve
Hides the silver of the long wave rippling through:
The chill for the warm room let us leave.
Turn the lamp down low and draw the curtain wide,
So the greyness of the starlight bathes the room;
Let us see the giant face of...Read more of this...
by
George William Russell
HOW came this pigmy rabble spun,
After the gods and kings of old,
Upon a tapestry begun
With threads of silver and of gold?
In heaven began the heroic tale
What meaner destinies prevail!
They wove about the antique brow
A circlet of the heavenly air.
To whom is due such reverence now,
The thought “What deity is there”?
We choose the chieftains of our race
From hucksters in the...Read more of this...
by
Robert Browning
I.
I dream of a red-rose tree.
And which of its roses three
Is the dearest rose to me?
II.
Round and round, like a dance of snow
In a dazzling drift, as its guardians, go
Floating the women faded for ages,
Sculptured in stone, on the poet's pages.
Then follow women fresh and gay,
Living and loving and loved to-day.
Last, in the rear, flee the multitude of maidens,
Beauties...Read more of this...
by
Francis Thompson
What is the song the stars sing?
(And a million songs are as song of one)
This is the song the stars sing:
(Sweeter song's none)
One to set, and many to sing,
(And a million songs are as song of one)
One to stand, and many to cling,
The many things, and the one Thing,
The one that runs not, the many that run.
The ever new...Read more of this...
by
Hafez
Since neither man’s proud pomp & kingly name
Endureth, nor his monumental throne,
Nor honour’d shrine, nor pinnacle of fame;
Since borne in agony to life he came
& in pain too he passeth, one by one
His joys desert him, friendless & alone,
Yea since all lov’d delights their cycles range,
All to their parent elements return,
Air to air, dust to dust,—when Thy Life’s breath,
The fire...Read more of this...
by
Jorie Graham
Over a dock railing, I watch the minnows, thousands, swirl
themselves, each a minuscule muscle, but also, without the
way to create current, making of their unison (turning, re-
infolding,
entering and exiting their own unison in unison) making of themselves a
visual current, one that cannot freight or sway by
minutest fractions the water's downdrafts and upswirls, the
dockside cycles of finally-arriving boat-wakes, there...Read more of this...
by
Nikki Giovanni
Life Cyclesshe realized she wasn't one of life's winners when she wasn't sure life to her was some dark dirty secret that like some unwanted child too late for an abortion was to be borne alone she had so many private habits she would masturbate sometimes she...Read more of this...
by
Bernadette Geyer
Train. Distant Train. Praise the glorious distance of Train.
Dogs bark, reply to the mournful echo of Train's whistle. Train looks back, keeps moving. Train carries its boxcars of secrets further and further away (and even further still) from those who profess to love Train, but who do not run after him. Eyes brimmed with glassy reflections of Train.
To watch...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Papa above!
Regard a Mouse
O'erpowered by the Cat!
Reserve within thy kingdom
A "Mansion" for the Rat!
Snug in seraphic Cupboards
To nibble all the day
While unsuspecting Cycles
Wheel solemnly away!...Read more of this...
by
Gary Snyder
Lew Welch just turned up one day,
live as you and me. "Damn, Lew" I said,
"you didn't shoot yourself after all."
"Yes I did" he said,
and even then I felt the tingling down my back.
"Yes you did, too" I said—"I can feel it now."
"Yeah" he said,
"There's a basic fear between your world and
mine. I don't know why.
What I came to say...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
AS a strong bird on pinions free,
Joyous, the amplest spaces heavenward cleaving,
Such be the thought I’d think to-day of thee, America,
Such be the recitative I’d bring to-day for thee.
The conceits of the poets of other lands I bring thee not,
Nor the compliments that have served their turn so long,
Nor rhyme—nor the classics—nor perfume of...Read more of this...
by
Sidney Lanier
How tall among her sisters, and how fair, --
How grave beyond her youth, yet debonair
As dawn, 'mid wrinkled Matres of old lands
Our youngest Alma Mater modest stands!
In four brief cycles round the punctual sun
Has she, old Learning's latest daughter, won
This grace, this stature, and this fruitful fame.
Howbeit she was born
Unnoised as any stealing summer morn.
From far the sages saw,...Read more of this...
by
Oscar Wilde
I.
The corn has turned from grey to red,
Since first my spirit wandered forth
From the drear cities of the north,
And to Italia's mountains fled.
And here I set my face towards home,
For all my pilgrimage is done,
Although, methinks, yon blood-red sun
Marshals the way to Holy Rome.
O Blessed Lady, who dost hold
Upon the seven hills thy reign!
O Mother without blot or stain,
Crowned...Read more of this...
by
Conrad Aiken
He, in the room above, grown old and tired,
She, in the room below—his floor her ceiling—
Pursue their separate dreams. He turns his light,
And throws himself on the bed, face down, in laughter. . . .
She, by the window, smiles at a starlight night,
His watch—the same he has heard these cycles of ages—
Wearily chimes at seconds beneath his pillow.
The clock,...Read more of this...
Dont forget to view our wonderful member Cycles poems.