Famous Delightful Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Psalm 87

by Isaac Watts
 The church the birth-place of the saints.

God in his earthly temple lays
Foundations for his heav'nly praise:
He likes the tents of Jacob well,
But still in Zion loves to dwell.

His mercy visits every house
That pay their night and morning vows;
But makes a more delightful stay
Where churches meet to praise and pray.

What glories were described of old!
What wonders are of Zion told!
Thou...Read more of this...

Oban

by William Topaz McGonagall
 Oh! beautiful Oban with your lovely bay,
Your surroundings are magnificent on a fine summer-day;
There the lover of the picturesque can behold,
As the sun goes down, the scenery glittering like gold. 

And on a calm evening, behind the village let him climb the hill,
And as he watches the sun go down, with delight his heart will fill
As he beholds the...Read more of this...

Julian and Maddalo (excerpt)

by Percy Bysshe Shelley
 I rode one evening with Count Maddalo 
Upon the bank of land which breaks the flow
Of Adria towards Venice: a bare strand
Of hillocks, heap'd from ever-shifting sand,
Matted with thistles and amphibious weeds,
Such as from earth's embrace the salt ooze breeds,
Is this; an uninhabited sea-side,
Which the lone fisher, when his nets are dried,
Abandons; and no other object breaks
The waste, but...Read more of this...

Sonnet: Oh! Death will find me long before I tire

by Rupert Brooke
 Oh! Death will find me, long before I tire
Of watching you; and swing me suddenly
Into the shade and loneliness and mire
Of the last land! There, waiting patiently,

One day, I think, I'll feel a cool wind blowing,
See a slow light across the Stygian tide,
And hear the Dead about me stir, unknowing,
And tremble. And I shall know that you have died,

And...Read more of this...

This Month the Almonds Bloom at Kandahar

by Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
   The singer only sang the Joy of Life,
     For all too well, alas! the singer knew
   How hard the daily toil, how keen the strife,
     How salt the falling tear; the joys how few.

   He who thinks hard soon finds it hard to live,
 ...Read more of this...

Oh! Death Will Find Me Long Before I Tire

by Rupert Brooke
 Oh! Death will find me, long before I tire 
 Of watching you; and swing me suddenly 
Into the shade and loneliness and mire 
 Of the last land! There, waiting patiently, 

One day, I think, I'll feel a cool wind blowing, 
 See a slow light across the Stygian tide, 
And hear the Dead about me stir, unknowing,...Read more of this...

V. To the River Tweed

by William Lisle Bowles
 O TWEED! a stranger, that with wand'ring feet 
O'er hill and dale has journey'd many a mile, 
(If so his weary thoughts he might beguile) 
Delighted turns thy beauteous scenes to greet. 
The waving branches that romantick bend 
O'er thy tall banks, a soothing charm bestow; 
The murmurs of thy wand'ring wave below 
Seem to his ear the pity...Read more of this...

Bellinglise

by Alan Seeger
 Deep in the sloping forest that surrounds 
The head of a green valley that I know, 
Spread the fair gardens and ancestral grounds 
Of Bellinglise, the beautiful chateau. 
Through shady groves and fields of unmown grass, 
It was my joy to come at dusk and see, 
Filling a little pond's untroubled glass, 
Its antique towers and mouldering masonry. 
Oh,...Read more of this...

IV. To the River Wenbeck

by William Lisle Bowles
 AS slowly wanders thy forsaken stream, 
Wenbeck! the mossy-scatter'd rocks among, 
In fancy's ear still making plaintive song 
To the dark woods above: ah! sure I seem 
To meet some friendly Genius in the gloom, 
And in each breeze a pitying voice I hear 
Like sorrow's sighs upon misfortune's tomb. 
Ah! soothing are your quiet scenes -- the tear...Read more of this...

Modern Love X: But Where Began the Change

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...

Psalm 48 part 1

by Isaac Watts
 v.1-8 
S. M.
The church is the honor and safety of a nation.

[Great is the Lord our God,
And let his praise be great;
He makes his churches his abode,
His most delightful seat.

These temples of his grace,
How beautiful they stand!
The honors of our native place,
And bulwarks of our land.]

In Zion God is known,
A refuge in distress;
How bright has his salvation shone
Through all...Read more of this...

Sonnet XXXIV

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET XXXIV. Levommi il mio pensier in parte ov' era. SOARING IN IMAGINATION TO HEAVEN, HE MEETS LAURA, AND IS HAPPY.  Fond fancy raised me to the spot, where straysShe, whom I seek but find on earth no more:There, fairer still and humbler than before,I saw her, in the third heaven's blessèd...Read more of this...

Questions of Travel

by Elizabeth Bishop
 There are too many waterfalls here; the crowded streams 
hurry too rapidly down to the sea, 
and the pressure of so many clouds on the mountaintops 
makes them spill over the sides in soft slow-motion, 
turning to waterfalls under our very eyes. 
--For if those streaks, those mile-long, shiny, tearstains, 
aren't waterfalls yet, 
in a quick age or so,...Read more of this...

Love's Pictures

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Like the blush upon the rose
When the wooing south wind speaks,
Kissing soft its petals,
Are thy cheeks.
Tender, soft, beseeching, true,
Like the stars that deck the skies
Through the ether sparkling,
Are thine eyes.
Like the song of happy birds,
When the woods with spring rejoice,
In their blithe awak'ning,
Is thy voice.
Like soft threads of clustered silk
O'er thy face so pure and fair,
Sweet in its profusion,
Read more of this...

Inscription 04 - For The Apartment In Chepstow-Castle

by Robert Southey
 For thirty years secluded from mankind,
Here Marten linger'd. Often have these walls
Echoed his footsteps, as with even tread
He paced around his prison: not to him
Did Nature's fair varieties exist;
He never saw the Sun's delightful beams,
Save when thro' yon high bars it pour'd a sad
And broken splendor. Dost thou ask his crime?
He had rebell'd against the King, and sat
In judgment...Read more of this...

Musings On A Landscape Of Gaspar Poussin

by Robert Southey
 Poussin! most pleasantly thy pictur'd scenes
Beguile the lonely hour; I sit and gaze
With lingering eye, till charmed FANCY makes
The lovely landscape live, and the rapt soul
From the foul haunts of herded humankind
Flies far away with spirit speed, and tastes
The untainted air, that with the lively hue
Of health and happiness illumes the cheek
Of mountain LIBERTY. My willing soul
All eager follows...Read more of this...

A Poem Sacred to the Memory of Sir Isaac Newton

by James Thomson
 Shall the great soul of Newton quit this earth, 
To mingle with his stars; and every muse,
Astonish'd into silence, shun the weight
Of honours due to his illustrious name?
But what can man?--Even now the sons of light,
In strains high-warbled to seraphic lyre,
Hail his arrival on the coast of bliss.
Yet am not I deterr'd, though high the theme,
And sung to harps...Read more of this...

Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey

by William Wordsworth
Five years have passed; five summers, with the length 
Of five long winters! and again I hear
These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs
With a soft inland murmur.  Once again
Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs,
That on a wild secluded scene impress
Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect
The landscape with the quiet of the sky.
The day is come when I...Read more of this...

Psalm 71 part 2

by Isaac Watts
 v.14-16,22-24 
C. M.
Christ our strength and righteousness.

My Savior, my almighty Friend,
When I begin thy praise,
Where will the growing numbers end,
The numbers of thy grace?

Thou art my everlasting trust,
Thy goodness I adore;
And since I knew thy graces first,
I speak thy glories more.

My feet shall travel all the length
Of the celestial road,
And march with courage in thy strength,
To see my Father...Read more of this...

To Olivia

by Francis Thompson
 I fear to love thee, Sweet, because 
Love's the ambassador of loss; 
White flake of childhood, clinging so 
To my soiled raiment, thy shy snow 
At tenderest touch will shrink and go. 
Love me not, delightful child. 
My heart, by many snares beguiled, 
Has grown timorous and wild. 
It would fear thee not at all, 
Wert thou not so...Read more of this...

To Dorothy Wellesley

by William Butler Yeats
 Stretch towards the moonless midnight of the trees,
As though that hand could reach to where they stand,
And they but famous old upholsteries
Delightful to the touch; tighten that hand
As though to draw them closer yet.
 Rammed full
Of that most sensuous silence of the night
(For since the horizon's bought strange dogs are still)
Climb to your chamber full of books and wait,
No...Read more of this...

Eudaemon

by Alan Seeger
 O happiness, I know not what far seas, 
Blue hills and deep, thy sunny realms surround, 
That thus in Music's wistful harmonies 
And concert of sweet sound 
A rumor steals, from some uncertain shore, 
Of lovely things outworn or gladness yet in store: 


Whether thy beams be pitiful and come, 
Across the sundering of vanished years, 
From childhood and...Read more of this...

Possessions Are Nine Points Of Conversation

by Ogden Nash
 Some people, and it doesn't matter whether they are paupers or millionaires, Think that anything they have is the best in the world just because it is theirs. If they happen to own a 1921 jalopy, They look at their neighbor's new de luxe convertible like the wearer of a 57th Street gown at a 14th Street copy. If...Read more of this...

Sonnet CLXIII

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET CLXIII. L' aura serena che fra verdi fronde. THE GENTLE BREEZE (L' AURA) RECALLS TO HIM THE TIME WHEN HE FIRST SAW HER.  The gentle gale, that plays my face around,Murmuring sweet mischief through the verdant grove,To fond remembrance brings the time, when LoveFirst gave his deep, although delightful wound;Gave...Read more of this...

Sonnet LXXXV

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET LXXXV. Avventuroso più d' altro terreno. HE APOSTROPHIZES THE SPOT WHERE LAURA FIRST SALUTED HIM.  Ah, happiest spot of earth! in this sweet placeLove first beheld my condescending fairRetard her steps, to smile with courteous graceOn me, and smiling glad the ambient air.The deep-cut image, wrought with skilful care,Time...Read more of this...

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