Famous Enclosure Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Anorexic

...skin and bone.
She has learned her lesson.

Thin as a rib
I turn in sleep.
My dreams probe

a claustrophobia
a sensuous enclosure.
How warm it was and wide

once by a warm drum,
once by the song of his breath
and in his sleeping side.

Only a little more, 
only a few more days
sinless, foodless,

I will slip
back into him again
as if I had never been away.

Caged so
I will grow
angular and holy

past pain,
keeping his heart
such company

as will make me forget
in a small spac...Read more of this...
by Boland, Eavan


Beowulf (Modern English)

...1020-34)

Then the shelter of nobles ordered eight horses,
with gilded cheeks, to be led onto the floor,
inside the enclosure. One of them stood,
adorned cleverly with a saddle, worthied with treasure—
that was the high-king’s own battle-seat
when the son of Halfdane wished to perform
the dance of swords—he never laid low on the frontline,
a warrior widely-known where the slain were falling.
And then to Beowulf, the hedge of the Ingwines
bestowed control of them bo...Read more of this...
by Anonymous,

Beowulf (Old English)

...del” may mean one who grinds and crushes.

{1f} Cain’s.

{1g} Giants.

{2a} The smaller buildings within the main enclosure but separate from the hall.

{2b} Grendel.

{2c} “Sorcerers-of-hell.”

{2d} Hrothgar, who is the “Scyldings’-friend” of 170.

{2e} That is, in formal or prescribed phrase.

{3a} Ship.

{3b} That is, since Beowulf selected his ship and led his men to the harbor.

{3c} One of the auxiliary names of the Geats.

{3d} Or: Not thus openly...Read more of this...
by Anonymous,

Deer Enclosure

...Empty hill not see person 
Yet hear person voice sound 
Return scene enter deep forest 
Duplicate light green moss on 


Hills are empty, no man is seen, 
Yet the sound of people's voices is heard. 
Light is cast into the deep forest, 
And shines again on green moss....Read more of this...
by Wei, Wang

Lily Magnolia Enclosure

...Autumn hill gather surplus shine 
Fly bird chase before companion. 
Colour green moment bright, 
Sunset mist no fixed place. 


The autumn hill gathers remaining light, 
A flying bird chases its companion before. 
The green colour is momentarily bright, 
Sunset mist has no fixed place....Read more of this...
by Wei, Wang


May

...y ran
Alls ended as they ne'er began
While the new thing that took thy place
Wears faded smiles upon its face
And where enclosure has its birth
It spreads a mildew oer her mirth
The herd no longer one by one
Goes plodding on her morning way
And garlands lost and sports nigh gone
Leaves her like thee a common day
Yet summer smiles upon thee still
Wi natures sweet unalterd will
And at thy births unworshipd hours
Fills her green lap wi swarms of flowers
To crown thee still as th...Read more of this...
by Clare, John

Memories of West Street and Lepke

...boy with curlicues
of marijuana in his hair.

Given a year,
I walked on the roof of the West Street Jail, a short
enclosure like my school soccer court,
and saw the Hudson River once a day
through sooty clothesline entanglements
and bleaching khaki tenements.
Strolling, I yammered metaphysics with Abramowitz,
a jaundice-yellow ("it's really tan")
and fly-weight pacifist,
so vegetarian,
he wore rope shoes and preferred fallen fruit.
He tried to convert Bioff and...Read more of this...
by Lowell, Robert

Paradise Lost: Book 04

...d, unseen. 
 So on he fares, and to the border comes 
 Of Eden, where delicious Paradise, 
 Now nearer, crowns with her enclosure green, 
 As with a rural mound, the champaign head 
 Of a steep wilderness, whose hairy sides 
Access denied; and overhead upgrew 
 Insuperable height of loftiest shade, 
 Cedar, and pine, and fir, and branching palm, 
 A sylvan scene, and, as the ranks ascend, 
 Shade above shade, a woody theatre 
 Of stateliest view. Yet higher than their tops 
 ...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

Paradise Lost: Book 09

...nd thy celestial beauty adore 
With ravishment beheld! there best beheld, 
Where universally admired; but here 
In this enclosure wild, these beasts among, 
Beholders rude, and shallow to discern 
Half what in thee is fair, one man except, 
Who sees thee? and what is one? who should be seen 
A Goddess among Gods, adored and served 
By Angels numberless, thy daily train. 
So glozed the Tempter, and his proem tuned: 
Into the heart of Eve his words made way, 
Though at the voic...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

Saul

...ted, and under I stooped
Hands and knees on the slippery grass-patch, all withered and gone,
That extends to the second enclosure, I groped my way on
Till I felt where the foldskirts fly open. Then once more I prayed,
And opened the foldskirts and entered, and was not afraid
But spoke, ``Here is David, thy servant!'' And no voice replied.
At the first I saw nought but the blackness but soon I descried
A something more black than the blackness---the vast, the upright
Main prop...Read more of this...
by Browning, Robert

The Last Berkshire Eleven

...ade a grand stand,
While most of the officers were killed fighting hand to hand,
And at length the Sepoys fled from the enclosure, panic-stricken and irate,
Alas! leaving behind their European comrades to their fate. 

The Berkshires were now reduced to little more than one hundred men,
Who were huddled together like sheep in a pen;
But they broke loose from the enclosure, and back to back,
Poured volley after volley in the midst of the enemy, who weren't slack. 

And one by ...Read more of this...
by McGonagall, William Topaz

The Mores

...nd much they feel it in the smothered sigh
And birds and trees and flowers without a name
All sighed when lawless law's enclosure came
And dreams of plunder in such rebel schemes
Have found too truly that they were but dreams....Read more of this...
by Clare, John

The Unicorn

...trils quivered faintly:
he sought to quench his thirst, to rest and find repose.
His eyes looked far beyond the saint's enclosure,
reflecting vistas and events long vanished,
and closed the circle of this ancient mystic legend....Read more of this...
by Rilke, Rainer Maria

To A Fallen Elm

...ther by the name of right
It grows a liscence with oer bearing fools
To cheat plain honesty by force of might
Thus came enclosure—ruin was her guide
But freedoms clapping hands enjoyed the sight
Tho comforts cottage soon was thrust aside
And workhouse prisons raised upon the scite
Een natures dwelling far away from men
The common heath became the spoilers prey
The rabbit had not where to make his den
And labours only cow was drove away
No matter—wrong was right and right was ...Read more of this...
by Clare, John

Winding River (1)

...cannot have enough wine pass my lips. Kingfishers nest by the little hall on the river, Unicorns lie at the high tomb's enclosure. Having studied the world, one must seek joy, For what use is the trap of passing honour?...Read more of this...
by Fu, Du

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