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Famous In Public Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Dryden, John
...e, but turn'd the balance too;
So much the weight of one brave man can do.
Hushai, the friend of David in distress,
In public storms of manly steadfastness;
By foreign treaties he inform'd his youth;
And join'd experience to his native truth.
His frugal care suppli'd the wanting throne;
Frugal for that, but bounteous of his own:
'Tis easy conduct when exchequers flow;
But hard the task to manage well the low:
For sovereign power is too depress'd or high,
When kings ar...Read more of this...



by Whitman, Walt
...wn, casting swift shadows
 in
 specks
 on the opposite wall, where the shine is; 
The athletic American matron speaking in public to crowds of listeners; 
Males, females, immigrants, combinations—the copiousness—the individuality of
 The
 States,
 each for itself—the money-makers; 
Factories, machinery, the mechanical forces—the windlass, lever, pulley—All
 certainties,
The certainty of space, increase, freedom, futurity, 
In space, the sporades, the scatter’d islands, the st...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...lage or place which has the greatest man or woman! even if it be only a few
 ragged
 huts; 
O the city where women walk in public processions in the streets, the same as the men; 
O a wan and terrible emblem, by me adopted! 
O shapes arising! shapes of the future centuries! 
O muscle and pluck forever for me!
O workmen and workwomen forever for me! 
O farmers and sailors! O drivers of horses forever for me! 
O I will make the new bardic list of trades and tools! 
O you coarse...Read more of this...

by Estep, Maggie
...I'M NAKED IN A ROOM FULL OF STRANGERS THIS IS NOT ONE OF THOSE
RECURRING NIGHTMARES WE ALL HAVE ABOUT BEING BUTT NAKED IN PUBLIC, I AM
NAKED, I DON'T KNOW THESE PEOPLE, THIS REALLY SUCKS.

A few guys feel sorry for me and risk getting their hands bitten off by
sticking dollars in my garter belt. My disheveled pubic hairs stand at
full attention, ready to poke the guys' eyes out if they get too close.

Then I notice this bald guy in the audience, I've got a new em...Read more of this...

by Graves, Robert
...those two together,
Despite a lack of children,
Than pulled them apart.

Call it a good marriage:
They never fought in public,
They acted circumspectly
And faced the world with pride;
Thus the hazards of their love-bed
Were none of our damned business - 
Till as jurymen we sat on 
Two deaths by suicide....Read more of this...



by Whitman, Walt
...day and night tirelessly before her own face.

7
Seen at hand, or seen at a distance, 
Duly the twenty-four appear in public every day, 
Duly approach and pass with their companions, or a companion, 
Looking from no countenances of their own, but from the countenances of those who are with
 them, 
From the countenances of children or women, or the manly countenance,
From the open countenances of animals, or from inanimate things, 
From the landscape or waters, or from th...Read more of this...

by Pope, Alexander
...his God, or King: 
Alas! I copy (or my draught would fail) 
From honest Mah'met, or plain Parson Hale. 

But grant, in Public Men sometimes are shown, 
A Woman's seen in Private life alone: 
Our bolder Talents in full light displayed; 
Your Virtues open fairest in the shade. 
Bred to disguise, in Public 'tis you hide; 
There, none distinguish twixt your Shame or Pride, 
Weakness or Delicacy; all so nice, 
That each may seem a Virtue, or a Vice. 

In Men, we variou...Read more of this...

by Dryden, John
...

32

Such was our prince; yet own'd a soul above 
The highest acts it could produce to show: 
Thus poor mechanic arts in public move 
Whilst the deep secrets beyond practice go. 

33

Nor di'd he when his ebbing fame went less, 
But when fresh laurels courted him to live; 
He seem'd but to prevent some new success, 
As if above what triumphs earth could give. 

34

His latest victories still thickest came, 
As near the center motion does increase, 
Till he, press'd ...Read more of this...

by Pound, Ezra
...came home, home to a lie,
home to many deceits,
home to old lies and new infamy;

usury age-old and age-thick
and liars in public places.

Daring as never before, wastage as never before.
Young blood and high blood,
Fair cheeks, and fine bodies;

fortitude as never before 

frankness as never before,
disillusions as never told in the old days,
hysterias, trench confessions,
laughter out of dead bellies.


V. 

There died a myriad,
And of the best, among them,
...Read more of this...

by Pope, Alexander
...oner than a song?
What better teach a foreigner the tongue?
What's long or short, each accent where to place,
And speak in public with some sort of grace.
I scarce can think him such a worthless thing,
Unless he praise some monster of a king;
Or virtue or religion turn to sport,
To please a lewd, or unbelieving court.
Unhappy Dryden!--In all Charles's days,
Roscommon only boasts unspotted bays;
And in our own (excuse some courtly stains)
No whiter page than Addison re...Read more of this...

by Marvell, Andrew
...onspire, 
Load them with envy, and with sitting tire. 
And the loved King, and never yet denied, 
Is brought to beg in public and to chide; 
But when this failed, and months enow were spent, 
They with the first day's proffer seem content, 
And to Land-Tax from the Excise turn round, 
Bought off with eighteen-hundred-thousand pound. 
Thus like fair theives, the Commons' purse they share, 
But all the members' lives, consulting, spare. 

Blither than hare that hath...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...all enjoy the sight of
 the
 beef, lumber, bread-stuffs, of Chicago, the great city; 
They shall train themselves to go in public to become orators and oratresses; 
Strong and sweet shall their tongues be—poems and materials of poems shall come from
 their
 lives—they shall be makers and finders; 
Of them, and of their works, shall emerge divine conveyers, to convey gospels; 
Characters, events, retrospections, shall be convey’d in gospels
—Trees, animals, waters, shall be co...Read more of this...

by Murray, Les
...o attentive faces 
music has broken its frame 
its bodice of always-weak laces 
the entirely promiscuous art 
pours out in public spaces 
accompanying everything, the selections 
of sex and war, the rejections. 
To jeans-wearers in zipped sporrans 
it transmits an ideal body 
continuously as theirs age. Warrens 
of plastic tiles and mesh throats 
dispense this aural money 
this sleek accountancy of notes 
deep feeling adrift from its feelers 
thought that means everyt...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...wait; thus far He hath performed—
Sent his Anointed, and to us revealed him 
By his great Prophet pointed at and shown
In public, and with him we have conversed.
Let us be glad of this, and all our fears
Lay on his providence; He will not fail,
Nor will withdraw him now, nor will recall—
Mock us with his blest sight, then snatch him hence:
Soon we shall see our hope, our joy, return."
 Thus they out of their plaints new hope resume
To find whom at the first they foun...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...of women! and let women among
 themselves talk and think obscenely of men! 
Let us all, without missing one, be exposed in public, naked, monthly, at the peril of our
 lives! let our bodies be freely handled and examined by whoever chooses! 
Let nothing but copies at second hand be permitted to exist upon the earth!
Let the earth desert God, nor let there ever henceforth be mention’d the name of God!

Let there be no God! 
Let there be money, business, imports, exports, custo...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...emselves;
Where equanimity is illustrated in affairs; 
Where speculations on the Soul are encouraged; 
Where women walk in public processions in the streets, the same as the men, 
Where they enter the public assembly and take places the same as the men; 
Where the city of the faithfulest friends stands;
Where the city of the cleanliness of the sexes stands; 
Where the city of the healthiest fathers stands; 
Where the city of the best-bodied mothers stands, 
There the great ci...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...in every
 town, 
Observing shows, births, improvements, structures, arts, 
Listening to the orators and the oratresses in public halls, 
Of and through The States, as during life—each man and woman my neighbor,
The Louisianian, the Georgian, as near to me, and I as near to him and her, 
The Mississippian and Arkansian yet with me—and I yet with any of them; 
Yet upon the plains west of the spinal river—yet in my house of adobie, 
Yet returning eastward—yet in the Sea-Side St...Read more of this...

by Gilbert, Jack
...rage is not the abnormal. 
Not the marvelous act. Not Macbeth with fine speeches. 
The worthless can manage in public, or for the moment. 
It is too near the whore's heart: the bounty of impulse, 
And the failure to sustain even small kindness. 
Not the marvelous act, but the evident conclusion of being. 
Not strangeness, but a leap forward of the same quality. 
Accomplishment. The even loyalty. But fresh. 
Not the Prodigal Son, nor Fau...Read more of this...

by Byron, George (Lord)
...(41) The death-song of the Turkish women. The "silent slaves" are the men, whose notions of decorum forbid complain in public. 

(42) "I came to the place of my birth, and cried, 'The friends of my youth, where are they?' and an Echo answered, 'Where are they?'" — From an Arabic MS. 

The above quotation (from which the idea in the text is taken) must be already familiar to every reader — it is given in the first annotation, p. 67, of "The Pleasures of Memory;...Read more of this...

by Yeats, William Butler
...he country wench.

Did all old men and women, rich and poor,
Who trod upon these rocks or passed this door,
Whether in public or in secret rage
As I do now against old age?
But I have found an answer in those eyes
That are impatient to be gone;
Go therefore; but leave Hanrahan,
For I need all his mighty memories.

Old lecher with a love on every wind,
Bring up out of that deep considering mind
All that you have discovered in the grave,
For it is certain that you have
...Read more of this...

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Book: Reflection on the Important Things