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Famous Fasts Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Book: Radiant Verses: A Journey Through Inspiring Poetry
...laps the Navies
As the Vulture teased
Forces the Broods in lonely Valleys
As the Tiger eased

By but a Crumb of Blood, fasts Scarlet
Till he meet a Man
Dainty adorned with Veins and Tissues
And partakes -- his Tongue

Cooled by the Morsel for a moment
Grows a fiercer thing
Till he esteem his Dates and Cocoa
A Nutrition mean

I, of a finer Famine
Deem my Supper dry
For but a Berry of Domingo
And a Torrid Eye....Read more of this...
by Dickinson, Emily



...yself to stone.
All is not Heav'n's while Abelard has part,
Still rebel nature holds out half my heart;
Nor pray'rs nor fasts its stubborn pulse restrain,
Nor tears, for ages, taught to flow in vain.

Soon as thy letters trembling I unclose,
That well-known name awakens all my woes.
Oh name for ever sad! for ever dear!
Still breath'd in sighs, still usher'd with a tear.
I tremble too, where'er my own I find,
Some dire misfortune follows close behind.
Line after line my gushin...Read more of this...
by Pope, Alexander
...udder at me, 
Nor shun to call me sister, dwell with you; 
Wear black and white, and be a nun like you, 
Fast with your fasts, not feasting with your feasts; 
Grieve with your griefs, not grieving at your joys, 
But not rejoicing; mingle with your rites; 
Pray and be prayed for; lie before your shrines; 
Do each low office of your holy house; 
Walk your dim cloister, and distribute dole 
To poor sick people, richer in His eyes 
Who ransomed us, and haler too than I; 
And trea...Read more of this...
by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...moved and had your being,
Your humble vows you would not breathe
To powers, you'd no acquaintance with.


"As for your fasts," replied our 'Squire,
"What circumstance could fasts require?
We kept them not, but 'twas no crime,
We held them merely loss of time.
For what advantage firm and lasting,
Pray, did you ever get by fasting,
Or what the gain, that can arise
From vows and offerings to the skies?
Will heaven reward with posts and fees,
Or send us tea, as consignees,
Give ...Read more of this...
by Trumbull, John
...Well embodied, well ensouled,
He cools the present's fiery glow,
Sets the life pulse strong, but slow.
Bitter winds and fasts austere.
His quarantines and grottos, where
He slowly cures decrepit flesh,
And brings it infantile and fresh.
These exercises are the toys
And games with which he breathes his boys.
They bide their time, and well can prove,
If need were, their line from Jove,
Of the same stuff, and so allayed,
As that whereof the sun is made;
And of that fibre quick a...Read more of this...
by Emerson, Ralph Waldo



...wrongfully combined.After such bitters, if some sweet allays,Balk'd by long fasts my palate spurns the fare,Sole grace from them that falleth to my share. Macgregor....Read more of this...
by Petrarch, Francesco
..., the hutch of tasty lust,
Desire not to be rinsed with wine:
The can must be so sweet, the crust
So fresh that come in fasts divine! 

Nostrils, your careless breath that spend
Upon the stir and keep of pride,
What relish shall the censers send
Along the sanctuary side! 

O feel-of-primrose hands, O feet
That want the yield of plushy sward,
But you shall walk the golden street
And you unhouse and house the Lord. 

And, Poverty, be thou the bride
And now the marriage feast be...Read more of this...
by Hopkins, Gerard Manley
...cker-cradle, smiling.
"Jacques,"
Quoth he, "My son, I would behold this priest
That is not fat, and loves not wine, and fasts,
And stills the folk with waving of his hand,
And threats the knights and thunders at the Pope.
Make way for Gris, ye who are whole of limb!
Set me on yonder ledge, that I may see."
Forthwith a dozen horny hands reached out
And lifted Gris Grillon upon the ledge,
Whereon he lay and overlooked the crowd,
And from the gray-grown hedges of his brows
Shot ...Read more of this...
by Lanier, Sidney
...of grisly bone, 
I hardly fear its terrible shape, 
It seems so like my own —
It seems so like my own, 
Because of the fasts I keep; 
Oh, God! that bread should be so dear, 
And flesh and blood so cheap!

"Work — work — work! 
My Labour never flags; 
And what are its wages? A bed of straw, 
A crust of bread — and rags. 
That shatter'd roof — and this naked floor —
A table — a broken chair —
And a wall so blank, my shadow I thank 
For sometimes falling there!

"Work — work — ...Read more of this...
by Hood, Thomas
...uffer less from bad then from the good.
The sting is better drest and longer lasts,
As surfeits are more dangerous than fasts.
And to compleat the misery to us,
We see extreames are still contiguous.
And as we run so fast from what we hate,
Like Squibs on ropes, to know no middle state;
So (outward storms strengthen'd by us) we find
Our fortune as disordred as our mind.
But that's excus'd by this, it doth its part;
A treacherous world befits a treacherous heart.
All ill's our...Read more of this...
by Philips, Katherine

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Book: Radiant Verses: A Journey Through Inspiring Poetry