Famous Emerald Poems by Famous Poets

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

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The Fury Of Jewels And Coal

by Anne Sexton
 Many a miner has gone 
into the deep pit 
to receive the dust of a kiss, 
an ore-cell. 
He has gone with his lamp 
full of mole eyes 
deep deep and has brought forth 
Jesus at Gethsemane. 
Body of moss, body of glass, 
body of peat, how sharp 
you lie, emerald as heavy 
as a golf course, ruby as...Read more of this...

The Mask

by William Butler Yeats
 'Put off that mask of burning gold
With emerald eyes.'
'O no, my dear, you make so bold
To find if hearts be wild and wise,
And yet not cold.'

'I would but find what's there to find,
Love or deceit.'
'It was the mask engaged your mind,
And after set your heart to beat,
Not what's behind.'

'But lest you are my enemy,
I must enquire.'
'O no, my dear,...Read more of this...

Step lightly on this narrow spot --

by Emily Dickinson
 Step lightly on this narrow spot --
The broadest Land that grows
Is not so ample as the Breast
These Emerald Seams enclose.

Step lofty, for this name be told
As far as Cannon dwell
Or Flag subsist or Fame export
Her deathless Syllable....Read more of this...

April Rise

by Laurie Lee
 If ever I saw blessing in the air 
I see it now in this still early day 
Where lemon-green the vaporous morning drips 
Wet sunlight on the powder of my eye. 

Blown bubble-film of blue, the sky wraps round 
Weeds of warm light whose every root and rod 
Splutters with soapy green, and all the world 
Sweats with the...Read more of this...

Let Erin Remember the Days of Old

by Thomas Moore
 Let Erin remember the days of old, 
Ere her faithless sons betray'd her; 
When Malachi wore the collar of gold,
Which he won from her proud invader, 
When her kings, with standard of green unfurl'd, 
Led the Red-Branch Knights to danger!
Ere the emerald gem of the western world 
Was set in the crown of a stranger. 

On Lough Neagh's bank...Read more of this...

The Lotos-eaters

by Alfred Lord Tennyson
 "Courage!" he said, and pointed toward the land, 
"This mounting wave will roll us shoreward soon."
In the afternoon they came unto a land 
In which it seemed always afternoon.
All round the coast the languid air did swoon,
Breathing like one that hath a weary dream.
Full-faced above the valley stood the moon;
And like a downward smoke, the slender stream 
Along the...Read more of this...

The Animals

by Edwin Muir
 They do not live in the world, 
Are not in time and space. 
From birth to death hurled 
No word do they have, not one 
To plant a foot upon, 
Were never in any place. 

For with names the world was called 
Out of the empty air, 
With names was built and walled, 
Line and circle and square, 
Dust...Read more of this...

Daffy Duck In Hollywood

by John Ashbery
 Something strange is creeping across me.
La Celestina has only to warble the first few bars
Of "I Thought about You" or something mellow from
Amadigi di Gaula for everything--a mint-condition can
Of Rumford's Baking Powder, a celluloid earring, Speedy
Gonzales, the latest from Helen Topping Miller's fertile
Escritoire, a sheaf of suggestive pix on greige, deckle-edged
Stock--to come clattering through the rainbow trellis
Where Pistachio Avenue...Read more of this...

A Day Off

by Lucy Maud Montgomery
 Let us put awhile away 
All the cares of work-a-day, 
For a golden time forget, 
Task and worry, toil and fret, 
Let us take a day to dream 
In the meadow by the stream. 

We may lie in grasses cool 
Fringing a pellucid pool, 
We may learn the gay brook-runes 
Sung on amber afternoons, 
And the keen wind-rhyme that...Read more of this...

A Carol of Harvest for 1867

by Walt Whitman
 1
A SONG of the good green grass! 
A song no more of the city streets; 
A song of farms—a song of the soil of fields. 

A song with the smell of sun-dried hay, where the nimble pitchers handle the pitch-fork; 
A song tasting of new wheat, and of fresh-husk’d maize.

2
For the lands, and for these passionate days, and for...Read more of this...

Up At A Villa— Down In The City

by Robert Browning
 (As Distinguished by an Italian Person of Quality)

I

Had I but plenty of money, money enough and to spare,
The house for me, no doubt, were a house in the city-square;
Ah, such a life, such a life, as one leads at the window there!

II

Something to see, by Bacchus, something to hear, at least!
There, the whole day long, one's life is a...Read more of this...

On The Death Of A Favourite Cat Drowned In A Tub Of Gold Fishes

by Thomas Gray
 'Twas on a lofty vase's side,
Where China's gayest art had dyed
The azure flowers that blow,
Demurest of the tabby kind,
The pensive Selima, reclined,
Gazed on the lake below.

Her conscious tail her joy declared;
The fair round face, the snowy beard,
The velvet of her paws,
Her coat, that with the tortoise vies,
Her ears of jet, and emerald eyes,
She saw; and purred applause.

Still had she...Read more of this...

A Bay In Anglesey

by John Betjeman
 The sleepy sound of a tea-time tide
Slaps at the rocks the sun has dried,

Too lazy, almost, to sink and lift
Round low peninsulas pink with thrift.

The water, enlarging shells and sand,
Grows greener emerald out from land

And brown over shadowy shelves below
The waving forests of seaweed show.

Here at my feet in the short cliff grass
Are shells, dried bladderwrack, broken glass,

Pale blue...Read more of this...

The Rose and the Cross

by Aleister Crowley
 Out of the seething cauldron of my woes,
Where sweets and salt and bitterness I flung;
Where charmed music gathered from my tongue,
And where I chained strange archipelagoes
Of fallen stars; where fiery passion flows 
A curious bitumen; where among
The glowing medley moved the tune unsung
Of perfect love: thence grew the Mystic Rose. 

Its myriad petals of divided light;
Its leaves of the...Read more of this...

Tower Grove

by Fannie Isabelle Sherrick
Oh tell me not of the lands so old
Where the Orient treasures its hills of gold,
And the rivers lie in the sun's bright rays
Forever singing the old world's praise.
Nor proudly boast of the gardens grand
That spring to earth at a king's command;
There are treasures here in the far great West
That rival the hills on the Orient's crest.
Far from the sight...Read more of this...

The Fountain of Shadowy Beauty

by George William Russell
 I WOULD I could weave in
 The colour, the wonder,
 The song I conceive in
 My heart while I ponder,


 And show how it came like
 The magi of old
 Whose chant was a flame like
 The dawn’s voice of gold;


 Whose dreams followed near them
 A murmur of birds,
 And ear still could hear them
 Unchanted in words.


...Read more of this...

Blue Bell The

by Emily Brontë
 The blue bell is the sweetest flower
That waves in summer air;
Its blossoms have the mightiest power
To soothe my spirit's care. 

There is a spell in purple heath
Too wildly, sadly dear;
The violet has a fragrant breath
But fragrance will not cheer. 

The trees are bare, the sun is cold;
And seldom, seldom seen;
The heavens have lost their zone of gold
The earth its...Read more of this...

Antinous

by Alan Seeger
 Stretched on a sunny bank he lay at rest, 
Ferns at his elbow, lilies round his knees, 
With sweet flesh patterned where the cool turf pressed, 
Flowerlike crept o'er with emerald aphides. 
Single he couched there, to his circling flocks 
Piping at times some happy shepherd's tune, 
Nude, with the warm wind in his golden locks, 
And arched with...Read more of this...

The Wizard Way

by Aleister Crowley
 [Dedicated to General J.C.F. Fuller]


Velvet soft the night-star glowed 
Over the untrodden road, 
Through the giant glades of yew 
Where its ray fell light as dew 
Lighting up the shimmering veil 
Maiden pure and aery frail 
That the spiders wove to hide 
Blushes of the sylvan bride 
Earth, that trembled with delight 
At the male caress of Night. 

Velvet...Read more of this...

The Enkindled Spring

by D. H. Lawrence
 This spring as it comes bursts up in bonfires green, 
Wild puffing of emerald trees, and flame-filled bushes, 
Thorn-blossom lifting in wreaths of smoke between 
Where the wood fumes up and the watery, flickering rushes.

I am amazed at this spring, this conflagration
Of green fires lit on the soil of the earth, this blaze
Of growing, and sparks that puff in...Read more of this...

A Runnable Stag

by John Davidson
 When the pods went pop on the broom, green broom, 
And apples began to be golden-skinn'd, 
We harbour'd a stag in the Priory coomb, 
And we feather'd his trail up-wind, up-wind, 
We feather'd his trail up-wind- 
A stag of warrant, a stag, a stag, 
A runnable stag, a kingly crop, 
Brow, bay and tray and three on top, 
A...Read more of this...

The Spirit of Air

by Walter de la Mare
 Coral and clear emerald, 
And amber from the sea, 
Lilac-coloured amethyst, 
Chalcedony; 
The lovely Spirit of Air 
Floats on a cloud and doth ride, 
Clad in the beauties of earth 
Like a bride.

So doth she haunt me; and words 
Tell but a tithe of the tale. 
Sings all the sweetness of Spring 
Even in the nightengale? 
Nay, but with...Read more of this...

Over The Parapet

by Robert William Service
 All day long when the shells sail over
 I stand at the sandbags and take my chance;
But at night, at night I'm a reckless rover,
 And over the parapet gleams Romance.
Romance! Romance! How I've dreamed it, writing
 Dreary old records of money and mart,
Me with my head chuckful of fighting
 And the blood of vikings to thrill my heart.

But...Read more of this...

The Queen-Rose—A Summer Idyl

by Fannie Isabelle Sherrick
The sunlight fell with a golden gleam
  On the waves of the rippling rill;
The pansies nodded their purple heads;
  But the proud queen-rose stood still.
She loved the light and she loved the sun,
And the peaceful night when the day was done,
But the faithless sun in his careless way
Had broken her heart on that summer's day.
She had bathed her...Read more of this...

A Mothers Dream

by Allama Muhammad Iqbal
One night while sleeping
I dreamt
Seeing which I began
To get impatient

I saw that
To a place I am going
Where everywhere was dark
And paths are not reaching

As I proceeded
With the confidence I gathered
A queue I saw
Where boys had assembled

Emerald-like garment
They were wearing
In every hand
A little lamp was burning

Without making any noise
To and fro they were moving
Lord alone knows
Where exactly were they going?

While in...Read more of this...

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