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Famous For Children Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Aiken, Conrad
...agination dreams of thought.
But of the heart beneath the winecup moon
the tears that fell beneath the winecup moon
for children lost, lost lovers, and lost friends,
what can we say but that it never ends?
Even for us it never ends, only begins.
Yet to spell down the poem on her page,
margining her phrases, parsing forth
the sevenfold prism of meaning, up the scale
from chicory pink to blue, is to assume
Li Po himself: as he before assumed
the poets and the sages who ...Read more of this...



by Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns)
...nd time, between
Hour and hour, word and word, power and power, those who wait
In darkness? Will the veiled sister pray
For children at the gate
Who will not go away and cannot pray:
Pray for those who chose and oppose

O my people, what have I done unto thee.

Will the veiled sister between the slender
Yew trees pray for those who offend her
And are terrified and cannot surrender
And affirm before the world and deny between the rocks
In the last desert before the last bl...Read more of this...

by von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang
...g us a ballad, the tale then repeat,

'Till brother and I learn it right;
We long have been hoping a minstrel to meet,

For children hear tales with delight.

"At midnight, when darkness its fearful veil weaves,
His lofty and stately old castle he leaves,

But first he has buried his wealth.
What figure is that in his arms one perceives,

As the Count quits the gateway by stealth?
O'er what is his mantle so hastily thrown?

What bears he along in his flight?
A daughte...Read more of this...

by Carman, Bliss
...to be
Found by the stranger and brought over sea,
A marvel and delight
To ease the noon and pierce the dark blue night,
For children such as he.

He learns the silver strain
Wherewith the ghostly houses of gray rain
And lonely valleys ring,
When the untroubled whitethroats make the spring
A world without a stain;

Then on his river reed,
With strange and unsuspected notes that plead
Of their own wild accord
For utterances no bird's throat could afford,
Lifts it to human n...Read more of this...

by Robinson, Edwin Arlington
...I heard one who said: "Verily, 
What word have I for children here? 
Your Dollar is your only Word, 
The wrath of it your only fear. 

"You build it altars tall enough 
To make you see but you are blind; 
You cannot leave it long enough 
To look before you or behind. 

"When Reason beckons you to pause, 
You laugh and say that you know best; 
But what it is you know, you keep 
As dark as ingots in ...Read more of this...



by Jeffers, Robinson
...ion of all hopes
That starred man's forhead. Tyranny for freedom, horror for 
 happiness, famine for bread, carrion for children.
Reason will not decide at last, the sword will decide.

Dear God, who are the whole splendor of things and the sacred 
 stars, but also the cruelty and greed, the treacheries
And vileness, insanities and filth and anguish: now that this 
 thing comes near us again I am finding it hard
To praise you with a whole heart.
I know what pa...Read more of this...

by Lowell, Robert
...(I.R.A. Bombing)

The British Army now carries two rifles,
one with rubber rabbit-pellets for children,
the other's of course for the Provisionals....
'When they first showed me the boy, I thought oh good,
it's not him because he's blonde—
I imagine his hair was singed dark by the bomb.
He had nothing on him to identify him,
except this box of joke trick matches;
he liked to have them on him, even at mass.
The police were ...Read more of this...

by Levine, Philip
...winds 
off the moon. No one is awake and yet 
sunlight streams across 
the hundred still beds 
of the public wards 
for children. At ten 
do we truly sleep 
in a blessed sleep 
guarded by angels 
and social workers? 
Do we dream of gold 
found in secret trunks 
in familiar rooms? 
Do we talk to cats 
and dogs? I think not. 
I think when I was 
ten I was almost 
an adult, slightly 
less sentimental 
than now and better 
with figures. No one 
could force me to c...Read more of this...

by McGonagall, William Topaz
...ous shouts of children does rend the air,
While the boats sail along with them o'er Lohengrin Lake,
And fare is 5 cents for children, and adults ten is all they take. 

And there's also summer-house shades, and merry-go-rounds
And with the merry laughter of the children the Park resounds,
During the live-long Sabbath day
Enjoying themselves at the merry-go-round play. 

Then there's the elevated railroads abont five storeys high,
Which the inhabitants can hear night a...Read more of this...

by Yeats, William Butler
...gh,
For when we have blamed the wind we can blame love;
Or, if there needs be more, be nothing said
That would be harsh for children that have strayed....Read more of this...

by Cowper, William
...Gracious Lord, our children see,
By Thy mercy we are free;
But shall these, alas! remain
Subjects still of Satan's reign?
Israel's young ones, when of old
Pharaoh threaten'd to withhold,
Then Thy messenger said, "No;
Let the children also go!"

When the angel of the Lord,
Drawing forth his dreadful sword,
Slew with an avenging hand,
All the first-born of t...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...d oh what not in man
Deceivable and vain! Nay what thing good 
Pray'd for, but often proves our woe, our bane?
I pray'd for Children, and thought barrenness
In wedlock a reproach; I gain'd a Son,
And such a Son as all Men hail'd me happy;
Who would be now a Father in my stead?
O wherefore did God grant me my request,
And as a blessing with such pomp adorn'd?
Why are his gifts desirable, to tempt
Our earnest Prayers, then giv'n with solemn hand
As Graces, draw a Scorpions tail...Read more of this...

by Frost, Robert
...ould come?
That’s what for reasons I should like to know—
If you can comfort me by any answer.”

“Oh, but war’s not for children—it’s for men.”

“Now we are digging almost down to China.
My dears, my dears, you thought that—we all thought it.
So your mistake was ours. Haven’t you heard, though,
About the ships where war has found them out
At sea, about the towns where war has come
Through opening clouds at night with droning speed
Further o’erhead than all...Read more of this...

by Yeats, William Butler
...moon is staggering in the sky;
Moon-struck by the despairing
Glances of her wandering eye
We grope, and grope in vain,
For children born of her pain.

Children dazed or dead!
When she in all her virginal pride
First trod on the mountain's head
What stir ran through the countryside
Where every foot obeyed her glance!
What manhood led the dance!

Fly-catchers of the moon,
Our hands are blenched, our fingers seem
But slender needles of bone;
Blenched by that malicious dream...Read more of this...

by Bradstreet, Anne
...rich, I'm urged then to gather more
4.20 To bear me out i' th' world and feed the poor;
4.21 If a father, then for children must provide,
4.22 But if none, then for kindred near ally'd;
4.23 If Noble, then mine honour to maintain;
4.24 If not, yet wealth, Nobility can gain.
4.25 For time, for place, likewise for each relation,
4.26 I wanted not my ready allegation.
4.27 Yet all my powers for self-ends are not spent,
4.28 For hundre...Read more of this...

by Masters, Edgar Lee
...assed in a fever,
One was burned in a mine,
One was killed in a brawl,
One died in jail,
One fell from a bridge toiling for children and wife--
All, all are sleeping, sleeping, sleeping on the hill.

Where are Ella, Kate, Mag, Lizzie, and Edith,
The tender heart, the simple soul, the loud, the proud, the happy one?--
All, all, are sleeping on the hill.

One died in shameful child-birth,
One of a thwarted love,
One at the hands of a brute in a brothel,
One of a broken ...Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...ike a God's, 
Have we not made ourself the sacrifice? 
You are bold indeed: we are not talked to thus: 
Yet will we say for children, would they grew 
Like field-flowers everywhere! we like them well: 
But children die; and let me tell you, girl, 
Howe'er you babble, great deeds cannot die; 
They with the sun and moon renew their light 
For ever, blessing those that look on them. 
Children--that men may pluck them from our hearts, 
Kill us with pity, break us with ourselv...Read more of this...

by Yeats, William Butler
...at race were run
And these things came, So much the more thereby
Have you made greatness your companion,
Although it be for children that you sigh:
These are the clouds about the fallen sun,
The majesty that shuts his burning eye....Read more of this...

by Jeffers, Robinson
...The best is, in war or faction or ordinary vindictive
 life, not to take sides.
Leave it for children, and the emotional rabble of the
 streets, to back their horse or support a brawler.

But if you are forced into it: remember that good and
 evil are as common as air, and like air shared
By the panting belligerents; the moral indignation that
 hoarsens orators is mostly a fool.

Hold your nose and compromise; keep a cold mind. Fight...Read more of this...

by Sassoon, Siegfried
...s crucified for ever—those poor arms enfolding 
The life, the consummation that had been denied you? 
I too have longed for children. Ah, but you must not weep. 
Something I have to whisper as I kneel beside you... 
And you must pray for me before you fall asleep....Read more of this...

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Book: Reflection on the Important Things