Famous Joys Poems by Famous Poets

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

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To Ladies Of A Certain Age

by John Trumbull
 Ye ancient Maids, who ne'er must prove
The early joys of youth and love,
Whose names grim Fate (to whom 'twas given,
When marriages were made in heaven)
Survey'd with unrelenting scowl,
And struck them from the muster-roll;
Or set you by, in dismal sort,
For wintry bachelors to court;
Or doom'd to lead your faded lives,
Heirs to the joys of former wives;
Attend! nor fear in state...Read more of this...

Modern Love IV: All Other Joys of Life

by George Meredith
 All other joys of life he strove to warm, 
And magnify, and catch them to his lip: 
But they had suffered shipwreck with the ship, 
And gazed upon him sallow from the storm. 
Or if Delusion came, 'twas but to show 
The coming minute mock the one that went. 
Cold as a mountain in its star-pitched tent, 
Stood high...Read more of this...

I Live I Die I Burn I Drown

by Delmira Agustini
 I live, I die, I burn, I drown
I endure at once chill and cold
Life is at once too soft and too hard
I have sore troubles mingled with joys

Suddenly I laugh and at the same time cry
And in pleasure many a grief endure
My happiness wanes and yet it lasts unchanged
All at once I dry up and grow green

Thus I suffer...Read more of this...

The Surprise

by Ingeborg Bachmann
 As there I left the road in May,
And took my way along a ground,
I found a glade with girls at play,
By leafy boughs close-hemmed around,
And there, with stores of harmless joys,
They plied their tongues, in merry noise:
Though little did they seem to fear
So ***** a stranger might be near;
Teeh-hee! Look here! Hah! ha! Look there!
And oh! so playsome, oh!...Read more of this...

Signet of Eternity

by Rabindranath Tagore
 The day was when I did not keep myself in readiness for thee; 
and entering my heart unbidden even as one of the common crowd, 
unknown to me, my king, thou didst press the signet of eternity upon 
many a fleeting moment of my life. 

And today when by chance I light upon them and see thy signature, 
I...Read more of this...

Sonnet CXCV

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET CXCV. I' mi vivea di mia sorte contento. HE FEARS THAT AN ILLNESS WHICH HAS ATTACKED THE EYES OF LAURA MAY DEPRIVE HIM OF THEIR SIGHT.  I lived so tranquil, with my lot content,No sorrow visited, nor envy pined,To other loves if fortune were more kindOne pang of mine their thousand...Read more of this...

Eidólons

by Walt Whitman
 I MET a Seer, 
Passing the hues and objects of the world, 
The fields of art and learning, pleasure, sense, To glean Eidólons. 
 Put in thy chants, said he, 
No more the puzzling hour, nor day—nor segments, parts, put in,
Put first before the rest, as light for all, and entrance-song of all, That of
 Eidólons. 
 Ever the...Read more of this...

A Farewel (To Worldly Joys.)

by Anne Killigrew
 FArewel ye Unsubstantial Joyes, 
Ye Gilded Nothings, Gaudy Toyes, 
Too long ye have my Soul misled, 
Too long with Aiery Diet fed: 
But now my Heart ye shall no more
Deceive, as you have heretofore: 
For when I hear such Sirens sing, 
Like Ithaca's fore-warned King, 
With prudent Resolution I
Will so my Will and Fancy tye, 
That stronger to the...Read more of this...

435. Song—Where are the Joys I have met

by Robert Burns
 WHERE are the joys I have met in the morning,
 That danc’d to the lark’s early song?
Where is the peace that awaited my wand’ring,
 At evening the wild-woods among?


No more a winding the course of yon river,
 And marking sweet flowerets so fair,
No more I trace the light footsteps of Pleasure,
 But Sorrow and sad-sighing Care.


Is it that Summer’s...Read more of this...

Bed Sitter

by Robert William Service
 He stared at me with sad, hurt eyes,
That drab, untidy man;
And though my clients I despise
I do the best I can
To comfort them with cheerful chat;
(Quite comme il faut, of course)
And furnish evidence so that
Their wives may claim divorce. 

But as this chap sobbed out his woes
I thought: How it's a shame!
His wife's a ***** and so he goes
And...Read more of this...

Hymn 100

by Isaac Watts
 Believe and be saved.

John 3:16-18. 

Not to condemn the sons of men,
Did Christ, the Son of God, appear;
No weapons in his hands are seen,
No flaming sword nor thunder there.

Such was the pity of our God,
He loved the race of man so well,
He sent his Son to bear our load
Of sins, and save our souls from hell.

Sinners, believe the Savior's...Read more of this...

Botany Bay Eclogues 02 - Elinor

by Robert Southey
 (Time, Morning. Scene, the Shore.)

Once more to daily toil--once more to wear
The weeds of infamy--from every joy
The heart can feel excluded, I arise
Worn out and faint with unremitting woe;
And once again with wearied steps I trace
The hollow-sounding shore. The swelling waves
Gleam to the morning sun, and dazzle o'er
With many a splendid hue the breezy strand.
Oh there was once a...Read more of this...

Like Truthless Dreams So Are My Joys Expired

by Sir Walter Raleigh
 Like truthless dreams, so are my joys expired, 
And past return are all my dandled days; 
My love misled, and fancy quite retired— 
Of all which passed the sorrow only stays. 

My lost delights, now clean from sight of land, 
Have left me all alone in unknown ways; 
My mind to woe, my life in fortune's hand— 
Of all...Read more of this...

The World

by Katherine Philips
 Wee falsely think it due unto our friends,
That we should grieve for their too early ends:
He that surveys the world with serious eys,
And stripps Her from her grosse and weak disguise,
Shall find 'tis injury to mourn their fate;
He only dy's untimely who dy's Late.
For if 'twere told to children in the womb,
To what a stage of mischief they must...Read more of this...

Delilah

by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
 cIn the midnight of darkness and terror, 
When I would grope nearer to God, 
With my back to a record of error
And the highway of sin I have trod, 
There comes to me shapes I would banish –
The shapes of the deeds I have done; 
And I pray and I plead till they vanish –
All vanish and leave me,...Read more of this...

The Grasshopper

by Richard Lovelace
 O thou that swing'st upon the waving ear
Of some well-filled oaten beard,
Drunk ev'ry night with a delicious tear
Dropped thee from heav'n, where now th' art reared,

The joys of earth and air are thine entire,
That with thy feet and wings dost hop and fly;
And, when the poppy works, thou dost retire
To thy carved acorn-bed to lie.

Up with the day, the...Read more of this...

105. Despondency: An Ode

by Robert Burns
 OPPRESS’D with grief, oppress’d with care,
A burden more than I can bear,
 I set me down and sigh;
O life! thou art a galling load,
Along a rough, a weary road,
 To wretches such as I!
Dim backward as I cast my view,
 What sick’ning scenes appear!
What sorrows yet may pierce me through,
 Too justly I may fear!
 Still caring, despairing,
 Must...Read more of this...

I never drank of joy's sweet cordial,

by Omar Khayyam
I never drank of joy's sweet cordial,
But grief's fell hand infused a drop of gall;
Nor dipped my bread in pleasure's piquant salt,
But briny sorrow made me smart withal!...Read more of this...

Hymn 51

by Isaac Watts
 Persevering grace.

Jude 1:24,25. 

To God the only wise,
Our Savior and our King,
Let all the saints below the skies
Their humble praises bring.

'Tis his almighty love,
His counsel, and' his care,
Preserves us safe from sin and death,
And every hurtful snare.

He will present our souls,
Unblemished and complete,
Before the glory of his face,
With joys divinely great.

Then all the chosen seed
Shall meet around the throne,
Shall...Read more of this...

Sonnet CXLVII

by Francesco Petrarch
[Pg 166] SONNET CXLVII. Po, ben puo' tu portartene la scorza. TO THE RIVER PO, ON QUITTING LAURA.  Thou Po to distant realms this frame mayst bear,On thy all-powerful, thy impetuous tide;But the free spirit that within doth bideNor for thy might, nor any might doth care:Not varying...Read more of this...

To A Husband

by Anne Kingsmill Finch
 This is to the crown and blessing of my life,
The much loved husband of a happy wife;
To him whose constant passion found the art
To win a stubborn and ungrateful heart,
And to the world by tenderest proof discovers
They err, who say that husbands can't be lovers.
With such return of passion, as is due,
Daphnis I love, Daphinis my thoughts pursue;
Daphnis, my...Read more of this...

Now of old joys naught but the name is left,

by Omar Khayyam
Now of old joys naught but the name is left,
Of all old friends but wine we are bereft,
And that wine new, but still cleave to the cup,
For save the cup, what single joy is left?...Read more of this...

Long too Long O Land!

by Walt Whitman
 LONG, too long, O land, 
Traveling roads all even and peaceful, you learn’d from joys and prosperity only; 
But now, ah now, to learn from crises of anguish—advancing, grappling with direst
 fate,
 and
 recoiling not; 
And now to conceive, and show to the world, what your children en-masse really are; 
(For who except myself has yet conceiv’d what your...Read more of this...

Song To Celia - I

by Ben Jonson
 Come, my Celia, let us prove
While we may the sports of love;
Time will not be ours forever,
He at length our good will sever.

Spend not then his gifts in vain;
Suns that set may rise again,
But if once we lose this light,
'Tis with us perpetual night.

Why should we defer our joys?
Fame and rumour are but toys.
Cannot we delude the eyes
Of a...Read more of this...

Fair is the leisure of life's garden-ground

by Hafez
Fair is the leisure of life’s garden-ground:
Pleasant is friendship’s voice & mirth’s soft sound.

Sweet are the perfumed flowers; yea, yea, what bliss
Sootheth like hope’s fresh scent of loveliness?

Lovely, O nightingale, is thy lament;
Ever to listening love thy plaint is dear;
In the fond thought of love thy life is spent.

Though in this world joy’s goal is but a name,
Fair is thy...Read more of this...

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