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Famous Gentle Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Book: Radiant Verses: A Journey Through Inspiring Poetry
...t,
And bastards of his foul adulterate heart.

'And long upon these terms I held my city,
Till thus he gan besiege me: 'Gentle maid,
Have of my suffering youth some feeling pity,
And be not of my holy vows afraid:
That's to ye sworn to none was ever said;
For feasts of love I have been call'd unto,
Till now did ne'er invite, nor never woo.

''All my offences that abroad you see
Are errors of the blood, none of the mind;
Love made them not: with acture they may be,
Where neith...Read more of this...
by Shakespeare, William



...Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green b...Read more of this...
by Thomas, Dylan
...ct Bellefontaine, the wealthiest farmer of Grand-Pre,
Dwelt on his goodly acres: and with him, directing his household,
Gentle Evangeline lived, his child, and the pride of the village.
Stalworth and stately in form was the man of seventy winters;
Hearty and hale was he, an oak that is covered with snow-flakes;
White as the snow were his locks, and his cheeks as brown as the oak-leaves.
Fair was she to behold, that maiden of seventeen summers.
Black were her eyes as the berry...Read more of this...
by Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
...suns which never rise.

The quenched-out torch, the lonely cypress-gloom,
The little dust stored in the narrow urn,
The gentle XAIPE of the Attic tomb, -
Were not these better far than to return
To my old fitful restless malady,
Or spend my days within the voiceless cave of misery?

Nay! for perchance that poppy-crowned god
Is like the watcher by a sick man's bed
Who talks of sleep but gives it not; his rod
Hath lost its virtue, and, when all is said,
Death is too rude, too o...Read more of this...
by Wilde, Oscar
...I tell. Ravenna, on that shore 
 Where Po finds rest for all his streams, we knew; 
 And there love conquered. Love, in gentle heart 
 So quick to take dominion, overthrew 
 Him with my own fair body, and overbore 
 Me with delight to please him. Love, which gives 
 No pardon to the loved, so strongly in me 
 Was empired, that its rule, as here ye see, 
 Endureth, nor the bitter blast contrives 
 To part us. Love to one death led us. The mode 
 Afflicts me, shrinking, still. ...Read more of this...
by Alighieri, Dante



...nd the gay dance of bounding Beauty's train 
Links grace and harmony in happiest chain: 
Blest are the early hearts and gentle hands 
That mingle there in well according bands; 
It is a sight the careful brow might smooth, 
And make Age smile, and dream itself to youth, 
And Youth forget such hour was pass'd on earth, 
So springs the exulting bosom to that mirth! 

XXI. 

And Lara gazed on these sedately glad, 
His brow belied him if his soul was sad, 
And his glance follow'd...Read more of this...
by Byron, George (Lord)
...y Eve;   And Hopes, and Fears that kindle Hope,  An undistinguishable Throng!  And gentle Wishes long subdued,    Subdued and cherish'd long!   She wept with pity and delight,  She blush'd with love and maiden shame;  And, like the murmur of a dream,    I heard her breathe my name.   Her Bosom heav'd—she stepp'd aside;  As conscious of m...Read more of this...
by Wordsworth, William
...NEVER seek to tell thy love  
Love that never told can be; 
For the gentle wind doth move 
Silently invisibly.

I told my love I told my love 5 
I told her all my heart  
Trembling cold in ghastly fears.
Ah! she did depart! 

Soon after she was gone from me  
A traveller came by 10 
Silently invisibly: 
He took her with a sigh....Read more of this...
by Blake, William
...arch,
The cawing rooks, the wood-doves fluttering by,
The little clouds that race across the sky;
And fair the violet's gentle drooping head,
The primrose, pale for love uncomforted,
The rose that burgeons on the climbing briar,
The crocus-bed, (that seems a moon of fire
Round-girdled with a purple marriage-ring);
And all the flowers of our English Spring,
Fond snowdrops, and the bright-starred daffodil.
Up starts the lark beside the murmuring mill,
And breaks the gossamer-th...Read more of this...
by Wilde, Oscar
...woolly-pates hoe in the sugar-field, the overseer views them from his
 saddle; 
The bugle calls in the ball-room, the gentlemen run for their partners, the
 dancers bow to each other; 
The youth lies awake in the cedar-roof’d garret, and harks to the musical
 rain; 
The Wolverine sets traps on the creek that helps fill the Huron;
The squaw, wrapt in her yellow-hemm’d cloth, is offering moccasins and
 bead-bags for sale; 
The connoisseur peers along the exhibition-gal...Read more of this...
by Whitman, Walt
...ble of years,
And curdles a long life into one hour.

II

I saw two beings in the hues of youth
Standing upon a hill, a gentle hill,
Green and of mild declivity, the last
As 'twere the cape of a long ridge of such,
Save that there was no sea to lave its base,
But a most living landscape, and the wave
Of woods and corn-fields, and the abodes of men
Scattered at intervals, and wreathing smoke
Arising from such rustic roofs: the hill
Was crowned with a peculiar diadem
Of trees, ...Read more of this...
by Byron, George (Lord)
...to you will-tell,  For still, the more he works, the more  His poor old ancles swell.  My gentle reader, I perceive  How patiently you've waited,  And I'm afraid that you expect  Some tale will be related.   O reader! had you in your mind  Such stores as silent thought can bring,  O gentle reader! you would find  A tale in every thing.  What more I have to say ...Read more of this...
by Wordsworth, William
...r that might have misst
Thro' very care the gold at which I aim'd;
And am as happy but to hear thee named,
As are those gentle souls by angels kisst
In pictures seen leaving their marble cist
To go before the throne of grace unblamed. 
Nor surer am I water hath the skill
To quench my thirst, or that my strength is freed
In delicate ordination as I will,
Than that to be myself is all I need
For thee to be most mine: so I stand still,
And save to taste my joy no more take heed....Read more of this...
by Bridges, Robert Seymour
...   I to the muses have been bound  These fourteen years, by strong indentures:  Oh gentle muses! let me tell  But half of what to him befel,  For sure he met with strange adventures.   Oh gentle muses! is this kind  Why will ye thus my suit repel?  Why of your further aid bereave me?  And can ye thus unfriended leave me?  Ye muses! whom I love so well. &nbs...Read more of this...
by Wordsworth, William
...your honour;
But we beseechen mercy and succour.
Have mercy on our woe and our distress;
Some drop of pity, through thy gentleness,
Upon us wretched women let now fall.
For certes, lord, there is none of us all
That hath not been a duchess or a queen;
Now be we caitives*, as it is well seen: *captives
Thanked be Fortune, and her false wheel,
That *none estate ensureth to be wele*. *assures no continuance of
And certes, lord, t'abiden your presence prosperous estate*
Here in t...Read more of this...
by Chaucer, Geoffrey
...orn,
     Now on the gale her voice was borne:—
     'Father!' she cried; the rocks around
     Loved to prolong the gentle sound.
     Awhile she paused, no answer came;—
     'Malcolm, was thine the blast?' the name
     Less resolutely uttered fell,
     The echoes could not catch the swell.
     'A stranger I,' the Huntsman said,
     Advancing from the hazel shade.
     The maid, alarmed, with hasty oar
     Pushed her light shallop from the shore,
     And w...Read more of this...
by Scott, Sir Walter
...thers, yea: but not to thee." 

But when she saw him quail and quake,
And when he urged "For pity's sake!"
Once more in gentle tones she spake. 

"Thought in the mind doth still abide
That is by Intellect supplied,
And within that Idea doth hide: 

"And he, that yearns the truth to know,
Still further inwardly may go,
And find Idea from Notion flow: 

"And thus the chain, that sages sought,
Is to a glorious circle wrought,
For Notion hath its source in Thought." 

So passed t...Read more of this...
by Carroll, Lewis
...found myself asleep
Under a mountain which from unknown time
"Had yawned into a cavern high & deep,
And from it came a gentle rivulet
Whose water like clear air in its calm sweep
"Bent the soft grass & kept for ever wet
The stems of the sweet flowers, and filled the grove
With sound which all who hear must needs forget
"All pleasure & all pain, all hate & love,
Which they had known before that hour of rest:
A sleeping mother then would dream not of
"The only child who died u...Read more of this...
by Shelley, Percy Bysshe
...and what we do 
Above is more august; to judge of kings 
Is the tribunal met: so now you know.' 
'Then I presume those gentlemen with wings,' 
Said Wilkes, 'are cherubs; and that soul below 
Looks much like George the Third, but to my mind 
A good deal older — Bless me! is he blind?' 

LXIX 

'He is what you behold him, and his doom 
Depends upon his deeds,' the Angel said; 
'If you have aught to arraign in him, the tomb 
Give licence to the humblest beggar's head 
To lift i...Read more of this...
by Byron, George (Lord)
..., it atones 
For low-hung leaden skies, and rain and dim 
Moist fogs that paint the verdure on her stones 
And fill her gentle rivers to the brim. 
When the sun shines on England, shafts of light 
Fall on far towers and hills and dark old trees, 
And hedge-bound meadows of a green as bright— 
As bright as is the blue of tropic seas. 
When the sun shines, it is as if the face 
Of some proud man relaxed his haughty stare, 
And smiled upon us with a sudden grace, 
Flattering bec...Read more of this...
by Miller, Alice Duer

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Book: Radiant Verses: A Journey Through Inspiring Poetry