Famous Equal Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Equal poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous equal poems. These examples illustrate what a famous equal poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Delmore Schwartz
The riches of the poet are equal to his poetry
His power is his left hand
It is idle weak and precious
His poverty is his wealth, a wealth which may destroy him
like Midas Because it is that laziness which is a form of impatience
And this he may be destroyed by the gold of the light
which never...Read more of this...
by
Ralph Waldo Emerson
I
Thy trivial harp will never please
Or fill my craving ear;
Its chords should ring as blows the breeze,
Free, peremptory, clear.
No jingling serenader's art,
Nor tinkle of piano strings,
Can make the wild blood start
In its mystic springs.
The kingly bard
Must smile the chords rudely and hard,
As with hammer or with mace;
That they...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
DAREST thou now, O Soul,
Walk out with me toward the Unknown Region,
Where neither ground is for the feet, nor any path to follow?
2
No map, there, nor guide,
Nor voice sounding, nor touch of human hand,
Nor face with blooming flesh, nor lips, nor eyes, are in that land.
3
I know it not, O Soul;
Nor dost thou—all...Read more of this...
by
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
AFTER ANACREON.
[The strong resemblance of this fine poem to
Cowley's Ode bearing the same name, and beginning "Happy insect!
what can be," will be at once seen.]
HAPPY art thou, darling insect,
Who, upon the trees' tall branches,
By a modest draught inspired,
Singing, like a monarch livest!
Thou possessest as thy portion
All that on the plains thou seest,
All that by the hours is...Read more of this...
by
John Dryden
To the Pious Memory of the Accomplished Young Lady, Mrs Anne Killigrew,
Excellent in the Two Sister-arts of Poesy and Painting
Thou youngest Virgin Daughter of the skies,
Made in the last promotion of the blest;
Whose palms, new-plucked from Paradise,
In spreading branches more sublimely rise,
Rich with immortal green, above the rest:
Whether, adopted to some neighbouring star,
Thou roll'st above us in thy wand'ring...Read more of this...
by
Francesco Petrarch
SONNET CCV. Fresco ambroso fiorito e verde colle. HE CONGRATULATES HIS HEART ON ITS REMAINING WITH HER. O hill with green o'erspread, with groves o'erhung!Where musing now, now trilling her sweet lay,Most like what bards of heavenly spirits say,Sits she by fame through every region sung:My heart, which wisely unto her...Read more of this...
by
John Donne
For every hour that thou wilt spare me now
I will allow,
Usurious God of Love, twenty to thee,
When with my brown my gray hairs equal be;
Till then, Love, let my body reign, and let
Me travel, sojourn, snatch, plot, have, forget,
Resume my last year's relic: think that yet
We'had never met.
Let me think any rival's letter mine,
And at next nine
Keep midnight's promise;...Read more of this...
by
Robert Frost
To drive Paul out of any lumber camp
All that was needed was to say to him,
"How is the wife, Paul?"--and he'd disappear.
Some said it was because be bad no wife,
And hated to be twitted on the subject;
Others because he'd come within a day
Or so of having one, and then been Jilted;
Others because he'd had one once, a good one,
Who'd...Read more of this...
by
George William Russell
HOW came this pigmy rabble spun,
After the gods and kings of old,
Upon a tapestry begun
With threads of silver and of gold?
In heaven began the heroic tale
What meaner destinies prevail!
They wove about the antique brow
A circlet of the heavenly air.
To whom is due such reverence now,
The thought “What deity is there”?
We choose the chieftains of our race
From hucksters in the...Read more of this...
by
William Butler Yeats
Why should I blame her that she filled my days
With misery, or that she would of late
Have taught to ignorant men most violent ways,
Or hurled the little streets upon the great.
Had they but courage equal to desire?
What could have made her peaceful with a mind
That nobleness made simple as a fire,
With beauty like a tightened bow, a kind
That is...Read more of this...
by
Peter Orlovsky
My bed is covered yellow - Oh Sun, I sit on you
Oh golden field I lay on you
Oh money I dream of you
More, More, cried the bed - talk to me more -
Oh bed that taked the weight of the world -
all the lost dreams laid on you
Oh bed that grows no hair, that cannot be...Read more of this...
by
Anne Kingsmill Finch
Fair Youth! who wish the Wars may cease,
We own you better form'd for Peace.
Nor Pallas you, nor Mars shou'd follow;
Your Gods are Cupid and Apollo;
Who give sweet Looks, and early Rhimes,
Bespeaking Joys, and Halcyon Times.
Your Face, which We, as yet, may praise,
Calls for the Myrtle, and the Bays.
The Martial Crowns Fatigues...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
Who is it that says most? which can say more
Than this rich praise, that you alone are you?
In whose confine immured is the store
Which should example where your equal grew.
Lean penury within that pen doth dwell
That to his subject lends not some small glory;
But he that writes of you, if he can tell
That you are you, so dignifies his...Read more of this...
by
Francesco Petrarch
SONNET LXII. Vidi fra mille donne una già tale. BEAUTY SHOWED ITSELF IN, AND DISAPPEARED WITH, LAURA. 'Mid many fair one such by me was seenThat amorous fears my heart did instant seize,Beholding her—nor false the images—Equal to angels in her heavenly mien.Nothing in her was mortal or terrene,As one...Read more of this...
by
Francesco Petrarch
CANZONE XI.[R] Mai non vo' più cantar, com' io soleva. ENIGMAS. Never more shall I sing, as I have sung:For still she heeded not; and I was scorn'd:So e'en in loveliest spots is trouble found.Unceasingly to sigh is no relief.Already on the Alp snow gathers round:Already...Read more of this...
by
Ralph Waldo Emerson
I LIKE a church; I like a cowl;
I love a prophet of the soul;
And on my heart monastic aisles
Fall like sweet strains or pensive smiles;
Yet not for all his faith can see 5
Would I that cowl¨¨d churchman be.
Why should the vest on him allure
Which I could not on me endure?
Not from...Read more of this...
by
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Yet, love, mere love, is beautiful indeed
And worthy of acceptation. Fire is bright,
Let temple burn, or flax; an equal light
Leaps in the flame from cedar-plank or weed:
And love is fire. And when I say at need
I love thee . . . mark! . . . I love thee—in thy sight
I stand transfigured, glorified aright,
With conscience of the new rays...Read more of this...
by
Anne Killigrew
I.
HEre take no Care, take here no Care, my Muse,
Nor ought of Art or Labour use:
But let thy Lines rude and unpolisht go,
Nor Equal be their Feet, nor Num'rous let them flow.
The ruggeder my Measures run when read,
They'l livelier paint th'unequal Paths fond Mortals tread.
Who when th'are tempted by the smooth Ascents,
Which flatt'ring Hope...Read more of this...
by
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
HE.
CANST thou give, oh fair and matchless maiden,
'Neath the shadow of the lindens yonder,--
Where I'd fain one moment cease to wander,--
Food and drink to one so heavy laden?
SHE.
Wouldst thou find refreshment, traveller weary,
Bread, ripe fruit and cream to meet thy wishes,--
None but Nature's plain and homely dishes,--
Near the spring may soothe thy wanderings dreary.
HE.
Dreams of old acquaintance now pass...Read more of this...
by
Alexander Pope
Not with more glories, in th' etherial plain,
The sun first rises o'er the purpled main,
Than, issuing forth, the rival of his beams
Launch'd on the bosom of the silver Thames.
Fair nymphs, and well-dress'd youths around her shone,
But ev'ry eye was fix'd on her alone.
On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore,
Which Jews might kiss, and infidels adore.
Her lively...Read more of this...
by
William Topaz McGonagall
Alas! the people's hearts are now full of sorrow
For the deceased Professor Blackie, of Edinboro';
Because he was a Christian man, affable and kind,
And his equal in charitable actions would be hard to find
'Twas in the year of 1895, March the 2nd, he died at 10 o'clock.
Which to his dear wife, and his adopted son, was a great shock;
And...Read more of this...
by
Mother Goose
Read my riddle, I pray.
What God never sees,
What the king seldom sees,
What we see every day....Read more of this...
by
Ben Jonson
XII. — EPISTLE TO ELIZABETH COUNTESS OF RUTLAND. That which, to boot with hell, is thought worth heaven, And for it, life, conscience, yea souls are given, Toils, by grave custom, up and down the court, To every squire, or groom, that will report Well or ill, only all the following year, Just to the weight their this day's presents...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
LONE on the bleaky hills the straying flocks
Shun the fierce storms among the sheltering rocks;
Down from the rivulets, red with dashing rains,
The gathering floods burst o’er the distant plains;
Beneath the blast the leafless forests groan;
The hollow caves return a hollow moan.
Ye hills, ye plains, ye forests, and ye caves,
Ye howling winds, and wintry swelling waves!
Unheard, unseen, by human ear...Read more of this...
by
Algernon Charles Swinburne
Mother of man's time-travelling generations,
Breath of his nostrils, heartblood of his heart,
God above all Gods worshipped of all nations,
Light above light, law beyond law, thou art.
Thy face is as a sword smiting in sunder
Shadows and chains and dreams and iron things;
The sea is dumb before thy face, the thunder
Silent, the skies are narrower than thy wings.
Angels and Gods, spirit...Read more of this...
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