Famous Knows Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Compassion

by Robert William Service
 A beggar in the street I saw,
Who held a hand like withered claw,
 As cold as clay;
But as I had no silver groat
To give, I buttoned up my coat
 And turned away.

And then I watched a working wife
Who bore the bitter load of life
 With lagging limb;
A penny from her purse she took,
And with sweet pity in her look
...Read more of this...

The Trolls Nosegay

by Robert Graves
 A simple nosegay! Was that much to ask?
(Winter still nagged, with scarce a bud yet showing.)
He loved her ill, if he resigned the task.
'Somewhere,' she cried, 'there must be blossom blowing.'
It seems my lady wept and the troll swore
By Heaven he hated tears: he'd cure her spleen -
Where she had begged one flower he'd shower fourscore,
A bunch fit to...Read more of this...

Three Marching Songs

by William Butler Yeats
 I

Remember all those renowned generations,
They left their bodies to fatten the wolves,
They left their homesteads to fatten the foxes,
Fled to far countries, or sheltered themselves
In cavern, crevice, or hole,
Defending Ireland's soul.

Be still, be still, what can be said?
My father sang that song,
But time amends old wrong,
All that is finished, let it fade.

Remember all those renowned generations,
Remember all that have...Read more of this...

At the door

by Eugene Field
 I thought myself indeed secure,
So fast the door, so firm the lock;
But, lo! he toddling comes to lure
My parent ear with timorous knock.

My heart were stone could it withstand
The sweetness of my baby's plea,--
That timorous, baby knocking and
"Please let me in,--it's only me."

I threw aside the unfinished book,
Regardless of its tempting charms,
And opening wide the door, I took
My laughing...Read more of this...

Comparisons

by Algernon Charles Swinburne
 CHILD, when they say that others
Have been or are like you,
Babes fit to be your brothers,
Sweet human drops of dew,
Bright fruit of mortal mothers,
What should one say or do?

We know the thought is treason,
We feel the dream absurd;
A claim rebuked of reason,
That withers at a word:
For never shone the season
That bore so blithe a bird.

Some smiles may seem as...Read more of this...

Thought was born blind, but Thought knows what is seeing

by Fernando Pessoa
Thought was born blind, but Thought knows what is seeing.

Its careful touch, deciphering forms from shapes,

Still suggests form as aught whose proper being

Mere finding touch with erring darkness drapes.

Yet whence, except from guessed sight, does touch teach

That touch is but a close and empty sense?

How does mere touch, self-uncontented, reach

For some truer sense's whole intelligence?

The thing once touched, if touch...Read more of this...

The Saki knows my genus properly ,

by Omar Khayyam
The Saki knows my genus properly,
To all woe's species he holds a key,
Whene'er my mood is sad, he brings me wine,
And that makes all the difference to me!...Read more of this...

Knows how to forget!

by Emily Dickinson
 Knows how to forget!
But could It teach it?
Easiest of Arts, they say
When one learn how

Dull Hearts have died
In the Acquisition
Sacrificed for Science
Is common, though, now --

I went to School
But was not wiser
Globe did not teach it
Nor Logarithm Show

"How to forget"!
Say -- some -- Philosopher!
Ah, to be erudite
Enough to know!

Is it in a Book?
So, I could buy it --
Is it...Read more of this...

The Supplanter: A Tale

by Thomas Hardy
 I 

He bends his travel-tarnished feet 
 To where she wastes in clay: 
From day-dawn until eve he fares 
 Along the wintry way; 
From day-dawn until eve repairs 
 Unto her mound to pray. 

II 

"Are these the gravestone shapes that meet 
 My forward-straining view? 
Or forms that cross a window-blind 
 In circle, knot, and queue:...Read more of this...

Until the Desert knows

by Emily Dickinson
 Until the Desert knows
That Water grows
His Sands suffice
But let him once suspect
That Caspian Fact
Sahara dies

Utmost is relative --
Have not or Have
Adjacent sums
Enough -- the first Abode
On the familiar Road
Galloped in Dreams --...Read more of this...

What Almost Every Woman Knows Sooner Or Later

by Ogden Nash
 Husbands are things that wives have to get used to putting up with.
And with whom they breakfast with and sup with.
They interfere with the discipline of nurseries,
And forget anniversaries,
And when they have been particularly remiss
They think they can cure everything with a great big kiss,
And when you tell them about something awful they have done they just
look unbearably patient...Read more of this...

The devotee knows not how to appreciate as well as

by Omar Khayyam
The devotee knows not how to appreciate as well as
we Thy divine pity. A stranger can never know Thee
as perfectly as a friend. [They pretend] that Thou hast
said: If you commit sin, I will send you into Hell. Go
now—tell that to one who knows Thee not....Read more of this...

Who dares to take this life from me Knows no better

by T Wignesan
for Eric Mottram

"Nur wenn das Herz erschlossen,

Dann ist die Erde schön."

Goethe.

I

An important thing in living
Is to know when to go;
He who does not know this
Has not far to go,
Though death may come and go
When you do not know.


Come, give me your hand,
Together shoulder and cheek to shoulder
We'll go, sour kana in cheeks
And in the mornings cherry sticks
To gum: the infectious...Read more of this...

Fate Knows no Tears

by Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
   Just as the dawn of Love was breaking
          Across the weary world of grey,
   Just as my life once more was waking
          As roses waken late in May,
   Fate, blindly cruel and havoc-making,
  ...Read more of this...

Who Knows?

by Vachel Lindsay
 They say one king is mad. Perhaps. Who knows?
They say one king is doddering and grey.
They say one king is slack and sick of mind,
A puppet for hid strings that twitch and play.

Is Europe then to be their sprawling-place?
Their mad-house, till it turns the wide world's bane?
Their place of maudlin, slavering conference
Till every far-off farmstead goes insane?...Read more of this...

He Knows All There Is To Know. Now He Is Acquainted With The Day And Night

by Delmore Schwartz
 (Robert Frost, 1875-1963) 


Whose wood this is I think I know:
He made it sacred long ago:
He will expect me, far or near
To watch that wood immense with snow.

That famous horse must feel great fear
Now that his noble rider's no longer here:
He gives his harness bells to rhyme
--Perhaps he will be back, in time?

All woulds were promises he kept
Throughout the...Read more of this...

Louise Smith

by Edgar Lee Masters
 Herbert broke our engagement of eight years
When Annabelle returned to the village
From the Seminary, ah me!
If I had let my love for him alone
It might have grown into a beautiful sorrow --
Who knows? -- filling my life with healing fragrance.
But I tortured it, I poisoned it,
I blinded its eyes, and it became hatred --
Deadly ivy instead of clematis.
And my...Read more of this...

Sweet Skepticism of the Heart --

by Emily Dickinson
 Sweet Skepticism of the Heart --
That knows -- and does not know --
And tosses like a Fleet of Balm --
Affronted by the snow --
Invites and then retards the Truth
Lest Certainty be sere
Compared with the delicious throe
Of transport thrilled with Fear --...Read more of this...

A worldly love knows not how to produce reflection

by Omar Khayyam
A worldly love knows not how to produce reflection.
It is like a fire half extinguished which no longer gives
heat. A true love should know neither tranquillity, nor
repose, nor nourishment, nor sleep for months and years,
day nor night.
320...Read more of this...

Epode

by Ben Jonson
  XI. — EPODE.                                   And her black spite expel, Which to effect (since no breast is so sure,                  Or safe, but she'll procure Some way of entrance) we must plant a guard                  Of thoughts to watch, and ward At the eye and ear, the ports unto the mind,                 Give knowledge instantly, To wakeful reason, our affections' king :                  Who, in th' examining,...Read more of this...

Nobody knows this little Rose

by Emily Dickinson
 Nobody knows this little Rose --
It might a pilgrim be
Did I not take it from the ways
And lift it up to thee.
Only a Bee will miss it --
Only a Butterfly,
Hastening from far journey --
On its breast to lie --
Only a Bird will wonder --
Only a Breeze will sigh --
Ah Little Rose -- how easy
For such as thee to die!...Read more of this...

Everybody Knows

by Leonard Cohen
 (co-written by Sharon Robinson)
Everybody knows that the dice are loaded 
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed 
Everybody knows that the war is over 
Everybody knows the good guys lost 
Everybody knows the fight was fixed 
The poor stay poor, the rich get rich 
That's how it goes 
Everybody knows 
Everybody knows that the boat is leaking 
Everybody knows the...Read more of this...

I Have A Rendezvous With Death

by Alan Seeger
 I have a rendezvous with Death
At some disputed barricade,
When Spring comes back with rustling shade
And apple-blossoms fill the air— 
I have a rendezvous with Death
When Spring brings back blue days and fair.

It may be he shall take my hand
And lead me into his dark land
And close my eyes and quench my breath— 
It may be I shall pass him...Read more of this...

In The Valley Of The Elwy

by Gerard Manley Hopkins
 I remember a house where all were good
 To me, God knows, deserving no such thing:
 Comforting smell breathed at very entering,
Fetched fresh, as I suppose, off some sweet wood.
That cordial air made those kind people a hood
 All over, as a bevy of eggs the mothering wing
 Will, or mild nights the new morsels of spring:
Why, it seemed...Read more of this...

Wine, which the wise man knows how to appreciate,

by Omar Khayyam
Wine, which the wise man knows how to appreciate,
is for me the water of life and I its prophet am. It is
balm for the heart, an elixir which fortifies the soul.
Has God Himself not said: The benefits of the human
race are found in wine....Read more of this...

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