Famous Discontented Poems by Famous Poets

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

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A Holiday

...x –
Zounds! but ‘tis difficult to please the sex.
I’ve housed and gowned her like a very queen
Yet there she goes, with discontented mien.
I gave her diamonds only yesterday:
Some women are like that, do what you may....Read more of this...
by Wilcox, Ella Wheeler


Autumn Perspective

...s if, when the room
contains us and all our treasured junk
we will have filled whatever gap it is
that makes us wander, discontented
from ourselves.

The room will not change:
a rug, or armchair, or new coat of paint
won't make much difference;
our eyes are fickle
but we remain the same beneath our suntans,
pale, frightened,
dreaming ourselves backward and forward in time,
dreaming our dreaming selves.

I look forward and see myself looking back....Read more of this...
by Jong, Erica

Denial

...re my soul lay out of sight, 
Untuned, unstrung: 
My feeble spirit, unable to look right, 
Like a nipped blossom, hung 
Discontented. 

O cheer and tune my heartless breast, 
Defer no time; 
That so thy favors granting my request, 
They and my mind may chime, 
And mend my rime....Read more of this...
by Herbert, George

Greedy Richard

...Then slowing rising from his seat,
He threw his cheesecake in the street,
And left the tempting pastry-cook's
With very discontented looks. 

Just then a man with wooden leg
Met Dick, and held his hat to beg; 
And while he told his mournful case,
Look'd at him with imploring face. 

Dick, wishing to relieve his pain,
His pockets search'd, but search'd in vain; 
And so at last he did declare,
He had not left a farthing there. 

The beggar turn'd with face of grief,
And look of...Read more of this...
by Taylor, Jane

Mazies Ghost

...she assented.
We climbed on top, and all the way
I held her hand, I felt quite gay,
Bu Mazie, I regret to say,
 Seemed discontented.

In fact we almost had a tiff.
It's true it rained and she was stiff,
And all she did was sneeze and sniff
 And shudder coldly.
So I said: "Mazzie, there's the maze;
Let's frolic in its leafy ways,"
And buying tickets where one pays
 I entered boldly.

The, as the game is, we were lots;
We dashed and darted, crissed and crossed,
But Mazie she g...Read more of this...
by Service, Robert William


Paradise Lost: Book 04

...e animal spirits, that from pure blood arise 
Like gentle breaths from rivers pure, thence raise 
At least distempered, discontented thoughts, 
Vain hopes, vain aims, inordinate desires, 
Blown up with high conceits ingendering pride. 
Him thus intent Ithuriel with his spear 
Touched lightly; for no falshood can endure 
Touch of celestial temper, but returns 
Of force to its own likeness: Up he starts 
Discovered and surprised. As when a spark 
Lights on a heap of nitrous pow...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

Sonnet LXXVI

...class=i2>Alas! fair Liberty, thus left by thee,Well hast thou taught my discontented heartTo mourn the peace it felt, ere yet Love's dartDealt me the wound which heal'd can never be;Mine eyes so charm'd with their own weakness growThat my dull mind of reason spurns the chain;All worldly occupation they disdain,Read more of this...
by Petrarch, Francesco

The Everlasting Mercy

...nd-down starving man 
That Squire's greed's Jehovah's plan. 
You get his learning circumvented 
Lest it should make him discontented 
(Better a brutal, starving nation 
Than men with thoughts above their station), 
You let him neither read nor think, 
You goad his wretched soul to drink 
And then to jail, the drunken boor; 
O sad intemperance of the poor. 
You starve his soul till it's rapscallion, 
Then blame his flesh for being stallion. 
You send your wife around to paint ...Read more of this...
by Masefield, John

The House Of Dust: Part 03: 10: Letter

...eets as yet unlighted? This, I think.

You have been always, let me say, "romantic,"—
Eager for color, for beauty, soon discontented
With a world of dust and stones and flesh too ailing:
Even before the question grew to problem
And drove you bickering into metaphysics,
You met on lower planes the same great dragon,
Seeking release, some fleeting satisfaction,
In strange aesthetics . . . You tried, as I remember,
One after one, strange cults, and some, too, morbid,
The cruder ...Read more of this...
by Aiken, Conrad

The Investiture

...den gate,
Wearing a blood-soaked bandage on your head; 
And God says something kind because you’re dead, 
And homesick, discontented with your fate. 

If I were there we’d snowball Death with skulls; 
Or ride away to hunt in Devil’s Wood
With ghosts of puppies that we walked of old. 
But you’re alone; and solitude annuls 
Our earthly jokes; and strangely wise and good 
You roam forlorn along the streets of gold....Read more of this...
by Sassoon, Siegfried

The Living Beauty

...I bade, because the wick and oil are spent
And frozen are the channels of the blood,
My discontented heart to draw content
From beauty that is cast out of a mould
In bronze, or that in dazzling marble appears,
Appears, but when wc have gone is gone again,
Being more indifferent to our solitude
Than 'twere an apparition. O heart, we are old;
The living beauty is for younger men:
We cannot pay its rribute of wild tears....Read more of this...
by Yeats, William Butler

The Miseries of Man

...Eye of Day. 
By oblique windings through this gloomy Shade,
Has a clear purling Stream its Passage made,
The Nimph, as discontented seem'd t'ave chose
This sad Recess to murmur forth her Woes. 
 To this Retreat, urg'd by tormenting Care, 
The melancholly Cloris did repair, 

As a fit Place to take the sad Relief
Of Sighs and Tears, to ease oppressing Grief. 
Near to the Mourning Nimph she chose a Seat,
And these Complaints did to the Shades repeat. 

 Ah wretched, truly wret...Read more of this...
by Killigrew, Anne

The Poet as Hero

...You've heard me, scornful, harsh, and discontented, 
Mocking and loathing War: you've asked me why 
Of my old, silly sweetness I've repented-- 
My ecstasies changed to an ugly cry. 

You are aware that once I sought the Grail, 
Riding in armour bright, serene and strong; 
And it was told that through my infant wail 
There rose immortal semblances of song. 

But now I've said good-bye to Galahad,...Read more of this...
by Sassoon, Siegfried

The Rape of the Lock

...uld ease:
Hear me, and touch Belinda with Chagrin;
That single Act gives half the World the Spleen.

The Goddess with a discontented Air
Seems to reject him, tho' she grants his Pray'r. 
A wondrous Bag with both her Hands she binds,
Like that where once Ulysses held the Winds;
There she collects the Force of Female Lungs,
Sighs, Sobs, and Passions, and the War of Tongues.
A Vial next she fills with fainting Fears,
Soft Sorrows, melting Griefs, and flowing Tears.
The Gnome rej...Read more of this...
by Pope, Alexander

The Rape of the Lock: Canto 4

...ase:
Hear me, and touch Belinda with chagrin;
That single act gives half the world the spleen."

The goddess with a discontented air
Seems to reject him, though she grants his pray'r.
A wondrous bag with both her hands she binds,
Like that where once Ulysses held the winds;
There she collects the force of female lungs,
Sighs, sobs, and passions, and the war of tongues.
A vial next she fills with fainting fears,
Soft sorrows, melting griefs, and flowing tears.
The ...Read more of this...
by Pope, Alexander

To A Sick Child During The Siege Of Paris

...Not rooted to our earth you seem to be. 
 If still, beneath the skies, 
 You turn, O Jeanne, on our mystery 
 Soft, discontented eyes! 
 If I behold you, gay and strong no more; 
 If you mope sadly thus; 
 If you behind you have not shut the door, 
 Through which you came to us; 
 If you no more like some fair dame I see 
 Laugh, walk, be well and gay; 
 If like a little soul you seem to me 
 That fain would fly away— 
 I'll deem that to this world, where oft are...Read more of this...
by Hugo, Victor

Upon a Little Lady Under the Discipline of an Excellent Person

...and sit and droop; 
 The Flowers do languish on their Beds,
 And fading hang their Mourning Heads; 
 The little Cupids discontented, shew, 
 In Grief and Rage one breaks his Bow, 
 An other tares his Cheeks and Haire, 
A third sits blubring in Despaire, 

 Confessing though, in Love, he be, 
 A Powerful, Dreadful Deitie, 
A Child, in Wrath, can do as much as he: 
 Whence is this Evil hurl'd, 
 On all the sweetness of the World ? 
 Among those Things with Beauty shine, 
 (Bot...Read more of this...
by Killigrew, Anne

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