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Famous Genial Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Masefield, John
...iet hornpipe as the old salts taught us to. 

O! the fiddle on the fo'c'sle, and the slapping naked soles, 
And the genial "Down the middle, Jake, and curtsey when she rolls!" 
With the silver seas around us and the pale moon overhead, 
And the look-out not a-looking and his pipe-bowl glowing red. 

Ah! the pig-tailed, quidding pirates and the pretty pranks we played, 
All have since been put a stop to by the naughty Board of Trade; 
The schooners and the merry crews ...Read more of this...



by Brackenridge, Hugh Henry
...th the pole in dancing beams of light, 
Playing its gambols on the northern hills. 
That light is vain and gives no genial heat, 
To warm the tenants of those frozen climes, 
Or give that heav'nly vigour to the soul, 
Which truth divine and revelation brings; 
And but for which each heart must still remain, 
Hard as the rock on Scandanavia's shore, 
Cold as the ice which bridges up her streams, 
Fierce as the storm which tempests all her waves. 


Thus in its dawn did...Read more of this...

by Gray, Thomas
...her ample page,
Rich with the spoils of Time, did ne'er unroll;
Chill Penury repressed their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of the soul.

Full many a gem of purest ray serene
The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear;
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Some village-Hampden that with dauntless breast
The little tyrant of his fields withstood,
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,
Some Cromwell, guiltles...Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...riefs
Like his have worse or better, Enoch saw. 

For cups and silver on the burnish'd board
Sparkled and shone; so genial was the hearth:
And on the right hand of the hearth he saw
Philip, the slighted suitor of old times,
Stout, rosy, with his babe across his knees;
And o'er her second father stoopt a girl,
A later but a loftier Annie Lee,
Fair-hair'd and tall, and from her lifted hand
Dangled a length of ribbon and a ring
To tempt the babe, who rear'd his creasy arms,
...Read more of this...

by Pope, Alexander
...r what end the heav'nly bodies shine, 
Earth for whose use? Pride answers, "Tis for mine: 
For me kind Nature wakes her genial pow'r, 
Suckles each herb, and spreads out ev'ry flow'r; 
Annual for me, the grape, the rose renew 
The juice nectareous, and the balmy dew; 
For me, the mine a thousand treasures brings; 
For me, health gushes from a thousand springs; 
Seas roll to waft me, suns to light me rise; 
My foot-stool earth, my canopy the skies." 
But errs not Nature fr...Read more of this...



by Wordsworth, William
...ing. 

                                   Nor perchance,
If I were not thus taught, should I the more
Suffer my genial spirits to decay:
For thou art with me here upon the banks
Of this fair river; thou my dearest Friend,
My dear, dear Friend; and in thy voice I catch
The language of my former heart, and read
My former pleasures in the shooting lights
Of thy wild eyes.  Oh! yet a little while
May I behold in thee what I was once,
My dear, dear Sister! and ...Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...rse -- 
Ay, and this Kypris also -- did I take
That popular name of thine to shadow forth
The all-generating powers and genial heat
Of Nature, when she strikes thro' the thick blood
Of cattle, and light is large, and lambs are glad
Nosing the mother's udder, and the bird
Makes his heart voice amid the blaze of flowers;
Which things appear the work of mighty Gods.

"The Gods! and if I go my work is left
Unfinish'd -- if I go. The Gods, who haunt
The lucid interspace of...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...weet-smelling herbs, 
Espoused Eve decked first her nuptial bed; 
And heavenly quires the hymenaean sung, 
What day the genial Angel to our sire 
Brought her in naked beauty more adorned, 
More lovely, than Pandora, whom the Gods 
Endowed with all their gifts, and O! too like 
In sad event, when to the unwiser son 
Of Japhet brought by Hermes, she ensnared 
Mankind with her fair looks, to be avenged 
On him who had stole Jove's authentick fire. 
Thus, at their shady lodge...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...idle; but, with warm 
Prolifick humour softening all her globe, 
Fermented the great mother to conceive, 
Satiate with genial moisture; when God said, 
Be gathered now ye waters under Heaven 
Into one place, and let dry land appear. 
Immediately the mountains huge appear 
Emergent, and their broad bare backs upheave 
Into the clouds; their tops ascend the sky: 
So high as heaved the tumid hills, so low 
Down sunk a hollow bottom broad and deep, 
Capacious bed of waters: ...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...replied. 
Neither her outside formed so fair, nor aught 
In procreation common to all kinds, 
(Though higher of the genial bed by far, 
And with mysterious reverence I deem,) 
So much delights me, as those graceful acts, 
Those thousand decencies, that daily flow 
From all her words and actions mixed with love 
And sweet compliance, which declare unfeigned 
Union of mind, or in us both one soul; 
Harmony to behold in wedded pair 
More grateful than harmonious sound to the...Read more of this...

by Wordsworth, William
...lived in pleasant thought, 
As if life's business were a summer mood; 
As if all needful things would come unsought 
To genial faith, still rich in genial good; 
But how can He expect that others should 
Build for him, sow for him, and at his call 
Love him, who for himself will take no heed at all? 

VII 

I thought of Chatterton, the marvellous Boy, 
The sleepless Soul that perished in his pride; 
Of Him who walked in glory and in joy 
Following his plough, along the mounta...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...eat with light,
Nor th' other light of life continue long,
But yield to double darkness nigh at hand:
So much I feel my genial spirits droop,
My hopes all flat, nature within me seems
In all her functions weary of herself;
My race of glory run, and race of shame,
And I shall shortly be with them that rest.

Man. Believe not these suggestions which proceed
From anguish of the mind and humours black, 
That mingle with thy fancy. I however
Must not omit a Fathers tim...Read more of this...

by Bronte, Anne
...he shuddering heart.
Love may be full of pain, but still,
'Tis sad to see it so depart, -­
To watch that fire whose genial glow
Was formed to comfort and to cheer,
For want of fuel, fading so,
Sinking to embers dull and drear, -­
To see the soft soil turned to stone
For lack of kindly showers, -­
To see those yearnings of the breast,
Pining to bless and to be blessed,
Drop withered, frozen one by one,
Till, centred in itself alone,
It wastes its blighted powers. 

Oh,...Read more of this...

by Whittier, John Greenleaf
...h all the poor details 
And homespuun warp of circumstance 
A golden woof-thread of romance. 
For well she kept her genial mood 
And simple faith of maidenhood; 
Before her still a cloud-land lay, 
The mirage loomed across her way; 
The morning dew, that dries so soon 
With others, glistened at her noon; 
Through years of toil and soil and care, 
From glossy tress to thin gray hair, 
All unprofaned she held apart 
The virgin fancies of the heart. 
Be shame to him of w...Read more of this...

by Wordsworth, William
...secure,  In depth of forest glade, when jocund June  Rolled fast along the sky his warm and genial moon.   But ill it suited me, in journey dark  O'er moor and mountain, midnight theft to hatch;  To charm the surly house-dog's faithful bark,  Or hang on tiptoe at the lifted latch;  The gloomy lantern, and the dim blue match,  The black disguise, the warning w...Read more of this...

by Carroll, Lewis
...loped in absolute mystery,
And without extra charge I will give you at large
 A Lesson in Natural History."

In his genial way he proceeded to say
 (Forgetting all laws of propriety,
And that giving instruction, without introduction,
 Would have caused quite a thrill in Society),

"As to temper the Jubjub's a desperate bird,
 Since it lives in perpetual passion:
Its taste in costume is entirely absurd--
 It is ages ahead of the fashion:

"But it knows any friend it has me...Read more of this...

by Scott, Sir Walter
...ay;
     And while yon little bark glides down the bay,
          Wafting the stranger on his way again,
     Morn's genial influence roused a minstrel gray,
          And sweetly o'er the lake was heard thy strain,
     Mixed with the sounding harp, O white-haired Allan-bane!
     II.

     Song.

     'Not faster yonder rowers' might
          Flings from their oars the spray,
     Not faster yonder rippling bright,
     That tracks the shallop's course in ligh...Read more of this...

by Warton, Thomas
...ummit, where thou dwell´st
Remote from man, conversing with the spheres!
O, lead me, queen sublime, to solemn glooms
Congenial with my soul; to cheerless shades,
To ruin´d seats, to twilight cells and bowers,
Where thoughtful Melancholy loves to muse
Her favorite midnight haunts. The laughing scenes
Of purple Spring, where all the wanton train
Of Smiles and Graces seem to lead the dance
In sportive round, while from their hands they shower
Ambrosial blooms and flowers, no...Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...smiles at our disguise 
Broke from their lips, and, ere the windy jest 
Had laboured down within his ample lungs, 
The genial giant, Arac, rolled himself 
Thrice in the saddle, then burst out in words. 

'Our land invaded, 'sdeath! and he himself 
Your captive, yet my father wills not war: 
And, 'sdeath! myself, what care I, war or no? 
but then this question of your troth remains: 
And there's a downright honest meaning in her; 
She flies too high, she flies too high! a...Read more of this...

by Thomson, James
...lling, onward to the Southern Sky.

BEHOLD! the well-pois'd Hornet, hovering, hangs,
With quivering Pinions, in the genial Blaze;
Flys off, in airy Circles: then returns, 
And hums, and dances to the beating Ray.
Nor shall the Man, that, musing, walks alone,
And, heedless, strays within his radiant Lists,
Go unchastis'd away. -- Sometimes, a Fleece
Of Clouds, wide-scattering, with a lucid Veil, 
Soft, shadow o'er th'unruffled Face of Heaven;
And, thro' their dewy ...Read more of this...

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