Famous Discretion Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Discretion poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous discretion poems. These examples illustrate what a famous discretion poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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...hear me opening it, no paper crackle,
No falling ribbons, no scream at the end.
I do not think you credit me with this discretion.
If you only knew how the veils were killing my days.
To you they are only transparencies, clear air.
But my god, the clouds are like cotton.
Armies of them. They are carbon monoxide.
Sweetly, sweetly I breathe in,
Filling my veins with invisibles, with the million
Probable motes that tick the years off my life.
You are silver-suited for the o...Read more of this...
by
Plath, Sylvia
...s fault and merit, but her own.
All the good qualities that ever blessed
A woman so distinguished from the rest,
Except discretion only, she possessed.
--But now, "Mon cher dear Pug," she cries, "adieu!"
And the discourse broke off does thus renew:
--"You smile to see me, whom the world perchance
Mistakes to have some wit, so far advance
The interest of fools, that I approve
Their merit, more than men's of wit, in love.
But, in our sex, too many proofs there are
Of such whom...Read more of this...
by
Wilmot, John
...
The father of the youth
Wanted not beauty for him, wanted not
Song, that could lift earth's weight from off his heart,
Discretion, that could guide him thro' the world,
Innocence, that could clear his way to heaven;
Silver and gold and land, not green before
The ancestral gate, but purple under skies
Bending far off, he wanted for his heir.
Fathers have given life, but virgin heart
They never gave; and dare they then control
Or check it harshly? dare they break a bond
Girt ...Read more of this...
by
Landor, Walter Savage
...alp-disease
Confounds me, crossing so with leprosy--
Thou hadst admired one sort I gained at Zoar--
But zeal outruns discretion. Here I end.
Yet stay: my Syrian blinketh gratefully,
Protesteth his devotion is my price--
Suppose I write what harms not, though he steal?
I half resolve to tell thee, yet I blush,
What set me off a-writing first of all.
An itch I had, a sting to write, a tang!
For, be it this town's barrenness--or else
The Man had something in the look...Read more of this...
by
Browning, Robert
...rother
Used to sit by my feet
But wandered away,
Till err passed his way.
Who is to blame
When the mind is aflight
And discretion is abandoned
For valor?...Read more of this...
by
Gorry, Godfrey Mutiso
...vernight,
Stand still and quiver, unable to turn
Around or go left or right.
Or you can grasp it with a sly, soundless discretion,
Open it inch by inch, testing each fraction
Of torque on the spindles, on tiptoe
Slip yourself through the upright slot
And press the lock-stile silently
Back into its frame.
Or you can use your shoulder
Or the hard heel of your shoe
And a leg-thrust to break it open.
Or you can approach the door as if accustomed
To having all barriers open by ...Read more of this...
by
Wagoner, David
...ttle weather-worn,
Inspiriting habiliments
Of indigo and brown.
With specimens of song,
As if for you to choose,
Discretion in the interval,
With gay delays he goes
To some superior tree
Without a single leaf,
And shouts for joy to nobody
But his seraphic self!...Read more of this...
by
Dickinson, Emily
...undered the hoard in the tomb, all alone,
the old work of giants, the cups and dishes
loading up his bosom at his own discretion.
The standard also was taken, brightest of beacons.
The sword of his elder lord had already injured,
iron-edged, the one who had been the protector
of those treasures for a very long while,
who carried forth a lighted terror,
hot before the hoard, a deadly welling
at midnight, until he was killed in the assault. (ll. 2767-82)
The messeng...Read more of this...
by
Anonymous,
...arms she hath such store
All rivalry excelling,
Though I used adjectives galore,
They'd fail me in the telling;
But now discretion stays my hand--
Adieu, eyes, voice, and tresses.
Of all the husbands in the land
There's none so fierce as Jessie's....Read more of this...
by
Field, Eugene
...m the deep,
Invade your marshall'd hosts of sheep;
Disperse whole troops of horse, and pressing,
Make cows surrender at discretion;
Attack your hens, like Alexanders,
And regiments rout of geese and ganders;
Or where united arms combine,
Lead captive many a herd of swine!
Then rush in dreadful fury down
To fire on every seaport town;
Display their glory and their wits,
Fright helpless children into fits;
And stoutly, from the unequal fray,
Make many a woman run away.
"And c...Read more of this...
by
Trumbull, John
...oking!
"Don't talk!" he cried, as I began
To mutter some excuse.
"Who can have patience with a man
That's got no more discretion than
An idiotic goose?
"To keep me waiting here, instead
Of telling me at once
That this was not the house!" he said.
"There, that'll do - be off to bed!
Don't gape like that, you dunce!"
"It's very fine to throw the blame
On ME in such a fashion!
Why didn't you enquire my name
The very minute that you came?"
I answered in a passion.
"Of cou...Read more of this...
by
Carroll, Lewis
...vity; or introducing trivial and
vulgar persons, which by all judicious hath bin counted absurd; and
brought in without discretion, corruptly to gratifie the people. And
though antient Tragedy use no Prologue, yet using sometimes, in
case of self defence, or explanation, that which Martial calls an
Epistle; in behalf of this Tragedy coming forth after the antient
manner, much different from what among us passes for best, thus
much before-hand may be Epistl'd; that Chorus is h...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...hesses have got a trick
To dote on a fool for the sake of his prick,
The fops were undone did their graces but know
The discretion and vigour of Signior *****.
The Duchess of Modena, though she looks so high,
With such a gallant is content to lie,
And for fear that the English her secrets should know,
For her gentleman usher took Signior *****.
The Countess o'th'Cockpit (who knows not her name?
She's famous in story for a killing dame),
When all her old lovers forsake her, ...Read more of this...
by
Wilmot, John
...charm my thoughts from FRIENDSHIP'S dearer claim;
Or wound a heart, that scarce a wish employs,
For age to censure, or discretion blame.
Tir'd of the world, my weary mind recoils
From splendid scenes, and transitory joys;
From fell Ambition's false and fruitless toils,
From hope that flatters, and from bliss that cloys.
With THEE, above the taunts of empty pride,
The rigid frowns to youthful error given;
Content in solitude my griefs I'll hide,
Thy voice my counsellorth...Read more of this...
by
Robinson, Mary Darby
...ay well swear,
(``No novice, we've won our spurs elsewhere
``And so can afford the confession,)
``We exercise wholesome discretion
``In keeping aloof from his threshold;
``Once hold you, those jaws want no fresh hold,
``Their first would too pleasantly purloin
``The visitor's brisket or surloin:
``But who's he would prove so fool-hardy?
``Not the best man of Marignan, pardie!''
The sentence no sooner was uttered,
Than over the rails a glove flattered,
Fell close to the lion,...Read more of this...
by
Browning, Robert
...ead,
As well as-to a proud dispiteous* man *unpitying
That will maintaine what he first began.
That lord hath little of discretion,
That in such case *can no division*: *can make no distinction*
But weigheth pride and humbless *after one*." *alike*
And shortly, when his ire is thus agone,
He gan to look on them with eyen light*, *gentle, lenient*
And spake these same wordes *all on height.* *aloud*
"The god of love, ah! benedicite*, *bless ye him
How mighty and how great a l...Read more of this...
by
Chaucer, Geoffrey
...ouse,
She deftly expiscated little Miss Mouse!
And, as for the Swallow, she shrieked and withdrew--
I rather admire her discretion, don't you?
Now listen: That evening a cyclone obtained,
And the mortgage was all on that farm that remained!
Barn, strawstack and spider--they all blew away,
And nobody knows where they're at to this day!
And, as for the little straw parlor, I fear
It was wafted clean off this sublunary sphere!
I really incline to a hearty "boo-hoo"
When I think...Read more of this...
by
Field, Eugene
...our Cerberus up to heaven!'
LI
Here Michael interposed: 'Good saint! and devil!
Pray, not so fast; you both outrun discretion.
Saint Peter! you were wont to be more civil!
Satan! excuse this warmth of his expression,
And condescension to the vulgar's level:
Event saints sometimes forget themselves in session.
Have you got more to say?' — 'No.' — If you please
I'll trouble you to call your witnesses.'
LII
Then Satan turn'd and waved his swarthy hand,
Which stir...Read more of this...
by
Byron, George (Lord)
...te's mark upon my face,
And also in another privy place.
For God so wisly* be my salvation, *certainly
I loved never by discretion,
But ever follow'd mine own appetite,
All* were he short, or long, or black, or white, *whether
I took no keep,* so that he liked me, *heed
How poor he was, neither of what degree.] 25
What should I say? but that at the month's end
This jolly clerk Jenkin, that was so hend,* *courteous
Had wedded me with great solemnity,
And to him gave I all the ...Read more of this...
by
Chaucer, Geoffrey
...l?
Darling,
terror in happiness may not cure the hungry future,
the time when any illness is chronic,
and the years of discretion are spent on complaint—
until the wristwatch is taken from the wrist....Read more of this...
by
Lowell, Robert
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