Famous Generosity Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Reflection On Caution

by Ogden Nash
 Affection is a noble quality;
It leads to generosity and jollity.
But it also leads to breach of promise
If you go around lavishing it on red-hot momise....Read more of this...

The Funeral of Youth: Threnody

by Rupert Brooke
 The Day that Youth had died,
There came to his grave-side, 
In decent mourning, from the country’s ends, 
Those scatter’d friends 
Who had lived the boon companions of his prime,
And laughed with him and sung with him and wasted, 
In feast and wine and many-crown’d carouse, 
The days and nights and dawnings of the time 
When Youth kept open house,...Read more of this...

Dream Song 79: Op. posth. no. 2

by John Berryman
 Whence flew the litter whereon he was laid?
Of what heroic stuff was warlock Henry made?
and questions of that sort
perplexed the bulging cosmos, O in short
was sandalwood in good supply when he
flared out of history

& the obituary in The New York Times
into the world of generosity
creating the air where are
& can be, only, heroes? Statues & rhymes
signal his fiery Passage,...Read more of this...

Octaves

by Edwin Arlington Robinson
 I 

We thrill too strangely at the master's touch;
We shrink too sadly from the larger self
Which for its own completeness agitates
And undetermines us; we do not feel -- 
We dare not feel it yet -- the splendid shame
Of uncreated failure; we forget,
The while we groan, that God's accomplishment
Is always and unfailingly at hand. 

II 

Tumultuously void of a clean...Read more of this...

Giving chapter V

by Kahlil Gibran
 Then said a rich man, "Speak to us of Giving." 

And he answered: 

You give but little when you give of your possessions. 

It is when you give of yourself that you truly give. 

For what are your possessions but things you keep and guard for fear you may need them tomorrow? 

And tomorrow, what shall tomorrow bring to...Read more of this...

The Choir Invisible

by George Eliot
 Oh, may I join the choir invisible 
Of those immortal dead who live again 
In minds made better by their presence; live 
In pulses stirred to generosity, 
In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn 
For miserable aims that end with self, 
In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like stars, 
And with their mild persistence urge men's search 
To...Read more of this...

Brother of All with Generous Hand

by Walt Whitman
 1
BROTHER of all, with generous hand, 
Of thee, pondering on thee, as o’er thy tomb, I and my Soul, 
A thought to launch in memory of thee, 
A burial verse for thee. 

What may we chant, O thou within this tomb?
What tablets, pictures, hang for thee, O millionaire? 
—The life thou lived’st we know not, 
But that thou walk’dst...Read more of this...

Funeral Of Youth The: Threnody

by Rupert Brooke
 The day that YOUTH had died,
There came to his grave-side,
In decent mourning, from the country's ends,
Those scatter'd friends
Who had lived the boon companions of his prime,
And laughed with him and sung with him and wasted,
In feast and wine and many-crown'd carouse,
The days and nights and dawnings of the time
When YOUTH kept open house,
Nor left untasted
Aught of his high emprise...Read more of this...

The City Limits

by A R Ammons
 When you consider the radiance, that it does not withhold
itself but pours its abundance without selection into every
nook and cranny not overhung or hidden; when you consider

that birds' bones make no awful noise against the light but
lie low in the light as in a high testimony; when you consider
the radiance, that it will look into the guiltiest

swervings of the...Read more of this...

Dream Song 324: An Elegy for W.C.W. the lovely man

by John Berryman
 Henry in Ireland to Bill underground:
Rest well, who worked so hard, who made a good sound
constantly, for so many years:
your high-jinks delighted the continents & our ears:
you had so many girls your life was a triumph
and you loved your one wife.

At dawn you rose & wrote-”the books poured forth-”
you delivered infinite babies, in one great birth-”
and your generosity
to juniors...Read more of this...

Be Lost In The Call

by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi
Lord, said David, since you do not need us,
why did you create these two worlds? Reality replied: O prisoner of time,
I was a secret treasure of kindness and generosity,
and I wished this treasure to be known,
so I created a mirror: its shining face, the heart;
its darkened back, the world;
The back would please you if you’ve never seen the face. Has...Read more of this...

He took a few cups of love

by Muhammad Ali
He took a few cups of love.
He took one tablespoon of patience,
One teaspoon of generosity,
One pint of kindness.
He took one quart of laughter,
One pinch of concern.
And then, he mixed willingness with happiness.
He added lots of faith,
And he stirred it up well.
Then he spread it over a span of a lifetime,
And he served it to each and every deserving person he...Read more of this...

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