Famous Foe Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Foe poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous foe poems. These examples illustrate what a famous foe poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Isaac Watts
God's wonders of creation, providence, redemption of Israel, and salvation of his people.
Give thanks to God the sovereign Lord;
His mercies still endure;
And be the King of kings adored;
His truth is ever sure.
What wonders hath his wisdom done!
How mighty is his hand!
Heav'n, earth, and sea, he framed alone;
How wide is his command
The sun supplies the day with light;
How bright his...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
From mosque an outcast, and to church a foe,
Allah! of what clay didst thou form me so?
Like sceptic monk, or ugly courtesan,
No hopes have I above, no joys below....Read more of this...
by
Thomas Campbell
1 Ye Mariners of England
2 That guard our native seas,
3 Whose flag has braved, a thousand years,
4 The battle and the breeze--
5 Your glorious standard launch again
6 To match another foe!
7 And sweep through the deep,
8 While the stormy winds do blow,--
9 While the battle rages loud and long,
10 And the stormy winds do blow.
11 The spirits of your...Read more of this...
by
Phillis Wheatley
WHILE an intrinsic ardor prompts to write,
The muses promise to assist my pen;
'Twas not long since I left my native shore
The land of errors, and Egyptain gloom:
Father of mercy, 'twas thy gracious hand
Brought me in safety from those dark abodes.
Students, to you 'tis giv'n to scan the heights
Above, to traverse the ethereal space,
And mark the systems of revolving worlds.
Still...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
It isn't the foe that we fear;
It isn't the bullets that whine;
It isn't the business career
Of a shell, or the bust of a mine;
It isn't the snipers who seek
To nip our young hopes in the bud:
No, it isn't the guns,
And it isn't the Huns --
It's the MUD,
MUD,
MUD.
It isn't the melee we mind.
That often...Read more of this...
by
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
THESE are the most singular of all the Poems
of Goethe, and to many will appear so wild and fantastic, as to
leave anything but a pleasing impression. Those at the beginning,
addressed to his friend Behrisch, were written at the age of eighteen,
and most of the remainder were composed while he was still quite
young. Despite, however,...Read more of this...
by
George (Lord) Byron
When Friendship or Love
Our sympathies move;
When Truth, in a glance, should appear,
The lips may beguile,
With a dimple or smile,
But the test of affection's a Tear:
Too oft is a smile
But the hypocrite's wile,
To mask detestation, or fear;
Give me the soft sigh,
Whilst the soultelling eye
Is dimm'd, for a time, with a Tear:
Mild Charity's glow,
To us mortals below,
Shows the soul from barbarity...Read more of this...
by
Vachel Lindsay
(Being a Chant of the American Soap-Box and the Russian Revolution.)
O market square, O slattern place,
Is glory in your slack disgrace?
Plump quack doctors sell their pills,
Gentle grafters sell brass watches,
Silly anarchists yell their ills.
Shall we be as weird as these?
In the breezes nod and wheeze?
Heaven's mass is sung,
Tomorrow's mass is sung
In a spirit tongue
By wind and...Read more of this...
by
Isaac Watts
Christian virtues; or, The difficulty of conversion.
Strait is the way, the door is strait,
That leads to joys on high;
'Tis but a few that find the gate,
While crowds mistake, and die.
Beloved self must be denied,
The mind and will renewed
Passion suppressed, and patience tried,
And vain desires subdued.
[Flesh is a dangerous foe to grace,
Where it prevails and rules;
Flesh must be humbled, pride...Read more of this...
by
William Topaz McGonagall
'Twas about the beginning of the past century
Billy Bowls was pressed into the British Navy,
And conveyed on board the "Waterwitch" without delay,
Scarce getting time to bid farewell to the villagers of Fairway.
And once on board the "Waterwitch" he resolved to do his duty,
And if he returned safe home he'd marry Nelly Blyth, his beauty;
And he'd fight for old...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
There where the mighty mountains bare their fangs unto the moon,
There where the sullen sun-dogs glare in the snow-bright, bitter noon,
And the glacier-glutted streams sweep down at the clarion call of June.
There where the livid tundras keep their tryst with the tranquil snows;
There where the silences are spawned, and the light of hell-fire flows
Into the bowl of the midnight...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
My Wars are laid away in Books --
I have one Battle more --
A Foe whom I have never seen
But oft has scanned me o'er --
And hesitated me between
And others at my side,
But chose the best -- Neglecting me -- till
All the rest, have died --
How sweet if I am not forgot
By Chums that passed away --
Since Playmates at threescore...Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
A Belgian Priest-Soldier Speaks;
GURR! You cochon! Stand and fight!
Show your mettle! Snarl and bite!
Spawn of an accursed race,
Turn and meet me face to face!
Here amid the wreck and rout
Let us grip and have it out!
Here where ruins rock and reel
Let us settle, steel to steel!
Look! Our houses, how they spit
Sparks from brands your friends have lit.
See! Our gutters running...Read more of this...
by
Friedrich von Schiller
Dearly I love a friend; yet a foe I may turn to my profit;
Friends show me that which I can; foes teach me that which I should....Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
Long since, in sore distress, I heard one pray,
"Lord, who prevailest with resistless might,
Ever from war and strife keep me away,
My battles fight!"
I know not if I play the Pharisee,
And if my brother after all be right;
But mine shall be the warrior's plea to thee—
Strength for the fight.
I do not ask that thou shalt front the fray,
And drive the warring...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Is a friend faithless? spurn him as a foe;
Upon trustworthy foes respect bestow;
Hold healing poison for an antidote,
And baneful sweets for deadly eisel know....Read more of this...
by
Percy Bysshe Shelley
I hated thee, fallen tyrant! I did groan
To think that a most unambitious slave,
Like thou, shouldst dance and revel on the grave
Of Liberty. Thou mightst have built thy throne
Where it had stood even now: thou didst prefer
A frail and bloody pomp which Time has swept
In fragments towards Oblivion. Massacre,
For this I prayed,...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
My comrades all are gone; Death, deadly foe,
Has caught them one by one, and trampled low;
They shared life's feast, and drank its wine with me,
But lost their heads, and dropped a while ago....Read more of this...
by
Anne Kingsmill Finch
At last, my old inveterate foe,
No opposition shalt thou know.
Since I by struggling, can obtain
Nothing, but encrease of pain,
I will att last, no more do soe,
Tho' I confesse, I have apply'd
Sweet mirth, and musick, and have try'd
A thousand other arts beside,
To drive thee from my darken'd breast,
Thou, who hast banish'd all my rest.
But, though sometimes, a short repreive...Read more of this...
by
Ezra Pound
For God, our God is a gallant foe
That playeth behind the veil.
I have loved my God as a child at heart
That seeketh deep bosoms for rest,
I have loved my God as a maid to man—
But lo, this thing is best:
To love your God as a gallant foe that plays behind the veil;
To...Read more of this...
by
William Topaz McGonagall
Ye Sons of Great Britain! come join with me
And King in praise of the gallant British Armie,
That behaved right manfully in the Soudan,
At the great battle of Omdurman.
'Twas in the year of 1898, and on the 2nd of September,
Which the Khalifa and his surviving followers will long remember,
Because Sir Herbert Kitchener has annihilated them outright,
By the British troops...Read more of this...
by
Anne Kingsmill Finch
WITH such a Pulse, with such disorder'd Veins,
Such lab'ring Breath, as thy Disease constrains;
With failing Eyes, that scarce the Light endure,
(So long unclos'd, they've watch'd thy doubtful Cure)
To his Hephaestion Alexander writes,
To soothe thy Days, and wing thy sleepless Nights,
I send thee Love: Oh! that I could impart,
As well my vital Spirits...Read more of this...
by
Friedrich von Schiller
Upon his battlements he stood,
And downward gazed in joyous mood,
On Samos' Isle, that owned his sway,
"All this is subject to my yoke;"
To Egypt's monarch thus he spoke,--
"That I am truly blest, then, say!"
"The immortals' favor thou hast known!
Thy sceptre's might has overthrown
All those who once were like to thee.
Yet to avenge them one lives still;
I cannot call thee blest,...Read more of this...
by
Rudyard Kipling
1919
As I pass through my incarnations in every age and race,
Make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market-Place.
'eering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all.
Ne were living in trees when they met us. They showed us each in turn
That Water would certainly wet us,...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
From right and left the censors came and stood,
Saying, «Renounce this wine, this foe of good»;
But if wine be the foe of holy faith,
By Allah, right it is to drink its blood!...Read more of this...
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