Famous Glee Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Fragment

by Anne Bronte
 Yes I will take a cheerful tone
And feign to share their heartless glee,
But I would rather weep alone
Than laugh amid their revelry....Read more of this...

The Death of Prince Leopold

by William Topaz McGonagall
 Alas! noble Prince Leopold, he is dead!
Who often has his lustre shed:
Especially by singing for the benefit of Esher School,
Which proves he was a wise prince. and no conceited fool.

Methinks I see him on the platform singing the Sands o' Dee,
The generous-hearted Leopold, the good and the free,
Who was manly in his actions, and beloved by his mother;
And in...Read more of this...

Inscriptions for a Friends House

by Henry Van Dyke
 THE HOUSE

The cornerstone in Truth is laid,
The guardian walls of Honour made,
The roof of Faith is built above,
The fire upon the hearth is Love:
Though rains descend and loud winds call,
This happy house shall never fall.


THE DOORSTEAD

The lintel low enough to keep out pomp and pride:
The threshold high enough to turn deceit aside:
The doorband strong enough from robbers to defend:
This...Read more of this...

Artists Life

by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
 Of all the waltzes the great Strauss wrote,
mad with melody, rhythm--rife
From the very first to the final note,
Give me his "Artist's Life!"

It stirs my blood to my finger ends,
Thrills me and fills me with vague unrest,
And all that is sweetest and saddest blends
Together within my breast.

It brings back that night in the dim arcade,
In love's sweet morning and life's...Read more of this...

The Lynching

by Claude McKay
 His Spirit in smoke ascended to high heaven. 
His father, by the cruelest way of pain, 
Had bidden him to his bosom once again; 
The awful sin remained still unforgiven. 
All night a bright and solitary star 
(Perchance the one that ever guided him, 
Yet gave him up at last to Fate's wild whim) 
Hung pitifully o'er the swinging...Read more of this...

Delight is as the flight

by Emily Dickinson
 Delight is as the flight --
Or in the Ratio of it,
As the Schools would say --
The Rainbow's way --
A Skein
Flung colored, after Rain,
Would suit as bright,
Except that flight
Were Aliment --

"If it would last"
I asked the East,
When that Bent Stripe
Struck up my childish
Firmament --
And I, for glee,
Took Rainbows, as the common way,
And empty Skies
The Eccentricity --

And so with Lives --
And...Read more of this...

Bird Watcher

by Robert William Service
 In Wall Street once a potent power,
 And now a multi-millionaire
Alone within a shady bower
 In clothes his valet would not wear,
He watches bird wings bright the air.

The man who mighty mergers planned,
 And oil and coal kinglike controlled,
With field-glasses in failing hand
 Spies downy nestlings five days old,
With joy he could not buy for gold.

Aye, even childlike is...Read more of this...

Grif of the Bloody Hand

by William Topaz McGonagall
 In an immense wood in the south of Kent,
There lived a band of robbers which caused the people discontent;
And the place they infested was called the Weald,
Where they robbed wayside travellers and left them dead on the field. 

Their leader was called Grif, of the Bloody Hand,
And so well skilled in sword practice there's few could him withstand;
And sometimes...Read more of this...

Symphonic Studies (After Schumann)

by Emma Lazarus
 Prelude 

Blue storm-clouds in hot heavens of mid-July 
Hung heavy, brooding over land and sea: 
Our hearts, a-tremble, throbbed in harmony 
With the wild, restless tone of air and sky. 
Shall we not call im Prospero who held 
In his enchanted hands the fateful key 
Of that tempestuous hour's mystery, 
And with controlling wand our spirits spelled, 
With him...Read more of this...

The Bonnie Sidlaw Hills

by William Topaz McGonagall
 Bonnie Clara, will you go to the bonnie Sidlaw hills
And pu' the blooming heather, and drink from their rills?
There the cranberries among the heather grow,
Believe me, dear Clara, as black as the crow. 

Chorus --

Then, bonnie Clara, will you go
And wander with me to and fro?
And with joy our hearts will o'erflow
When we go to the bonnie Sidlaws O....Read more of this...

Christmas In The Heart

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
The snow lies deep upon the ground,
And winter's brightness all around
Decks bravely out the forest sere,
With jewels of the brave old year.
The coasting crowd upon the hill
With some new spirit seems to thrill;
And all the temple bells achime.
Ring out the glee of Christmas time.
In happy homes the brown oak-bough
Vies with the red-gemmed holly now;
And here and there, like pearls, there...Read more of this...

If This Were Faith

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 God, if this were enough,
That I see things bare to the buff
And up to the buttocks in mire;
That I ask nor hope nor hire,
Nut in the husk,
Nor dawn beyond the dusk,
Nor life beyond death:
God, if this were faith! 

Having felt thy wind in my face
Spit sorrow and disgrace,
Having seen thine evil doom
In Golgotha and Khartoum,
And the brutes, the work...Read more of this...

Glee -- The great storm is over --

by Emily Dickinson
 Glee -- The great storm is over --
Four -- have recovered the Land --
Forty -- gone down together --
Into the boiling Sand --

Ring -- for the Scant Salvation --
Toll -- for the bonnie Souls --
Neighbor -- and friend -- and Bridegroom --
Spinning upon the Shoals --

How they will tell the Story --
When Winter shake the Door --
Till the Children...Read more of this...

The Giant In Glee

by Victor Hugo
 ("Ho, guerriers! je suis né dans le pays des Gaules.") 
 
 {V., March 11, 1825.} 


 Ho, warriors! I was reared in the land of the Gauls; 
 O'er the Rhine my ancestors came bounding like balls 
 Of the snow at the Pole, where, a babe, I was bathed 
 Ere in bear and in walrus-skin I...Read more of this...

The Christmas Tree

by Robert William Service
 In the dark and damp of the alley cold,
Lay the Christmas tree that hadn't been sold;
By a shopman dourly thrown outside;
With the ruck and rubble of Christmas-tide;
Trodden deep in the muck and mire,
Unworthy even to feed a fire...
So I stopped and salvaged that tarnished tree,
And thus is the story it told to me:

"My Mother was Queen of the forest...Read more of this...

Swiss Song

by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
 Up in th' mountain
I was a-sitting,
With the bird there
As my guest,
Blithely singing,
Blithely springing,
And building
His nest.

In the garden
I was a-standing,
And the bee there
Saw as well,
Buzzing, humming,
Going, coming,
And building
His cell.

O'er the meadow
I was a-going,
And there saw the
Butterflies,
Sipping, dancing,
Flying, glancing,
And charming
The eyes.

And then came my
Dear Hansel,
And I show'd them
With glee,
Sipping, quaffing,
And he, laughing,
Sweet kisses
Gave me.

1811....Read more of this...

The Rising Of The Storm

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
The lake's dark breast
Is all unrest,
It heaves with a sob and a sigh.
Like a tremulous bird,
From its slumber stirred,
The moon is a-tilt in the sky.[Pg 9]
From the silent deep
The waters sweep,
But faint on the cold white stones,
And the wavelets fly
With a plaintive cry
O'er the old earth's bare, bleak bones.
And the spray upsprings
On its ghost-white wings,
And tosses a kiss...Read more of this...

The Castle of Mains

by William Topaz McGonagall
 Ancient Castle of the Mains,
With your romantic scenery and surrounding plains,
Which seem most beautiful to the eye,
And the little rivulet running by,
Which the weary traveller can drink of when he feels dry.
And the heaven's breath smells sweetly there,
And scented perfumes fill the air,
Emanating from the green trees and beautiful wild flowers growing there. 

There the people can enjoy themselves
And...Read more of this...

Give me my cup in hand, and sing a glee

by Omar Khayyam
Give me my cup in hand, and sing a glee
In concert with the bulbul's symphony;
Wine would not gurgle as it leaves the flask,
If drinking mute were right for thee and me!...Read more of this...

The Seed

by Robert William Service
 I was a seed that fell
 In silver dew;
And nobody could tell,
 For no one knew;
No one could tell my fate,
 As I grew tall;
None visioned me with hate,
 No, none at all.

A sapling I became,
 Blest by the sun;
No rumour of my shame
 Had any one.
Oh I was proud indeed,
 And sang with glee,
When from a tiny seed
...Read more of this...

Better to make one soul rejoice with glee,

by Omar Khayyam
Better to make one soul rejoice with glee,
Than plant a desert with a colony;
Rather one freeman bind with chains of love,
Than set a thousand prisoned captives free!...Read more of this...

In Memoriam 131: O Living Will That Shalt Endure

by Alfred Lord Tennyson
 O living will that shalt endure
When all that seems shall suffer shock,
Rise in the spiritual rock,
Flow thro' our deeds and make them pure, 

That we may lift from out of dust
A voice as unto him that hears,
A cry above the conquer'd years
To one that with us works, and trust, 

With faith that comes of self-control,
The truths that never can...Read more of this...

Unholy Trinity

by Robert William Service
 Though Virtue hurt you Vice is nice;
Aye, Parson says it's wrong,
Yet for my pleasing I'll suffice
With Women, Wine and Song.
But though it be with jocund glee
my tavern voice is ringing,
Had I to chuck on of the three,
By gad! I'd give up singing.

Bu not the vine. What draught divine
Could better souse my throttle?
God never meant that mellow wine
Should languish in...Read more of this...

It is a lonesome Glee --

by Emily Dickinson
 It is a lonesome Glee --
Yet sanctifies the Mind --
With fair association --
Afar upon the Wind

A Bird to overhear
Delight without a Cause --
Arrestless as invisible --
A matter of the Skies....Read more of this...

The Queens Jubilee Celebrations

by William Topaz McGonagall
 'Twas in the year of 1897, and on the 22nd of June,
Her Majesty's Diamond Jubilee in London caused a great boom;
Because high and low came from afar to see,
The grand celebrations at Her Majesty's Diamond Jubilee. 

People were there from almost every foreign land,
Which made the scene really imposing and grand;
Especially the Queen's carriage, drawn by eight coloured bays,
And...Read more of this...

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