Famous Jackson Poems by Famous Poets

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

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With The Face

by Laura Riding Jackson
 With the face goes a mirror
As with the mind a world.
Likeness tells the doubting eye
That strangeness is not strange.
At an early hour and knowledge
Identity not yet familiar
Looks back upon itself from later,
And seems itself.

To-day seems now.
With reality-to-be goes time.
With the mind goes a world.
Wit the heart goes a weather.
With the face goes a mirror
As with the body a fear.
Young...Read more of this...

The Simple Line

by Laura Riding Jackson
 The secrets of the mind convene splendidly,
Though the mind is meek.
To be aware inwardly
of brain and beauty
Is dark too recognizable.
Thought looking out on thought
Makes one an eye:
Which it shall be, both decide.
One is with the mind alone,
The other is with other thoughts gone
To be seen from afar and not known.

When openly these inmost sights
Flash and speak fully,
Each head at...Read more of this...

The World And I

by Laura Riding Jackson
 This is not exactly what I mean
Any more than the sun is the sun.
But how to mean more closely
If the sun shines but approximately?
What a world of awkwardness!
What hostile implements of sense!
Perhaps this is as close a meaning
As perhaps becomes such knowing.
Else I think the world and I
Must live together as strangers and die—
A sour love, each doubtful whether
Was...Read more of this...

The Fir-Tree and the Brook

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 The Fir-Tree looked on stars, but loved the Brook! 
"O silver-voiced! if thou wouldst wait, 
My love can bravely woo." All smiles forsook 
The brook's white face. "Too late! 
Too late! I go to wed the sea. 
I know not if my love would curse or bless thee. 
I may not, dare not, tarry to caress thee, 
Oh, do...Read more of this...

A Calendar of Sonnets: January

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 O Winter! frozen pulse and heart of fire, 
What loss is theirs who from thy kingdom turn 
Dismayed, and think thy snow a sculptured urn 
Of death! Far sooner in midsummer tire 
The streams than under ice. June could not hire 
Her roses to forego the strength they learn 
In sleeping on thy breast. No fires can burn 
The...Read more of this...

Refrain

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 Of all the songs which poets sing 
The ones which are most sweet 
Are those which at close intervals 
A low refrain repeat; 
Some tender word, some syllable, 
Over and over, ever and ever, 
While the song lasts, 
Altering never, 
Music if sung, music if said, 
Subtle like some golden thread 
A shuttle casts, 
In and out on a...Read more of this...

Gods Light-Houses

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 1 When night falls on the earth, the sea 
2 From east to west lies twinkling bright
3 With shining beams from beacons high
4 Which flash afar a friendly light.

5 The sailor's eyes, like eyes in prayer,
6 Turn unto them for guiding ray:
7 If storms obscure their radiance,
8 The great ships helpless grope their way.

9 When night falls on the...Read more of this...

My Bees: An Allegory

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 "O bees, sweet bees!" I said, "that nearest field 
Is shining white with fragrant immortelles. 
Fly swiftly there and drain those honey wells." 
Then, spicy pines the sunny hive to shield, 
I set, and patient for the autumn's yield 
Of sweet I waited. 
When the village bells 
Rang frosty clear, and from their satin cells 
The chestnuts leaped, rejoicing,...Read more of this...

An Arctic Quest

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 O proudly name their names who bravely sail 
To seek brave lost in Arctic snows and seas! 
Bring money and bring ships, and on strong knees 
Pray prayers so strong that not one word can fail 
To pierce God's listening heart! 
Rigid and pale, 
The lost men's bodies, waiting, drift and freeze; 
Yet shall their solemn dead lips tell...Read more of this...

The Poets Forge

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 He lies on his back, the idling smith, 
A lazy, dreaming fellow is he; 
The sky is blue, or the sky is gray, 
He lies on his back the livelong day, 
Not a tool in sight, say what they may, 
A curious sort of smith is he. 

The powers of the air are in league with him; 
The country...Read more of this...

My Tenants

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 I never had a title-deed 
To my estate. But little heed 
Eyes give to me, when I walk by 
My fields, to see who occupy. 
Some clumsy men who lease and hire 
And cut my trees to feed their fire, 
Own all the land that I possess, 
And tax my tenants to distress. 
And if I say I had...Read more of this...

Two Truths

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 Darling,' he said, 'I never meant
To hurt you;' and his eyes were wet.
'I would not hurt you for the world:
Am I to blame if I forget?'

'Forgive my selfish tears!' she cried,
'Forgive! I knew that it was not
Because you meant to hurt me, sweet-
I knew it was that you forgot!'

But all the same, deep in her heart
Rankled this thought, and...Read more of this...

A Calendar of Sonnets: October

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 The month of carnival of all the year, 
When Nature lets the wild earth go its way, 
And spend whole seasons on a single day. 
The spring-time holds her white and purple dear; 
October, lavish, flaunts them far and near; 
The summer charily her reds doth lay 
Like jewels on her costliest array; 
October, scornful, burns them on a...Read more of this...

Freedom

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 I WILL not follow you, my bird,
 I will not follow you.
I would not breathe a word, my bird,
 To bring thee here anew.


I love the free in thee, my bird,
 The lure of freedom drew;
The light you fly toward, my bird,
 I fly with thee unto.


And there we yet will meet, my bird,
 Though far I go from...Read more of this...

The Poets Corner

by Laura Riding Jackson
 Here where the end of bone is no end of song
And the earth is bedecked with immortality
In what was poetry
And now is pride beside
And nationality,
Here is a battle with no bravery
But if the coward's tongue has gone
Swording his own lusty lung.
Listen if there is victory
Written into a library
Waving the books in banners
Soldierly at last, for the lines
Go marching on,...Read more of this...

Tryst

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 Somewhere thou awaitest, 
And I, with lips unkissed, 
Weep that thus to latest 
Thou puttest off our tryst!

The golden bowls are broken, 
The silver cords untwine; 
Almond flowers in token 
Have bloomed,---that I am thine!

Others who would fly thee 
In cowardly alarms, 
Who hate thee and deny thee, 
Thou foldest in thine arms!

How shall I entreat thee 
No longer...Read more of this...

A Dream

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 Once a dream did weave a shade,
O'er my Angel-guarded bed.
That an Emmet lost it's way
Where on grass methought I lay.

Troubled wildered and forlorn
Dark benighted travel-worn,
Over many a tangled spray,
All heart-broke I heard her say.

O my children! do they cry,
Do they hear their father sigh.
Now they look abroad to see,
Now return and weep for me.

Pitying I dropp'd a tear;
But I...Read more of this...

A Calendar of Sonnets: August

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 Silence again. The glorious symphony 
Hath need of pause and interval of peace. 
Some subtle signal bids all sweet sounds cease, 
Save hum of insects' aimless industry. 
Pathetic summer seeks by blazonry 
Of color to conceal her swift decrease. 
Weak subterfuge! Each mocking day doth fleece 
A blossom, and lay bare her poverty. 
Poor middle-aged summer! Vain this show!...Read more of this...

Michael Jackson

by James A Emanuel
 There ain't NO-BO-DY
can dance like THAT, 'cept them twins
Jazzlene and Jazzphat....Read more of this...

A Calendar of Sonnets: June

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 O month whose promise and fulfilment blend, 
And burst in one! it seems the earth can store 
In all her roomy house no treasure more; 
Of all her wealth no farthing have to spend 
On fruit, when once this stintless flowering end. 
And yet no tiniest flower shall fall before 
It hath made ready at its hidden core 
Its...Read more of this...

A Calendar of Sonnets: April

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 No days such honored days as these! While yet 
Fair Aphrodite reigned, men seeking wide 
For some fair thing which should forever bide 
On earth, her beauteous memory to set 
In fitting frame that no age could forget, 
Her name in lovely April's name did hide, 
And leave it there, eternally allied 
To all the fairest flowers Spring did...Read more of this...

Songs of Battle

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 Old as the world--no other things so old; 
Nay, older than the world, else, how had sprung 
Such lusty strength in them when earth was young?-- 
Stand valor and its passion hot and bold, 
Insatiate of battle. How, else, told 
Blind men, born blind, that red was fitting tongue 
Mute, eloquent, to show how trumpets rung 
When armies charged...Read more of this...

Octobers Bright Blue Weather

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 O suns and skies and clouds of June, 
And flowers of June together, 
Ye cannot rival for one hour 
October's bright blue weather;

When loud the bumblebee makes haste, 
Belated, thriftless vagrant, 
And goldenrod is dying fast, 
And lanes with grapes are fragrant;

When gentians roll their fingers tight 
To save them for the morning, 
And chestnuts fall from satin burrs...Read more of this...

The Dying Words Of Stonewall Jackson

by Sidney Lanier
 "Order A. P. Hill to prepare for battle."
"Tell Major Hawks to advance the Commissary train."
"Let us cross the river and rest in the shade."

The stars of Night contain the glittering Day
And rain his glory down with sweeter grace
Upon the dark World's grand, enchanted face --
All loth to turn away.

And so the Day, about to yield his breath,
Utters the stars...Read more of this...

Freedom

by Helen Hunt Jackson
 he drank wine all night of the 
28th, and he kept thinking of her: 
the way she walked and talked and loved 
the way she told him things that seemed true 
but were not, and he knew the color of each 
of her dresses 
and her shoes-he knew the stock and curve of 
each heel 
as well as the...Read more of this...

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