Famous Frowned Poems by Famous Poets

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

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The Ballad of the Anti-Puritan

by G K Chesterton
 They spoke of Progress spiring round, 
Of light and Mrs Humphrey Ward-- 
It is not true to say I frowned, 
Or ran about the room and roared; 
I might have simply sat and snored-- 
I rose politely in the club 
And said, `I feel a little bored; 
Will someone take me to a pub?' 

The new world's wisest did...Read more of this...

My Comrade

by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
 Out from my window westward 
I turn full oft my face; 
But the mountains rebuke the vision 
That would encompass space; 
They lift their lofty foreheads 
To the kiss of the clouds above, 
And ask, "With all our glory, 
Can we not win your love?"

I answer, "No, oh mountains! 
I see that you are grand; 
But you have not...Read more of this...

Archibalds Example

by Edwin Arlington Robinson
 Old Archibald, in his eternal chair,
Where trespassers, whatever their degree, 
Were soon frowned out again, was looking off 
Across the clover when he said to me: 

“My green hill yonder, where the sun goes down
Without a scratch, was once inhabited 
By trees that injured him—an evil trash 
That made a cage, and held him while he bled. 

“Gone fifty...Read more of this...

Merlin

by Edwin Arlington Robinson
 “Gawaine, Gawaine, what look ye for to see, 
So far beyond the faint edge of the world? 
D’ye look to see the lady Vivian, 
Pursued by divers ominous vile demons 
That have another king more fierce than ours?
Or think ye that if ye look far enough 
And hard enough into the feathery west 
Ye’ll have a glimmer of the...Read more of this...

Cripples And Other Stories

by Anne Sexton
 My doctor, the comedian
I called you every time
and made you laugh yourself
when I wrote this silly rhyme...


 Each time I give lectures
 or gather in the grants
 you send me off to boarding school
 in training pants.

God damn it, father-doctor,
I'm really thirty-six.
I see dead rats in the toilet.
I'm one of the lunatics.

Disgusted, mother put me
on the potty. She was...Read more of this...

The Sleepers

by William Henry Davies
 As I walked down the waterside 
This silent morning, wet and dark; 
Before the cocks in farmyards crowed, 
Before the dogs began to bark; 
Before the hour of five was struck 
By old Westminster's mighty clock:

As I walked down the waterside 
This morning, in the cold damp air, 
I was a hundred women and men 
Huddled in rags and...Read more of this...

Nirvana

by Sidney Lanier
 Through seas of dreams and seas of phantasies,
Through seas of solitudes and vacancies,
And through my Self, the deepest of the seas,
I strive to thee, Nirvana.

Oh long ago the billow-flow of sense,
Aroused by passion's windy vehemence,
Upbore me out of depths to heights intense,
But not to thee, Nirvana.

By waves swept on, I learned to ride the waves.
I served my masters till...Read more of this...

An Ode

by Matthew Prior
 The merchant, to secure his treasure, 
Conveys it in a borrowed name: 
Euphelia serves to grace my measure; 
But Cloe is my real flame.

My softest verse, my darling lyre 
Upon Euphelia's toilet lay; 
When Cloe noted her desire, 
That I should sing, that I should play.

My lyre I tune, my voice I raise; 
But with my numbers mix my...Read more of this...

The Roaring Days

by Henry Lawson
 The night too quickly passes 
And we are growing old, 
So let us fill our glasses 
And toast the Days of Gold; 
When finds of wondrous treasure 
Set all the South ablaze, 
And you and I were faithful mates 
All through the roaring days! 

Then stately ships came sailing 
From every harbour's mouth, 
And sought the land of promise...Read more of this...

The Farmers Daughter

by Robert William Service
 The Rector met a little lass
Who led a heifer by a rope.
Said he: "Why don't you go to Mass?
Do you not want to please the Pope?"

The village maiden made reply,
As on the rope she ceased to pull:
"My father said this morning I
Must take Paquerette to see the bull."

The Rector frowned. ";Tis wrong, I wist
To leave your prayer-book on the...Read more of this...

Strange Meeting

by Wilfred Owen
 It seemed that out of the battle I escaped
Down some profound dull tunnel, long since scooped
Through granites which Titanic wars had groined.
Yet also there encumbered sleepers groaned,
Too fast in thought or death to be bestirred.
Then, as I probed them, one sprang up, and stared
With piteous recognition in fixed eyes,
Lifting distressful hands as if to bless.
And by his smile, I...Read more of this...

The Conquerors Grave

by William Cullen Bryant
WITHIN this lowly grave a Conqueror lies  
And yet the monument proclaims it not  
Nor round the sleeper's name hath chisel wrought 
The emblems of a fame that never dies ¡ª 
Ivy and amaranth in a graceful sheaf 5 
Twined with the laurel's fair imperial leaf. 
A simple name alone  
To the great world unknown  
Is...Read more of this...

PSALM 105 Abridged

by Isaac Watts
 God's conduct of Israel, and the plagues of Egypt.

Give thanks to God, invoke his name,
And tell the world his grace;
Sound through the earth his deeds of fame,
That all may seek his face.

His cov'nant, which he kept in mind
For num'rous ages past,
To num'rous ages yet behind
In equal force shall last.

He sware to Abraham and his seed,
And made the blessing sure;
Gentiles...Read more of this...

The Scorcher and the Howling Swell

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 The Scorcher and the Howling Swell were riding through the land; 
They wept like anything to see the hills on every hand; 
"If these were only levelled down," they said, "it would be grand." 

"If every bloke that rides a bike put in a half-a-crown, 
Do you suppose," the Scorcher said, "that that would cut them down?" 
"I doubt...Read more of this...

The Whitsun Weddings

by Philip Larkin
 That Whitsun, I was late getting away:
 Not till about
One-twenty on the sunlit Saturday 
Did my three-quarters-empty train pull out,
All windows down, all cushions hot, all sense
Of being in a hurry gone. We ran 
Behind the backs of houses, crossed a street
Of blinding windscreens, smelt the fish-dock; thence 
The river's level drifting breadth began, 
Where sky and Lincolnshire and...Read more of this...

Mother and child

by Eugene Field
 One night a tiny dewdrop fell
Into the bosom of a rose,--
"Dear little one, I love thee well,
Be ever here thy sweet repose!"

Seeing the rose with love bedight,
The envious sky frowned dark, and then
Sent forth a messenger of light
And caught the dewdrop up again.

"Oh, give me back my heavenly child,--
My love!" the rose in anguish cried;
Alas! the sky triumphant smiled,
And...Read more of this...

Call It a Good Marriage

by Robert Graves
 Call it a good marriage - 
For no one ever questioned 
Her warmth, his masculinity,
Their interlocking views;
Except one stray graphologist
Who frowned in speculation 
At her h's and her s's, 
His p's and w's.

Though few would still subscribe
To the monogamic axiom
That strife below the hip-bones
Need not estrange the heart,
Call it a good marriage:
More drew those two together,
Despite a lack of...Read more of this...

Halls grew darker

by Aleksandr Blok
 Halls grew darker and somehow faded. 
Grates of windows drowned in black. 
Every knight, every beautiful lady 
Knew the tiding: "The Queen's deadly sick." 

And the king, very silent and frowned, 
Passed the doors, lost of pages and slaves ... 
Every word, that by chance cast around, 
Proved the truth of the closing grave. 

By the doors of the...Read more of this...

Elegy Written In A Country Churchyard

by Thomas Gray
 The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea,
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;

Save that from yonder...Read more of this...

Ione

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Ah, yes, 't is sweet still to remember,
Though 'twere less painful to forget;
For while my heart glows like an ember,
Mine eyes with sorrow's drops are wet,
And, oh, my heart is aching yet.
[Pg 32]It is a law of mortal pain
That old wounds, long accounted well,
Beneath the memory's potent spell,
Will wake to life and bleed again.
So 't is with me;...Read more of this...

Change

by Barry Tebb
 As milled silver I was welcome

In every gutter, tinkling over cobbles

I rang the truth loudly on solid-oak counters

And tills tolled for me clear as bells.



Boldly I gave myself to many,

Slipped from moist palm to pocket,

Pirouetting without points, jingling

With dull coppers and important keys.



First I was lost in a hundred

Children’s essays, found myself

With pearls in secret pockets,

Counterfeit and shiny.

Then I...Read more of this...

The Merchant To Secure His Treasure

by Matthew Prior
 The merchant, to secure his treasure,
Conveys it in a borrowed name:
Euphelia serves to grace my measure,
But Cloe is my real flame.

My softest verse, my darling lyre
Upon Euphelia's toilet lay— 
When Cloe noted her desire
That I should sing, that I should play.

My lyre I tune, my voice I raise,
But with my numbers mix my sighs;
And whilst I sing Euphelia's praise,
I...Read more of this...

The Dead Village

by Edwin Arlington Robinson
 Here there is death. But even here, they say, 
Here where the dull sun shines this afternoon 
As desolate as ever the dead moon 
Did glimmer on dead Sardis, men were gay; 
And there were little children here to play,
With small soft hands that once did keep in tune 
The strings that stretch from heaven, till too soon 
The...Read more of this...

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