Famous Hope Poems by Famous Poets

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

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The Return of Persephone

by Alec Derwent (A D) Hope
 Gliding through the still air, he made no sound; 
Wing-shod and deft, dropped almost at her feet, 
And searched the ghostly regiments and found 
The living eyes, the tremor of breath, the beat 
Of blood in all that bodiless underground.

She left her majesty; she loosed the zone 
Of darkness and put by the rod of dread. 
Standing, she turned...Read more of this...

Hope is a subtle Glutton --

by Emily Dickinson
 Hope is a subtle Glutton --
He feeds upon the Fair --
And yet -- inspected closely
What Abstinence is there --

His is the Halcyon Table --
That never seats but One --
And whatsoever is consumed
The same amount remain --...Read more of this...

Love Without Hope

by Robert Graves
 Love without hope, as when the young bird-catcher
Swept off his tall hat to the Squire's own daughter,
So let the imprisoned larks escape and fly
Singing about her head, as she rode by....Read more of this...

Tiger

by Alec Derwent (A D) Hope
 At noon thepaper tigers roar 
-- Miroslav Holub

The paper tigers roar at noon; 
The sun is hot, the sun is high. 
They roar in chorus, not in tune, 
Their plaintive, savage hunting cry.

O, when you hear them, stop your ears 
And clench your lids and bite your tongue. 
The harmless paper tiger bears 
Strong fascination for the young.

His forest...Read more of this...

The Hope Of My Heart

by John McCrae
 "Delicta juventutis et ignorantius ejus, quoesumus ne memineris, Domine."



I left, to earth, a little maiden fair,
With locks of gold, and eyes that shamed the light;
I prayed that God might have her in His care
And sight.

Earth's love was false; her voice, a siren's song;
(Sweet mother-earth was but a lying name)
The path she showed was but the path of wrong
And shame.

"Cast...Read more of this...

Sonnets 12: Cherish You Then The Hope I Shall Forget

by Edna St. Vincent Millay
 Cherish you then the hope I shall forget
At length, my lord, Pieria?—put away
For your so passing sake, this mouth of clay
These mortal bones against my body set,
For all the puny fever and frail sweat
Of human love,—renounce for these, I say,
The Singing Mountain's memory, and betray
The silent lyre that hangs upon me yet?
Ah, but indeed, some day shall you awake,
Rather,...Read more of this...

Hope

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
De dog go howlin' 'long de road,
De night come shiverin' down;
My back is tiahed of its load,
I cain't be fu' f'om town.
No mattah ef de way is long,
My haht is swellin' wid a song,
No mattah 'bout de frownin' skies,
I'll soon be home to see my Lize.
My shadder staggah on de way,
It's monstous col' to-night;
But I kin hyeah my honey say
"W'y...Read more of this...

Of Hope and Dinosaurs

by Syl Cheney-Coker
Always, we searched in the stone river,
while the slaughterhouse was waiting for us,
long before we turned the saccharin of words
into inflammable brawls. Full of ancient gluttony,
we have fed our appetites, eating with hasty mouths
what was meant for our own Passover.
It is thus that we shall be remembered:
the curse on the bellwether, crumbled destinies,
although it was possible, once again,
like some extinct...Read more of this...

i wrote a life

by Billy Jno Hope
 this might be the swan song
i have traveled beyond misty mountains
spilled my seed on the hungry rock
hallowed days
blasphemous timelines
art nourishment
prolific like sin
to the serpent edge of youth
once my head rolled in the streets
motors crashing by
inches from my intoxication
a fleshful laugh echoed in time
a mad initiation as part of the door
to the unrepentant lyric
heathen apprentices
i cracked the demon-s egg
tattooed pandora-s...Read more of this...

The Gateway

by Alec Derwent (A D) Hope
 Now the heart sings with all its thousand voices 
To hear this city of cells, my body, sing. 
The tree through the stiff clay at long last forces 
Its thin strong roots and taps the secret spring. 

And the sweet waters without intermission 
Climb to the tips of its green tenement; 
The breasts have borne the grace of their...Read more of this...

Hope

by Anne Kingsmill Finch
 The Tree of Knowledge we in Eden prov'd; 
The Tree of Life was thence to Heav'n remov'd: 
Hope is the growth of Earth, the only Plant, 
Which either Heav'n, or Paradise cou'd want. 


Hell knows it not, to Us alone confin'd, 
And Cordial only to the Human Mind. 
Receive it then, t'expel these mortal Cares, 
Nor wave a Med'cine,...Read more of this...

The Service without Hope --

by Emily Dickinson
 The Service without Hope --
Is tenderest, I think --
Because 'tis unsustained
By stint -- Rewarded Work --

Has impetus of Gain --
And impetus of Goal --
There is no Diligence like that
That knows not an Until --...Read more of this...

The way Hope builds his House

by Emily Dickinson
 The way Hope builds his House
It is not with a sill --
Nor Rafter -- has that Edifice
But only Pinnacle --

Abode in as supreme
This superficies
As if it were of Ledges smit
Or mortised with the Laws --...Read more of this...

Hope And Confidence In God

by The Bible
“Blessed be Jehovah, who daily carries the load for us,
The true God of our salvation.
Selah.
The true God is for us a God of saving acts;
And to Jehovah the Sovereign Lord belong the ways out from death.”—Ps. 68:19, 20.

“Whom do I have in the heavens?
And besides you I do have no other delight on the earth.
My organism and my heart have...Read more of this...

Afternoon Poem

by Billy Jno Hope
 a lion at the door
swallowed the day
broken with spite
at the inevitable chorus of pop songs
sutured for soft light

i burdened siesta
with a thousand little earthquakes
i listened where you suffered vertigo

flowers have faded
bellies betray
caught the wistful eye
that curved beneath my eyelids

something slime
and panic strewn
we gather the remnants of democracy

silence herds mad laughter
cumulus scorn
haunted horizons running
running to weep...Read more of this...

Hope in Failure

by George William Russell
 THOUGH now thou hast failed and art fallen, despair not because of defeat,
Though lost for a while be thy heaven and weary of earth be thy feet,
For all will be beauty about thee hereafter through sorrowful years,
And lovely the dews for thy chilling and ruby thy heart-drip of tears.


The eyes that had gazed from afar on a beauty that...Read more of this...

Hope

by Anne Kingsmill Finch
 Do you believe, in what you see
do you believe in reality
do you believe in the sun that’s bright
do you believe in the stars in the night

Do you believe in the birds that fly
do you believe in clouds and the sky
do you believe in wind that flows
do you believe in moon that glows
do you believe in light

Do you believe the...Read more of this...

In the region of hope, form as many friends as you

by Omar Khayyam
In the region of hope, form as many friends as you
can; in the time of existence, bind yourself to a perfect
friend, for, know well that a hundred Kaabas, made
of earth and water, are not worth one heart. Leave,
then, thy Kaabas and rather seek a heart....Read more of this...

Hope is the thing with feathers

by Emily Dickinson
Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all,

And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.

I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, in extremity,
It asked a crumb of me....Read more of this...

A Hope For Poetry: Remembering The Sixties

by Barry Tebb
 There was a hope for poetry in the sixties

And for education and society, teachers free

To do as they wanted: I could and did teach

Poetry and art all day and little else -

That was my way.



I threw rainbows against the classroom walls,

Gold and silver dragons in the corridors and

Halls; the children’s eyes were full of stars;

I taught the alphabet in...Read more of this...

To Hope

by John Keats
 When by my solitary hearth I sit,
 And hateful thoughts enwrap my soul in gloom;
When no fair dreams before my "mind's eye" flit,
 And the bare heath of life presents no bloom;
 Sweet Hope, ethereal balm upon me shed,
 And wave thy silver pinions o'er my head!

Whene'er I wander, at the fall of night,
 Where woven boughs shut out...Read more of this...

Somewhat to hope for

by Emily Dickinson
 Somewhat, to hope for,
Be it ne'er so far
Is Capital against Despair --

Somewhat, to suffer,
Be it ne'er so keen --
If terminable, may be borne....Read more of this...

Oh They have Robbed Me of The Hope

by Anne Bronte
 Oh, they have robbed me of the hope
My spirit held so dear;
They will not let me hear that voice
My soul delights to hear. 
They will not let me see that face
I so delight to see;
And they have taken all thy smiles,
And all thy love from me.

Well, let them seize on all they can: --
One treasure still is mine, --
A...Read more of this...

A great Hope fell

by Emily Dickinson
 A great Hope fell
You heard no noise
The Ruin was within
Oh cunning wreck that told no tale
And let no Witness in

The mind was built for mighty Freight
For dread occasion planned
How often foundering at Sea
Ostensibly, on Land

A not admitting of the wound
Until it grew so wide
That all my Life had entered it
And there were troughs beside

A closing of the simple lid
That...Read more of this...

Work Without Hope

by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
All Nature seems at work. Slugs leave their lair --
The bees are stirring -- birds are on the wing --
And Winter slumbering in the open air,
Wears on his smiling face a dream of Spring!
And I the while, the sole unbusy thing,
Nor honey make, nor pair, nor build, nor sing.

Yet well I ken the banks where amaranths blow,
Have traced the fount...Read more of this...

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