Famous I Am Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous I Am poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous i am poems. These examples illustrate what a famous i am poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
See also:
by
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Let you not say of me when I am old,
In pretty worship of my withered hands
Forgetting who I am, and how the sands
Of such a life as mine run red and gold
Even to the ultimate sifting dust, "Behold,
Here walketh passionless age!"—for there expands
A curious superstition in these lands,
And by its leave some weightless tales are told.
In me no lenten...Read more of this...
by
George Meredith
I am not of those miserable males
Who sniff at vice and, daring not to snap,
Do therefore hope for heaven. I take the hap
Of all my deeds. The wind that fills my sails
Propels; but I am helmsman. Am I wrecked,
I know the devil has sufficient weight
To bear: I lay it not on him, or fate.
Besides, he's damned. That man I...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
When I am dead, smooth to the level of the soil the
dust of my tomb, that I may thus be an example to other
men. Then, mix with wine the earth of my body and
make of it—a cover for a wine-jar.
313...Read more of this...
by
Calvin Ziegler
AM GRISCHTDAAG
Sis Grischtdaag. Die ganz Welt iwwer
Frei die Leit sich sehr,
Un alles is harrlich, as wann der Daag
Vom Himmel gelosse waer.
Ich hock allee in mei Zimmer
Un denk so iwwer die Zeit -
Wie der Geischt vun Grischt sich immer
Weider un weider ausbreid:
Un wie heit in yeder Famillye
Frehlich un gutes Mut
In die liewi aldi Heemet
Sich widder versammle dutt.
Ach widder deheem! Ach, Yammer!...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Guest am I to have
Light my northern room
Why to cordiality so averse to come
Other friends adjourn
Other bonds decay
Why avoid so narrowly
My fidelity --...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
I am constantly attracted by the sight of limpid wine,
my ears are ever attentive to the melodious sounds of
the flute and of the rubab [viol]. Oh, if the potter make
a pitcher of my dust, would that that pitcher might constantly
be full of wine!...Read more of this...
by
Gustavo Adolfo Bécquer
I am black and comely; my lips are glowing;
I am passion; my heart is hot;
The rapture of life in my veins is flowing.
For me thou callest?—I call thee not.
Pale is my forehead and gold my tresses;
Endless comforts are locked in me,
Treasure of hearthside tendernesses.
’Tis I whom thou seekest?—Nay, not thee.
I am a dream, afar, forbidden.
Vague as the mist on the...Read more of this...
by
Robert Browning
Man I am and man would be, Love--merest man and nothing more.
Bid me seem no other! Eagles boast of pinions--let them soar!
I may put forth angel's plumage, once unmanned, but not before.
Now on earth to stand suffices,--nay, if kneeling serves, to kneel:
Here you front me, here I find the all of heaven that earth can...Read more of this...
by
Regina Derieva
I don't feel at home where I am,
or where I spend time; only where,
beyond counting, there's freedom and calm,
that is, waves, that is, space where, when there,
you consist of pure freedom, which, seen,
turns that Gorgon, the crowd, to stone,
to pebbles and sand . . . where life's mean-
ing lies buried, that never let one
come within cannon shot yet.
From cloud-covered...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
I am worthy neither of Hell nor a celestial abode; God
knows from what clay he has moulded me. Heretical as
a dervish and foul as a lost woman, I have neither
wealth, nor fortune, nor hope of Paradise....Read more of this...
by
William Butler Yeats
'I am of Ireland,
And the Holy Land of Ireland,
And time runs on,' cried she.
'Come out of charity,
Come dance with me in Ireland.'
One man, one man alone
In that outlandish gear,
One solitary man
Of all that rambled there
Had turned his stately head.
That is a long way off,
And time runs on,' he said,
'And the night grows rough.'
'I am of Ireland,
And the Holy Land...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
NO churchman am I for to rail and to write,
No statesman nor soldier to plot or to fight,
No sly man of business contriving a snare,
For a big-belly’d bottle’s the whole of my care.
The peer I don’t envy, I give him his bow;
I scorn not the peasant, though ever so low;
But a club of good fellows, like those that are...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
A slave in dire revolt am I: where is Thy will? Black
with all sin my heart: where is Thy light and Thy control?
If Thou giv'st Paradise to our obedience alone
[to Thy laws], it is a debt of which Thou quit'st
Thyself and in such case we need Thy pity and benevolence....Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
When I am dead, with wine my body lave,
For obit chant a bacchanalian stave,
And, if you need me at the day of doom,
Beneath the tavern threshold seek my grave....Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
It is I who am the chief of habitual patrons of the
tavern; it is I who am plunged in rebellion against the
law, it is I who, during the long nights, soaked in pure
wine, cry out to God the griefs of my heart imbrued with
blood.
352...Read more of this...
by
Christina Rossetti
When I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
Nor shady cypress tree:
Be the green grass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet;
And if thou wilt, remember,
And if thou wilt, forget.
I shall not see the shadows,
I shall not feel the rain;
I shall not hear the nightingale
Sing on, as if in pain:
And dreaming through...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Conscious am I in my Chamber,
Of a shapeless friend --
He doth not attest by Posture --
Nor Confirm -- by Word --
Neither Place -- need I present Him --
Fitter Courtesy
Hospitable intuition
Of His Company --
Presence -- is His furthest license --
Neither He to Me
Nor Myself to Him -- by Accent --
Forfeit Probity --
Weariness of Him, were quainter
Than Monotony
Knew a Particle --...Read more of this...
by
Ehsan Sehgal
I am a very strange person
You will understand me
After years and years
I cleanup my heart
With my tears
And then enters
The Divine love
That is my life
That is my wealth
That is my power
That is my strength
I am the King of that Kingdom
O' senseless friend
I am not poor
I am love, I am love
------
Ehsan Sehgal...Read more of this...
by
George Meredith
Am I failing ? For no longer can I cast
A glory round about this head of gold.
Glory she wears, but springing from the mould;
Not like the consecration of the Past!
Is my soul beggared? Something more than earth
I cry for still: I cannot be at peace
In having Love upon a' mortal lease.
I cannot...Read more of this...
by
Jerome Rothenberg
I am not a native of this palce.(Yosimasu G.)
nor yet a stranger.
With the rst of you
I hunt for shade
my boots half off
to let the air through.
My head is on my shoulders
& is real.
I plant cucumbers
twice a year
& count the bounty.
Often I read
the papers
standing.
I am clean & pure.
I carry buckets
from the pond
more than my arms can bear.
Under a full moon
fish...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
ALL villain as I am—a damn?d wretch,
A hardened, stubborn, unrepenting villain,
Still my heart melts at human wretchedness;
And with sincere but unavailing sighs
I view the helpless children of distress:
With tears indignant I behold the oppressor
Rejoicing in the honest man’s destruction,
Whose unsubmitting heart was all his crime.—
Ev’n you, ye hapless crew! I pity you;
Ye, whom the seeming good think sin to...Read more of this...
by
John Donne
I am a little world made cunningly
Of elements, and an angelic sprite;
But black sin hath betrayed to endless night
My worlds both parts, and (oh!) both parts must die.
You which beyond that heaven which was most high
Have found new spheres, and of new lands can write,
Pour new seas in mine eyes, that so I might
Drown my world with my weeping...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
When I am dead, take me and grind me small,
So that I be a caution unto all,
And knead me into clay with wine, and then
Use me to stop the wine-jar's mouth withal....Read more of this...
by
Carl Sandburg
I AM the people--the mob--the crowd--the mass.
Do you know that all the great work of the world is
done through me?
I am the workingman, the inventor, the maker of the
world's food and clothes.
I am the audience that witnesses history. The Napoleons
come from me and the Lincolns. They die. And
then I send forth more Napoleons and Lincolns.
I am the seed ground....Read more of this...
by
Katherine Mansfield
Now I am a plant, a weed,
Bending and swinging
On a rocky ledge;
And now I am a long brown grass
Fluttering like flame;
I am a reed;
An old shell singing
For ever the same;
A drift of sedge;
A white, white stone;
A bone;
Until I pass
Into sand again,
And spin and blow
To and fro, to and fro,
On the edge of the sea
In the fading light--
For the light...Read more of this...
Dont forget to view our wonderful member I Am poems.