Famous Get Down Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Look Down Fair Moon

by Walt Whitman
 LOOK down, fair moon, and bathe this scene; 
Pour softly down night’s nimbus floods, on faces ghastly, swollen, purple; 
On the dead, on their backs, with their arms toss’d wide, 
Pour down your unstinted nimbus, sacred moon....Read more of this...

Now I lay thee down to Sleep --

by Emily Dickinson
 Now I lay thee down to Sleep --
I pray the Lord thy Dust to keep --
And if thou live before thou wake --
I pray the Lord thy Soul to make --...Read more of this...

Go Down Death

by James Weldon Johnson
 Weep not, weep not,
She is not dead;
She's resting in the bosom of Jesus.
Heart-broken husband--weep no more;
Grief-stricken son--weep no more;
Left-lonesome daughter --weep no more;
She only just gone home.

Day before yesterday morning,
God was looking down from his great, high heaven,
Looking down on all his children,
And his eye fell of Sister Caroline,
Tossing on her bed of pain.
And God's big heart was touched...Read more of this...

A bird came down the walk

by Emily Dickinson
A bird came down the walk:
He did not know I saw;
He bit an angle-worm in halves
And ate the fellow, raw.

And then he drank a dew
From a convenient grass,
And then hopped sidewise to the wall
To let a beetle pass.

He glanced with rapid eyes
That hurried all abroad,--
They looked like frightened beads, I thought;
He stirred his velvet head

Like one in danger; cautious,
I offered...Read more of this...

There was an Old Derry down Derry who loved to see little folks merry;

by Edward Lear
There was an Old Derry down Derry, who loved to see little folks merry;So he made them a Book, and with laughter they shook At the fun of that Derry down Derry. ...Read more of this...

Merrow Down

by Rudyard Kipling
 There runs a road by Merrow Down--
 A grassy track to-day it is--
An hour out Guildford town,
 Above the river Wey it is.

Here, when they heard the hors-bells ring,
 The ancient Britons dressed and rode
To which the dark Phoenicians bring
 Their goods along the Western Road.

Yes, here, or hereabouts, they met
 To hold their racial talks and such--
To barter...Read more of this...

The Low-Down White

by Robert William Service
 This is the pay-day up at the mines, when the bearded brutes come down;
There's money to burn in the streets to-night, so I've sent my klooch to town,
With a haggard face and a ribband of red entwined in her hair of brown.

And I know at the dawn she'll come reeling home with the bottles, one, two, three --
One for...Read more of this...

Like as the skies rain down sweet jessamine,

by Omar Khayyam
Like as the skies rain down sweet jessamine,
And sprinkle all the meads with eglantine,
Right so, from out this jug of violet hue,
I pour in lily cups this rosy wine....Read more of this...

The Ships that Wont Go Down

by Henry Lawson
 We hear a great commotion 
'Bout the ship that comes to grief, 
That founders in mid-ocean, 
Or is driven on a reef; 
Because it's cheap and brittle 
A score of sinners drown. 
But we hear but mighty little 
Of the ships that won't go down. 

Here's honour to the builders – 
The builders of the past; 
Here's honour to...Read more of this...

Down Times quaint stream

by Emily Dickinson
 Down Time's quaint stream
Without an oar
We are enforced to sail
Our Port a secret
Our Perchance a Gale
What Skipper would
Incur the Risk
What Buccaneer would ride
Without a surety from the Wind
Or schedule of the Tide --...Read more of this...

Looking Down in a Spring-rain

by Wang Wei
 Round a turn of the Qin Fortress winds the Wei River, 
And Yellow Mountain foot-hills enclose the Court of China; 
Past the South Gate willows comes the Car of Many Bells 
On the upper Palace-Garden Road-a solid length of blossom; 
A Forbidden City roof holds two phoenixes in cloud; 
The foliage of spring shelters multitudes from rain; 
And now,...Read more of this...

Taking Down a Trellis

by Du Fu
 Tie stick already wither and fall Pumpkin leaf become sparse Lucky bear fruit white flower finish Better take leave green vine eliminate Autumn insect sound not go Dusk sparrow think what Cold thing now lie waste Human life also have beginning  The sticks I tied already wither and fall, The pumpkin leaves are getting sparse...Read more of this...

When the Dark Comes Down

by Lucy Maud Montgomery
 When the dark comes down, oh, the wind is on the sea
With lisping laugh and whimper to the red reef's threnody,
The boats are sailing homeward now across the harbor bar
With many a jest and many a shout from fishing grounds afar.
So furl your sails and take your rest, ye fisher folk so brown,
For task and quest are ended when...Read more of this...

Marine Snow At Mid-Depths And Down

by Thomas Lux
 As you descend, slowly, falling faster past
you this snow,
ghostly, some flakes bio-
luminescent (you plunge,
and this lit snow doesn't land
at your feet but keeps falling below
you): single-cell-plant chains, shreds
of zooplankton's mucus food traps,
fish fecal pellets, radioactive fallouts,
sand grains, pollen....And inside
these jagged falling islands
live more microlives,
which feed creatures
on the way down
and all the way down. And you,
in your sinking isolation
booth, you...Read more of this...

I Went Down into the Desert

by Vachel Lindsay
 I went down into the desert
To meet Elijah—
Arisen from the dead.
I thought to. find him in an echoing cave;
For so my dream had said.

I went down into the desert
To meet John the Baptist.
I walked with feet that bled,
Seeking that prophet lean and brown and bold.
I spied foul fiends instead.

I went down into the desert
To meet my God.
By him be...Read more of this...

The House Of Dust: Part 01: 01: The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light

by Conrad Aiken
 The sun goes down in a cold pale flare of light.
The trees grow dark: the shadows lean to the east:
And lights wink out through the windows, one by one.
A clamor of frosty sirens mourns at the night.
Pale slate-grey clouds whirl up from the sunken sun.

And the wandering one, the inquisitive dreamer of dreams,
The eternal asker of answers, stands in...Read more of this...

When Death shall tread me down upon the plain,

by Omar Khayyam
When Death shall tread me down upon the plain,
And pluck my feathers, and my life-blood drain,
Then mould me to a cup, and fill with wine,
Haply its scent will make me breathe again....Read more of this...

Piping Down the Valleys Wild

by William Blake
 Piping down the valleys wild,
Piping songs of pleasant glee,
On a cloud I saw a child,
And he laughing said to me:

'Pipe a song about a lamb!'
So I piped with merry cheer.
'Piper, pipe that song again.'
So I piped: he wept to hear.

'Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe;
Sing thy songs of happy cheer.'
So I sung the same again,
While he wept with joy...Read more of this...

Ere Sleep Comes Down To Soothe The Weary Eyes

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Ere sleep comes down to soothe the weary eyes,Which all the day with ceaseless care have sought
The magic gold which from the seeker flies;
Ere dreams put on the gown and cap of thought,
And make the waking world a world of lies,—
Of lies most palpable, uncouth, forlorn,
That say life's full of aches and tears and sighs,—
Oh, how with more than dreams...Read more of this...

Ridden Down

by Ellis Parker Butler
 When I taught Ida how to ride a
 Bicycle that night,
I ran beside her, just to guide her
 Erring wheel aright;
And many times there in the street
She rode upon my weary feet.

But now can Ida mount and ride a
 Wheel with graceful ease,
And I, untiring in admiring,
 Fall upon my knees
To worship her,—and, for her part,
She rides upon my...Read more of this...

The Furl of Fresh-Leaved Dogrose Down

by Gerard Manley Hopkins
 The furl of fresh-leaved dogrose down 
His cheeks the forth-and-flaunting sun 
Had swarthed about with lion-brown 
Before the Spring was done. 

His locks like all a ravel-rope’s-end,
With hempen strands in spray— 
Fallow, foam-fallow, hanks—fall’n off their ranks, 
Swung down at a disarray. 

Or like a juicy and jostling shock 
Of bluebells sheaved in May
Or wind-long fleeces on the flock...Read more of this...

The Man in the Moon Came Down Too Soon

by J R R Tolkien
 There is an inn, a merry old inn
beneath an old grey hill,
And there they brew a beer so brown
That the Man in the Moon himself came down
one night to drink his fill.

The ostler has a tipsy cat
that plays a five-stringed fiddle;
And up and down he saws his bow
Now squeaking high, now purring low,
now sawing in the middle.

The landlord keeps...Read more of this...

By the Rivers of Babylon We Sat Down and Wept

by George (Lord) Byron
 We sat down and wept by the waters 
Of Babel, and thought of the day 
When our foe, in the hue of his slaughters, 
Made Salem's high places his prey; 
And ye, oh her desolate daughters! 
Were scattered all weeping away. 

While sadly we gazed on the river 
Which rolled on in freedom below, 
They demanded the song; but,...Read more of this...

Down Home

by Lucy Maud Montgomery
 Down home to-night the moonshine falls
Across a hill with daisies pied,
The pear tree by the garden gate
Beckons with white arms like a bride. 

A savor as of trampled fern
Along the whispering meadow stirs,
And, beacon of immortal love,
A light is shining through the firs. 

To my old gable window creeps
The night wind with a sigh and song,
And, weaving ancient sorceries,
Thereto...Read more of this...

The House Of Dust: Part 01: 05: The snow floats down upon us mingled with rain

by Conrad Aiken
 The snow floats down upon us, mingled with rain . . .
It eddies around pale lilac lamps, and falls
Down golden-windowed walls.
We were all born of flesh, in a flare of pain,
We do not remember the red roots whence we rose,
But we know that we rose and walked, that after a while
We shall lie down again.

The snow floats down upon...Read more of this...

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