Famous Greatly Poems by Famous Poets

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

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A Familiar Letter

...winning the laurels to which you aspire,
By docking the tails of the two prepositions
I' the style o' the bards you so greatly admire.

As for subjects of verse, they are only too plenty
For ringing the changes on metrical chimes;
A maiden, a moonbeam, a lover of twenty 
Have filled that great basket with bushels of rhymes.

Let me show you a picture--'t is far from irrelevant--
By a famous old hand in the arts of design;
'T is only a photographed sketch of an elephant,--
Th...Read more of this...
by Holmes, Oliver Wendell


A Tale of the Sea

...survivors was looking very pale,
Stretched on a sofa at the boarding-house, making his wail:
Poor fellow! his feet was greatly swollen, and with a melancholy air,
He gave the following account of the distressing affair: 

We belonged to the American fishing schooner named "Cicely",
And our captain was a brave man, called McKenzie;
And the vessel had fourteen hands altogether
And during the passage we had favourable weather. 

'Twas on March the 17th we sailed from Gloucester...Read more of this...
by McGonagall, William Topaz

Beowulf (Modern English)

...t the feet of the Scylding lord,
he unbound his battle-rhyme. Beowulf’s mission,
the proud sea-crosser, chagrined him greatly,
because he begrudged that any other man
ever could care for greater glory in this middle-earth,
under the heavens than he himself: (ll. 499-505)

“Are you that Beowulf who struggled against Brecca
upon the broad seas, challenging him to swim,
where you both tempted the waters out of pride
and your foolish boasting in the fathomless ocean,
r...Read more of this...
by Anonymous,

Endymion: Book I

...ainst the zodiac-lion cast,
There blossom'd suddenly a magic bed
Of sacred ditamy, and poppies red:
At which I wondered greatly, knowing well
That but one night had wrought this flowery spell;
And, sitting down close by, began to muse
What it might mean. Perhaps, thought I, Morpheus,
In passing here, his owlet pinions shook;
Or, it may be, ere matron Night uptook
Her ebon urn, young Mercury, by stealth,
Had dipt his rod in it: such garland wealth
Came not by common growth. Th...Read more of this...
by Keats, John

Guinevere

...cies 
Have erred not, that I march to meet my doom. 
Thou hast not made my life so sweet to me, 
That I the King should greatly care to live; 
For thou hast spoilt the purpose of my life. 
Bear with me for the last time while I show, 
Even for thy sake, the sin which thou hast sinned. 
For when the Roman left us, and their law 
Relaxed its hold upon us, and the ways 
Were filled with rapine, here and there a deed 
Of prowess done redressed a random wrong. 
But I was first of ...Read more of this...
by Tennyson, Alfred Lord


Hymn to Demeter by Homer

...e. And the Son of Hyperion answered her: "Queen Demeter, daughter of rich-haired Rhea, I will tell you the truth; for I greatly reverence and pity you in your grief for your trim-ankled daughter. None other of the deathless gods is to blame, but only cloud-gathering Zeus who gave her to Hades, her father's brother, to be called his buxom wife. And Hades seized her and took her loudly crying in his chariot down to his realm of mist and gloom. Yet, goddess, cease your loud lame...Read more of this...
by Homer,

Inferno (English)

.... 





Canto VI 



 THE misery of that sight of souls in Hell 
 Condemned, and constant in their loss, prevailed 
 So greatly in me, that I may not tell 
 How passed I from them, sense and memory failed 
 So far. 
 But here new torments I discern, 
 And new tormented, wheresoe'er I turn. 
 For sodden around me was the place of bane, 
 The third doomed circle, where the culprits know 
 The cold, unceasing, and relentless rain 
 Pour down without mutation. Heavy with hail, 
 ...Read more of this...
by Alighieri, Dante

Isabella or The Pot of Basil

...thermore, her brethren wonder'd much
Why she sat drooping by the Basil green,
And why it flourish'd, as by magic touch;
Greatly they wonder'd what the thing might mean:
They could not surely give belief, that such
A very nothing would have power to wean
Her from her own fair youth, and pleasures gay,
And even remembrance of her love's delay.

LIX.
Therefore they watch'd a time when they might sift
This hidden whim; and long they watch'd in vain;
For seldom did she go to chape...Read more of this...
by Keats, John

Lucretius

...e soldiers may not quit the post
Allotted by the Gods. But he that holds
The Gods are careless, wherefore need he care 
Greatly for them, nor rather plunge at once,
Being troubled, wholly out of sight, and sink
Past earthquake -- ay, and gout and stone, that break
Body toward death, and palsy, death-in-life,
And wretched age -- and worst disease of all,
These prodigies of myriad nakednesses,
And twisted shapes of lust, unspeakable,
Abominable, strangers at my hearth
Not welco...Read more of this...
by Tennyson, Alfred Lord

Paradise Lost: Book 10

...r our feet; 
Even he, who now foretold his fatal bruise; 
And to the Woman thus his sentence turned. 
Thy sorrow I will greatly multiply 
By thy conception; children thou shalt bring 
In sorrow forth; and to thy husband's will 
Thine shall submit; he over thee shall rule. 
On Adam last thus judgement he pronounced. 
Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, 
And eaten of the tree, concerning which 
I charged thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat thereof: 
Cursed is the...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

Paradise Lost: Book 11

...with three lifted colours gay, 
Betokening peace from God, and covenant new. 
Whereat the heart of Adam, erst so sad, 
Greatly rejoiced; and thus his joy broke forth. 
O thou, who future things canst represent 
As present, heavenly Instructer! I revive 
At this last sight; assured that Man shall live, 
With all the creatures, and their seed preserve. 
Far less I now lament for one whole world 
Of wicked sons destroyed, than I rejoice 
For one man found so perfect, and so jus...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

Paradise Lost: Book 12

...transient world, the race of time, 
Till time stand fixed! Beyond is all abyss, 
Eternity, whose end no eye can reach. 
Greatly-instructed I shall hence depart; 
Greatly in peace of thought; and have my fill 
Of knowledge, what this vessel can contain; 
Beyond which was my folly to aspire. 
Henceforth I learn, that to obey is best, 
And love with fear the only God; to walk 
As in his presence; ever to observe 
His providence; and on him sole depend, 
Merciful over all his wor...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

The Comedian As The Letter C

...overies of tidal skies, 
102 To whom oracular rockings gave no rest. 
103 Into a savage color he went on. 

104 How greatly had he grown in his demesne, 
105 This auditor of insects! He that saw 
106 The stride of vanishing autumn in a park 
107 By way of decorous melancholy; he 
108 That wrote his couplet yearly to the spring, 
109 As dissertation of profound delight, 
110 Stopping, on voyage, in a land of snakes, 
111 Found his vicissitudes had much enlarged 
11...Read more of this...
by Stevens, Wallace

The General Prologue

...was well better than his rent.
And rage he could and play as any whelp,
In lovedays ; there could he muchel* help. *greatly
For there was he not like a cloisterer,
With threadbare cope as is a poor scholer;
But he was like a master or a pope.
Of double worsted was his semicope*, *short cloak
That rounded was as a bell out of press.
Somewhat he lisped for his wantonness,
To make his English sweet upon his tongue;
And in his harping, when that he had sung,
His eyen* twinkle...Read more of this...
by Chaucer, Geoffrey

The Man of Laws Tale

...each one in that house,
Save he that Hermegild slew with his knife:
This gentle king had *caught a great motife* *been greatly moved
Of this witness, and thought he would inquere by the evidence*
Deeper into this case, the truth to lear.* *learn

Alas! Constance, thou has no champion,
Nor fighte canst thou not, so well-away!
But he that starf for our redemption, *died
And bound Satan, and yet li'th where he lay,
So be thy stronge champion this day:
For, but Christ upon thee ...Read more of this...
by Chaucer, Geoffrey

The Millers Tale

...idde what him list
Till Sunday, that* the sunne went to rest. *when
This silly carpenter *had great marvaill* *wondered greatly*
Of Nicholas, or what thing might him ail,
And said; "I am adrad*, by Saint Thomas! *afraid, in dread
It standeth not aright with Nicholas:
*God shielde* that he died suddenly. *heaven forbid!*
This world is now full fickle sickerly*. *certainly
I saw to-day a corpse y-borne to chirch,
That now on Monday last I saw him wirch*. *work
"Go up," quod he ...Read more of this...
by Chaucer, Geoffrey

The Vision of Judgment

...race began, 
That thou cans't claim him? Speak! and do thy will, 
If it be just: if in this earthly span 
He hath been greatly failing to fulfil 
His duties as a king and mortal, say, 
And he is thine; if not, let him have way.' 

XXXIX 

'Michael!' replied the Prince of Air, 'even here, 
Before the Gate of him thou servest, must 
I claim my subject: and will make appear 
That as he was my worshipper in dust, 
So shall he be in spirit, although dear 
To thee and thine, becau...Read more of this...
by Byron, George (Lord)

The Wife of Baths Tale

...ke his beard,* so may I the. *make a jest of him*

"Thou sayest eke, that there be thinges three, *thrive
Which thinges greatly trouble all this earth,
And that no wighte may endure the ferth:* *fourth
O lefe* sir shrew, may Jesus short** thy life. *pleasant **shorten
Yet preachest thou, and say'st, a hateful wife
Y-reckon'd is for one of these mischances.
Be there *none other manner resemblances* *no other kind of
That ye may liken your parables unto, comparison*
But if a si...Read more of this...
by Chaucer, Geoffrey

There was an old person of Fife

...
There was an old person of Fife,Who was greatly disgusted with life;They sang him a ballad, and fed him on salad,Which cured that old person of Fife. ...Read more of this...
by Lear, Edward

Very Like a Whale

...One thing that literature would be greatly the better for
Would be a more restricted employment by the authors of simile and
metaphor.
Authors of all races, be they Greeks, Romans, Teutons or Celts,
Can't seem just to say that anything is the thing it is but have to
go out of their way to say that it is like something else.
What does it mean when we are told
That that Assyrian came down like ...Read more of this...
by Nash, Ogden

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