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Famous Lawful Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Wilmot, John
...common arms his fate,
He leaves her bastard heir to his estate,
And, as the race of such an owl deserves,
His own dull lawful progeny he starves.
--"Nature, who never made a thing in vain,
But does each insect to some end ordain,
Wisely contrived kind keeping fools, no doubt,
To patch up vices men of wit wear out."
Thus she ran on two hours, some grains of sense
Still mixed with volleys of impertinence.
--But now 'tis time I should some pity show
To Chloe, since ...Read more of this...



by Dryden, John
...ld ambition loves to slide, not stand;
And fortune's ice prefers to virtue's land:
Achitophel, grown weary to possess
A lawful fame, and lazy happiness;
Disdain'd the golden fruit to gather free,
And lent the crowd his arm to shake the tree.
Now, manifest of crimes, contriv'd long since,
He stood at bold defiance with his prince:
Held up the buckler of the people's cause,
Against the crown; and skulk'd behind the laws.
The wish'd occasion of the plot he takes;
Some ci...Read more of this...

by Dickinson, Emily
...Defrauded I a Butterfly --
The lawful Heir -- for Thee --...Read more of this...

by Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns)
...omontory,
Pray for all those who are in ships, those
Whose business has to do with fish, and
Those concerned with every lawful traffic
And those who conduct them.

 Repeat a prayer also on behalf of
Women who have seen their sons or husbands
Setting forth, and not returning:
Figlia del tuo figlio,
Queen of Heaven.

 Also pray for those who were in ships, and
Ended their voyage on the sand, in the sea's lips
Or in the dark throat which will not reject them
Or wherever ...Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...
And moving out they found the stately horse, 
Who now no more a vassal to the thief, 
But free to stretch his limbs in lawful fight, 
Neighed with all gladness as they came, and stooped 
With a low whinny toward the pair: and she 
Kissed the white star upon his noble front, 
Glad also; then Geraint upon the horse 
Mounted, and reached a hand, and on his foot 
She set her own and climbed; he turned his face 
And kissed her climbing, and she cast her arms 
About him, and at on...Read more of this...



by Homer,
...art. Then Metaneira filled a cup with sweet wine and offered it to her; but she refused it, for she said it was not lawful for her to drink red wine, but bade them mix meal and water with soft mint and give her to drink. And Metaneira mixed the draught and gave it to the goddess as she bade. So the great queen Deo received it to observe the sacrament.[3]

[Line 212] And of them all, well-girded Metaneira first began to speak: "Hail, lady! For I think you are...Read more of this...

by Smart, Christopher
...e may be an atheist i.e. without God, by the folly of his doctrine concerning innate ideas. 

For it is not lawful to sell poyson in England any more than it is in Venice, the Lord restrain both the finder and receiver. 

For the ACCENTS are the invention of the Moabites, who learning the GREEK tongue marked the words after their own vicious pronuntiation. 

For the GAULS (the now-French and original Moabites) after they were subdued by Cæsar became such G...Read more of this...

by Trumbull, John
...ur Sovereign Lord, The People;
By plunder rise to power and glory,
And brand all property, as Tory;
Expose all wares to lawful seizures
By mobbers or monopolizers;
Break heads and windows and the peace,
For your own interest and increase;
Dispute and pray and fight and groan
For public good, and mean your own;
Prevent the law by fierce attacks
From quitting scores upon your backs;
Lay your old dread, the gallows, low,
And seize the stocks, your ancient foe,
And turn them to c...Read more of this...

by Hayden, Robert
...hould suffer the august John Quincey Adams 
to speak with so much passion of the right 
of chattel slaves to kill their lawful masters 
and with his Roman rhetoric weave a hero's 
garland for Cinquez. I tell you that 
we are determined to return to Cuba 
with our slaves and there see justice done. 
Cinquez-- 
or let us say 'the Prince'--Cinquez shall die." 

The deep immortal human wish, 
the timeless will: 

Cinquez its deathless primaveral image, 
life that tran...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...uin of so many glorious once 
And perfect while they stood? how last unfold 
The secrets of another world, perhaps 
Not lawful to reveal? yet for thy good 
This is dispensed; and what surmounts the reach 
Of human sense, I shall delineate so, 
By likening spiritual to corporal forms, 
As may express them best; though what if Earth 
Be but a shadow of Heaven, and things therein 
Each to other like, more than on earth is thought? 
As yet this world was not, and Chaos wild 
Reig...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...ove, thou blamest me not; for Love, thou sayest, 
Leads up to Heaven, is both the way and guide; 
Bear with me then, if lawful what I ask: 
Love not the heavenly Spirits, and how their love 
Express they? by looks only? or do they mix 
Irradiance, virtual or immediate touch? 
To whom the Angel, with a smile that glowed 
Celestial rosy red, Love's proper hue, 
Answered. Let it suffice thee that thou knowest 
Us happy, and without love no happiness. 
Whatever pure thou ...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...honour, glory, and popular praise
(Rocks whereon greatest men have oftest wrecked);
Or that which only seems to satisfy
Lawful desires of nature, not beyond. 
And now I know he hungers, where no food
Is to be found, in the wide Wilderness:
The rest commit to me; I shall let pass
No advantage, and his strength as oft assay."
 He ceased, and heard their grant in loud acclaim;
Then forthwith to him takes a chosen band
Of Spirits likest to himself in guile,
To be at hand ...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...d! fond wish too late)
Was in the Vale of Sorec, Dalila,
That specious Monster, my accomplisht snare. 
I thought it lawful from my former act,
And the same end; still watching to oppress
Israel's oppressours: of what now I suffer
She was not the prime cause, but I my self,
Who vanquisht with a peal of words (O weakness!)
Gave up my fort of silence to a Woman.

Chor: In seeking just occasion to provoke
The Philistine, thy Countries Enemy,
Thou never wast remiss, I hear...Read more of this...

by Browning, Robert
...then, with a smile that partook of the awful,
Turned her over to his yellow mother
To learn what was held decorous and lawful;
And the mother smelt blood with a cat-like instinct,
As her cheek quick whitened thro' all its quince-tinct.
Oh, but the lady heard the whole truth at once!
What meant she?--Who was she?---Her duty and station,
The wisdom of age and the folly of youth, at once,
Its decent regard and its fitting relation---
In brief, my friend, set all the devils ...Read more of this...

by Lowell, Amy
...br>
"`If in two years my vessel should yet stay
From Amsterdam, I give Grootver, sometime
A friend, my daughter for his lawful wife.' Now swear."

16
And Kurler swore, a palsied, tottering sound,
And traced his name, a shaking, wandering line.
Then dazed he sat there, speechless from his wound.
Grootver got up: "Fair voyage, the brigantine!"
He shuffled from the room, and left the house.
His footsteps wore to silence down the street.
At last the aged m...Read more of this...

by Dryden, John
...he gave 
He had a grudging still to be a knave. 
The frauds he learnt in his fanatic years 
Made him uneasy in his lawful gears. 
At best, as little honest as he could, 
And, like white witches, mischievously good. 
To his first bias longingly he leans 
And rather would be great by wicked means. 
Thus framed for ill, he loosed our triple hold, 
(Advice unsafe, precipitous, and bold.) 
From hence those tears, that Ilium was our woe: 
Who helps a powerful f...Read more of this...

by Chaucer, Geoffrey
...ewold the Reeve,
I pray you all that none of you do grieve,
Though I answer, and somewhat set his hove*, *hood 
For lawful is *force off with force to shove.* *to repel force
This drunken miller hath y-told us here by force*
How that beguiled was a carpentere,
Paraventure* in scorn, for I am one: *perhaps
And, by your leave, I shall him quite anon.
Right in his churlish termes will I speak,
I pray to God his necke might to-break.
He can well in mine eye see a ...Read more of this...

by Browning, Robert
...ermost 
For his life's set prize, be it what it will! 

The counter our lovers staked was lost 
As surely as if it were lawful coin: 
And the sin I impute to each frustrate ghost 

Is -- the unlit lamp and the ungirt loin, 
Though the end in sight was a vice, I say. 
You of the virtue (we issue join) 
How strive you? De te, fabula....Read more of this...

by Chaucer, Geoffrey
...ere a disgrace

Lo here, the wise king Dan* Solomon, *Lord 4
I trow that he had wives more than one;
As would to God it lawful were to me
To be refreshed half so oft as he!
What gift* of God had he for all his wives? *special favour, licence
No man hath such, that in this world alive is.
God wot, this noble king, *as to my wit,* *as I understand*
The first night had many a merry fit
With each of them, so *well was him on live.* *so well he lived*
Blessed be God that I...Read more of this...

by Marvell, Andrew
...rage led;
First from a Judge, then Souldier bred.

Small Honour would be in the Storm.
The Court him grants the lawful Form;
Which licens'd either Peace or Force,
To hinder the unjust Divorce.
Yet still the Nuns his Right debar'd,
Standing upon their holy Guard.
Ill-counsell'd Women, do you know
Whom you resist, or what you do?

Is not this he whose Offspring fierce
Shall fight through all the Universe;
And with successive Valour try
France, Poland, either Ger...Read more of this...

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