Famous Excels Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Excels poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous excels poems. These examples illustrate what a famous excels poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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...ON Cessnock banks a lassie dwells;
Could I describe her shape and mein;
Our lasses a’ she far excels,
An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een.
She’s sweeter than the morning dawn,
When rising Phoebus first is seen,
And dew-drops twinkle o’er the lawn;
An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een.
She’s stately like yon youthful ash,
That grows the cowslip braes between,
And drinks the stream with vigour fresh;
An’ she has twa sparkling roguish een.
...Read more of this...
by
Burns, Robert
...ands the rustic stranger up to fame,
With heartfelt throes his grateful bosom swells,
The godlike bliss, to give, alone excels.
—————— ’Twas when the stacks get on their winter hap,
And thack and rape secure the toil-won crap;
Potatoe-bings are snuggèd up frae skaith
O’ coming Winter’s biting, frosty breath;
The bees, rejoicing o’er their summer toils,
Unnumber’d buds an’ flow’rs’ delicious spoils,
Seal’d up with frugal care in massive waxen piles,
Are doom’d by Man, that t...Read more of this...
by
Burns, Robert
...op;
Seek we sepulture
On a tall mountain, citied to the top,
Crowded with culture!
All the peaks soar, but one the rest excels;
Clouds overcome it;
No! yonder sparkle is the citadel's
Circling its summit.
Thither our path lies; wind we up the heights:
Wait ye the warning?
Our low life was the level's and the night's;
He's for the morning.
Step to a tune, square chests, erect each head,
'Ware the beholders!
This is our master, famous calm and dead,
Borne on our shoulders.
Sle...Read more of this...
by
Browning, Robert
...on, a kind of In-mate Deity.
Which only can adapt to ev'ry Soul
A Yoke so fit and light, that the Controle
All Liberty excels; so sweet a Sway,
The same 'tis to be Happy, and Obey;
Commands so Wise and with Rewards so drest
That the according Soul replys, I'm Blest.
This teaches rightly how to Love and Hate,
To fear and hope by Measure and just Weight;
What Tears in Grief ought from our Eyes to flow,
What Transport in Felicity to show;
In ev'ry Passion how to steer the...Read more of this...
by
Killigrew, Anne
...ce
The perfect beauties be
A perfect harmony.
Musick more loftly swels
In speeches nobly plac'd;
Beauty as farre excels,
In action aptly grac'd:
A friend each party draws
To countenance his cause.
Loue more affected seemes
To Beauties louely light;
And Wonder more esteemes
Of Musickes wondrous might;
But both to both so bent,
As both in both are spent.
Musicke doth witnesse call
The eare his truth to trie;
Beauty brings to the hall
Eye-iudgement of the...Read more of this...
by
Sidney, Sir Philip
...e Celtic and Iberian fields,
At last betakes him to this ominous wood,
And, in thick shelter of black shades imbowered,
Excels his mother at her mighty art;
Offering to every weary traveller
His orient liquor in a crystal glass,
To quench the drouth of Phoebus; which as they taste
(For most do taste through fond intemperate thirst),
Soon as the potion works, their human count'nance,
The express resemblance of the gods, is changed
Into some brutish form of wolf or bear,
Or oun...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...are all.
I but found her in that, going
On my errant path unknowing,
I did not out-skirt the spot
That no spot on earth excels--
Where she dwells!...Read more of this...
by
Hardy, Thomas
...
And the poison wrung
From a serpent's tongue
By the light of a midnight moon!
In all neurotic ailments
I hear that he excels,
And he insures
Immediate cures
Of weird, uncanny spells;
The most unruly patient
Gets docile as a lamb
And is freed from ill by the potent skill
Of Hoodoo-Doctor Sam;
Feathers of strangled chickens,
Moss from the dank lagoon,
And plasters wet
With spider sweat
In the light of a midnight moon!
They say when nights are grewsome
And hours are, oh! so l...Read more of this...
by
Field, Eugene
...thou still give way to such Despair!
Amintor. Too just, alas! the weighty Causes are.
Mopsus, wise Mopsus, who in Art excels,
And of all Plants the secret Vertue tells,
Knows, with what healing Gifts our Springs abound,
And of each Bird explains the mystick Sound;
'Twas He, ev'n He! my wretched Fate foretold.
Thir. Dost thou this Speech then of that Mopsus hold,
Who, whilst his Smiles attract the easy View,
Drops flatt'ring Words, soft as the falling Dew;
Whose outw...Read more of this...
by
Finch, Anne Kingsmill
...e blood he shed for me;
The fairest of ten thousand fairs;
A sun amongst ten thousand stars.
[His head the finest gold excels;
There wisdom in perfection dwells,
And glory like a crown adorns
Those temples once beset with thorns.
Compassion's in his heart are found,
Hard by the signals of his wound:
His sacred side no more shall bear
The cruel scourge, the piercing spear.]
[His hands are fairer to behold
Than diamonds set in rings of gold;
Those heav'nly hands, that on the...Read more of this...
by
Watts, Isaac
...dear command,
'Lady, alone through whom the whole race of those
The smallest Heaven the moon's short orbits hold
Excels in its creation, not thy least,
Thy lightest wish in this dark realm were told
Vainly. But show me why the Heavens unclose
To loose thee from them, and thyself content
Couldst thus continue in such strange descent
From that most Spacious Place for which ye burn,
And while ye further left, would fain return.'
" 'That which thou wouldst,'...Read more of this...
by
Alighieri, Dante
...is at this moment more
Than all of Shakespeare’s sonnets, the unending vistas
Of the moor, an infinity of purity that excels even Mallarm?.
I sit on the cracked steps to the church, sipping tea
With my eye on the Black Bull where Bramwell worshipped
Until a mobile phone playing ‘The Bluebells of Scotland’
Disturbs my reverie and I notice the Big Issue seller
Can find no takers among the ernest camera-ready Japanese
And mid-life couple shuffling into tea rooms.
"We ar...Read more of this...
by
Tebb, Barry
...eing "designed to change
his surrender of her into despair, by drolly-fretful images."]
THERE'S no menagerie, I vow,
Excels my Lily's at this minute;
She keeps the strangest creatures in it,
And catches them, she knows not how.
Oh, how they hop, and run, and rave,
And their clipp'd pinions wildly wave,--
Poor princes, who must all endure
The pangs of love that nought can cure.
What is the fairy's name?--Is't Lily?--Ask not me!
Give thanks to Heaven if she's unknown to t...Read more of this...
by
von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang
...e immediate war
Did not dissuade me most, and seem to cast
Ominous conjecture on the whole success;
When he who most excels in fact of arms,
In what he counsels and in what excels
Mistrustful, grounds his courage on despair
And utter dissolution, as the scope
Of all his aim, after some dire revenge.
First, what revenge? The towers of Heaven are filled
With armed watch, that render all access
Impregnable: oft on the bodering Deep
Encamp their legions, or with obscur...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...
Of servitude, to serve whom God ordains,
Or Nature: God and Nature bid the same,
When he who rules is worthiest, and excels
Them whom he governs. This is servitude,
To serve the unwise, or him who hath rebelled
Against his worthier, as thine now serve thee,
Thyself not free, but to thyself enthralled;
Yet lewdly darest our ministring upbraid.
Reign thou in Hell, thy kingdom; let me serve
In Heaven God ever blest, and his divine
Behests obey, worthiest to be obeyed;...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...ed,
Which it had long stood under, strained to the highth
In that celestial colloquy sublime,
As with an object that excels the sense
Dazzled and spent, sunk down; and sought repair
Of sleep, which instantly fell on me, called
By Nature as in aid, and closed mine eyes.
Mine eyes he closed, but open left the cell
Of fancy, my internal sight; by which,
Abstract as in a trance, methought I saw,
Though sleeping, where I lay, and saw the shape
Still glorious before whom...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...im of his blindness;
And, being help'd, inhabits there.
Then to Silvia let us sing,
That Silvia is excelling;
She excels each mortal thing
Upon the dull earth dwelling:
To her let us garlands bring....Read more of this...
by
Shakespeare, William
...dour past belief I glow!None doubt this truth, except one only fair,Who all excels, for whom alone I care;She plainly sees, yet disbelieves my woe.O rich in charms, but poor in faith! canst thouLook in these eyes, nor read my whole heart there?Were I not fated by my baleful star,For me from pity's fount might favour flow.Read more of this...
by
Petrarch, Francesco
...sunshine -
And the Railway Bridge across it is really sublime.
The scenery is very beautiful when in full bloom,
It far excels the river Doon -
For the North Inch and South Inch is most beautiful to behold,
Where the buttercups do shine in the sunshine like gold.
And there's the Palace of Scone, most beautiful to be seen,
Near by the river Tay and the North Inch so green,
Whereon is erected the statue of Prince Albert, late husband of the Queen,
And also the statue of Sir W...Read more of this...
by
McGonagall, William Topaz
...e cabin home.
The waves reflect it like a drunken star.
A banjo and a hymn are heard afar.
No solace on the lazy shore excels
The Duke's blue castle with its steamer-bells.
The floor is running water, and the roof
The stars' brocade with cloudy warp and woof.
And on past sorghum fields the current swings.
To Christian Jim the Mississippi sings.
This prankish wave-swept barque has won its place,
A ship of jesting for the human race.
But do you laugh when Jim bows down forlor...Read more of this...
by
Lindsay, Vachel
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