Famous Long Rhyme Poems

Famous Long Rhyme Poems. Long Rhyme Poetry by Famous Poets. A collection of the all-time best Rhyme long poems

See also: Long Member Poems

 I.

I said---Then, dearest, since 'tis so,
Since now at length my fate I know,
Since nothing all my love avails,
Since all, my life seemed meant for, fails,
Since this was written and needs must be---
My whole heart rises up to bless
Your name in pride and thankfulness!
Take back the hope you gave,---I claim
---Only a memory of the same,
---And this beside, if you will not blame,
Your leave for one more last ride with me.

II.

My mistress bent that brow of hers;
Those deep dark eyes where pride demurs
When pity would be softening through,
Fixed me, a breathing-while or two,
With life or death in the balance: right!
The blood replenished me again;
My last thought was at least not vain:
I and my mistress, side by side
Shall be together, breathe and ride,
So, one day more am I deified.
Who knows but the world may end tonight?

III.

Hush! if you saw some western cloud
All billowy-bosomed, over-bowed
By many benedictions---sun's
And moon's and evening-star's at once---
And so, you, looking and loving best,
Conscious grew, your passion drew
Cloud, sunset, moonrise, star-shine too,
Down on you, near and yet more near,
Till flesh must fade for heaven was here!---
Thus leant she and lingered---joy and fear!
Thus lay she a moment on my breast.

IV.

Then we began to ride. My soul
Smoothed itself out, a long-cramped...
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 O THOU! whatever title suit thee—
Auld Hornie, Satan, Nick, or Clootie,
Wha in yon cavern grim an’ sootie,
 Clos’d under hatches,
Spairges about the brunstane cootie,
 To scaud poor wretches!


Hear me, auld Hangie, for a wee,
An’ let poor damned bodies be;
I’m sure sma’ pleasure it can gie,
 Ev’n to a deil,
To skelp an’ scaud poor dogs like me,
 An’ hear us squeel!


Great is thy pow’r an’ great thy fame;
Far ken’d an’ noted is thy name;
An’ tho’ yon lowin’ heuch’s thy hame,
 Thou travels far;
An’ faith! thou’s neither lag nor lame,
 Nor blate, nor scaur.


Whiles, ranging like a roarin lion,
For prey, a’ holes and corners tryin;
Whiles, on the strong-wind’d tempest flyin,
 Tirlin the kirks;
Whiles, in the human bosom pryin,
 Unseen thou lurks.


I’ve heard my rev’rend graunie say,
In lanely glens ye like to stray;
Or where auld ruin’d castles grey
 Nod to the moon,
Ye fright the nightly wand’rer’s way,
 Wi’ eldritch croon.


When twilight did my graunie summon,
To say her pray’rs, douse, honest woman!
Aft’yont the dyke she’s heard you bummin,
 Wi’ eerie drone;
Or, rustlin, thro’ the boortrees comin,
 Wi’ heavy groan.


Ae dreary, windy, winter night,
The stars shot down wi’ sklentin light,
Wi’ you, mysel’ I gat a fright,
 Ayont the lough;
Ye, like a rash-buss, stood in...
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 Mine own John Poynz, since ye delight to know
The cause why that homeward I me draw,
And flee the press of courts, whereso they go,
Rather than to live thrall under the awe
Of lordly looks, wrappèd within my cloak,
To will and lust learning to set a law:
It is not for because I scorn or mock
The power of them, to whom fortune hath lent
Charge over us, of right, to strike the stroke.
But true it is that I have always meant
Less to esteem them than the common sort,
Of outward things that judge in their intent
Without regard what doth inward resort.
I grant sometime that of glory the fire
Doth twyche my heart. Me list not to report
Blame by honour, and honour to desire.
But how may I this honour now attain,
That cannot dye the colour black a liar?
My Poynz, I cannot from me tune to feign,
To cloak the truth for praise without desert
Of them that list all vice for to retain.
I cannot honour them that sets their part
With Venus and Bacchus all their life long;
Nor hold my peace of them although I smart.
I cannot crouch nor kneel to do so great a wrong,
To worship them, like God on earth alone,
That are as wolves these sely lambs...
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 Can we not force from widow'd poetry, 
Now thou art dead (great Donne) one elegy 
To crown thy hearse? Why yet dare we not trust, 
Though with unkneaded dough-bak'd prose, thy dust, 
Such as th' unscissor'd churchman from the flower 
Of fading rhetoric, short-liv'd as his hour, 
Dry as the sand that measures it, should lay 
Upon thy ashes, on the funeral day? 
Have we no voice, no tune? Didst thou dispense 
Through all our language, both the words and sense? 
'Tis a sad truth. The pulpit may her plain 
And sober Christian precepts still retain, 
Doctrines it may, and wholesome uses, frame, 
Grave homilies and lectures, but the flame 
Of thy brave soul (that shot such heat and light 
As burnt our earth and made our darkness bright, 
Committed holy rapes upon our will, 
Did through the eye the melting heart distil, 
And the deep knowledge of dark truths so teach 
As sense might judge what fancy could not reach) 
Must be desir'd forever. So the fire 
That fills with spirit and heat the Delphic quire, 
Which, kindled first by thy Promethean breath, 
Glow'd here a while, lies quench'd now in thy death. 
The Muses' garden, with pedantic...
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 GIFT from the cold and silent Past! 
A relic to the present cast, 
Left on the ever-changing strand 
Of shifting and unstable sand, 
Which wastes beneath the steady chime 
And beating of the waves of Time! 
Who from its bed of primal rock 
First wrenched thy dark, unshapely block? 
Whose hand, of curious skill untaught, 
Thy rude and savage outline wrought? 
The waters of my native stream 
Are glancing in the sun's warm beam; 
From sail-urged keel and flashing oar 
The circles widen to its shore; 
And cultured field and peopled town 
Slope to its willowed margin down. 
Yet, while this morning breeze is bringing 
The home-life sound of school-bells ringing, 
And rolling wheel, and rapid jar 
Of the fire-winged and steedless car, 
And voices from the wayside near 
Come quick and blended on my ear,-- 
A spell is in this old gray stone, 
My thoughts are with the Past alone! 

A change! -- The steepled town no more 
Stretches along the sail-thronged shore; 
Like palace-domes in sunset's cloud, 
Fade sun-gilt spire and mansion proud: 
Spectrally rising where they stood, 
I see the old, primeval wood; 
Dark, shadow-like, on either hand 
I see its solemn waste expand; 
It climbs...
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To-day my skies are bare and ashen,
And bend on me without a beam.
Since love is held the master-passion,
Its loss must be the pain supreme—
And grinning Fate has wrecked my dream.
But pardon, dear departed Guest,
I will not rant, I will not rail;
For good the grain must feel the flail;
There are whom love has never blessed.
I had and have a younger brother,
One whom I loved and love to-day
As never fond and doting mother
Adored the babe who found its way
From heavenly scenes into her day.
Oh, he was full of youth's new wine,—
A man on life's ascending slope,
Flushed with ambition, full of hope;
And every wish of his was mine.
A kingly youth; the way before him
[Pg 36]Was thronged with victories to be won;
So joyous, too, the heavens o'er him
Were bright with an unchanging sun,—
His days with rhyme were overrun.
Toil had not taught him Nature's prose,
Tears had not dimmed his brilliant eyes,
And sorrow had not made him wise;
His life was in the budding rose.
I know not how I came to waken,
Some instinct pricked my soul to sight;
My heart by some vague thrill was shaken,—
A thrill so true and yet so slight,
I hardly deemed I read aright.
As when a sleeper, ign'rant why,
Not knowing what mysterious...
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 There was a strife 'twixt man and maid--
Oh, that was at the birth of time!
But what befell 'twixt man and maid,
Oh, that's beyond the grip of rhyme.
'Twas "Sweet, I must not bide with you,"
And, "Love, I cannot bide alone";
For both were young and both were true.
And both were hard as the nether stone.

Beware the man who's crossed in love;
 For pent-up steam must find its vent.
Stand back when he is on the move,
 And lend him all the Continent.

Your patience, Sirs. The Devil took me up
To the burned mountain over Sicily
(Fit place for me) and thence I saw my Earth--
(Not all Earth's splendour, 'twas beyond my need--)
And that one spot I love--all Earth to me,
And her I love, my Heaven. What said I?
My love was safe from all the powers of Hell-
For you--e'en you--acquit her of my guilt--
But Sula, nestling by our sail--specked sea,
My city, child of mine, my heart, my home--
Mine and my pride--evil might visit there!
It was for Sula and her naked port,
Prey to the galleys of the Algerine,
Our city Sula, that I drove my price--
For love of Sula and for love of her.
The twain were woven--gold on sackcloth--twined
Past any sundering till God shall judge
The evil and...
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 Deare Friend. 

I heare this Towne does soe abound, 
With sawcy Censurers, that faults are found, 
With what of late wee (in Poetique Rage) 
Bestowing, threw away on the dull Age; 
But (howsoe're Envy, their Spleen may raise, 
To Robb my Brow, of the deserved Bays) 
Their thanks at least I merit since through me, 
They are Partakers of your Poetry; 
And this is all, I'll say in my defence, 
T'obtaine one Line, of your well worded Sense 

I'd be content t'have writ the Brittish Prince. 
I'm none of those who thinke themselves inspir'd, 
Nor write with the vaine hopes to be admir'd; 
But from a Rule (I have upon long tryall) 
T'avoyd with care, all sort of self denyall. 
Which way soe're desire and fancy leade 
(Contemning Fame) that Path I boldly tread; 
And if exposeing what I take for Witt, 
To my deare self, a Pleasure I beget, 
Noe matter tho' the Censring Crittique fret. 
Those whom my Muse displeases, are at strife 
With equall Spleene, against my Course of life, 
The least delight of which, I'd not forgoe, 
For all the flatt'ring Praise, Man can bestow. 
If I designd to please the way were then, 
To...
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 A tale that the poet Rückert told
To German children, in days of old;
Disguised in a random, rollicking rhyme
Like a merry mummer of ancient time,
And sent, in its English dress, to please
The little folk of the Christmas trees. 

A little fir grew in the midst of the wood 
Contented and happy, as young trees should. 
His body was straight and his boughs were clean; 
And summer and winter the bountiful sheen 
Of his needles bedecked him, from top to root, 
In a beautiful, all-the-year, evergreen suit. 

But a trouble came into his heart one day, 
When he saw that the other trees were gay 
In the wonderful raiment that summer weaves 
Of manifold shapes and kinds of leaves: 
He looked at his needles so stiff and small, 
And thought that his dress was the poorest of all. 
Then jealousy clouded the little tree's mind, 
And he said to himself, "It was not very kind 
"To give such an ugly old dress to a tree! 
"If the fays of the forest would only ask me, 
"I'd tell them how I should like to be dressed,— 
"In a garment of gold, to bedazzle the rest!" 
So he fell asleep, but his dreams...
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 In vain, fair Maid, you ask in vain,
My pen should try th' advent'rous strain,
And following truth's unalter'd law,
Attempt your character to draw.
I own indeed, that generous mind
That weeps the woes of human kind,
That heart by friendship's charms inspired,
That soul with sprightly fancy fired,
The air of life, the vivid eye,
The flowing wit, the keen reply--
To paint these beauties as they shine,
Might ask a nobler pen than mine.


Yet what sure strokes can draw the Fair,
Who vary, like the fleeting air,
Like willows bending to the force,
Where'er the gales direct their course,
Opposed to no misfortune's power,
And changing with the changing hour.
Now gaily sporting on the plain,
They charm the grove with pleasing strain;
Anon disturb'd, they know not why,
The sad tear trembles in their eye:
Led through vain life's uncertain dance,
The dupes of whim, the slaves of chance.


From me, not famed for much goodnature,
Expect not compliment, but satire;
To draw your picture quite unable,
Instead of fact accept a Fable.


One morn, in Æsop's noisy time,
When all things talk'd, and talk'd in rhyme,
A cloud exhaled by vernal beams
Rose curling o'er the glassy streams.
The dawn her orient blushes spread,
And tinged its lucid skirts with red,
Wide waved its folds with glitt'ring dies,
And gaily streak'd the eastern skies;
Beneath, illumed with rising day,
The...
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 O, let me seize thy pen sublime
That paints, in melting dulcet rhyme, 
The glowing pow'r, the magic art, 
Th' extatic raptures of the Heart; 
Soft Beauty's timid smile serene,
The dimples of Love's sportive mien; 
The sweet descriptive tale to trace; 
To picture Nature's winning grace;
To steal the tear from Pity's eye; 
To catch the sympathetic sigh; 
O teach me, with swift light'nings force
To watch wild passion's varying course; 
To mark th' enthusiast's vivid fire,
Or calmly touch thy golden lyre,
While gentle Reason mildly sings
Responsive to the trembling strings. 

SWEET Nymph, enchanting Poetry! 
I dedicate my mind to Thee. 
Oh! from thy bright Parnassian bow'rs
Descend, to bless my sombre hours;
Bend to the earth thy eagle wing,
And on its glowing plumage bring
Blithe FANCY, from whose burning eye
The young ideas sparkling fly; 
O, come, and let us fondly stray,
Where rosy Health shall lead the way,
And soft FAVONIUS lightly spread
A perfum'd carpet as we tread;
Ah! let us from the world remove,
The calm forgetfulness to prove,
Which at the still of evening's close,
Lulls the tir'd peasant to repose; 
Repose, whose balmy joys o'er-pay
The sultry labours of the day. 

And when the blue-ey'd dawn appears,
Just peeping thro' her veil of tears; 
Or blushing opes her silver gate,...
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 WHILE winds frae aff Ben-Lomond blaw,
An’ bar the doors wi’ driving snaw,
 An’ hing us owre the ingle,
I set me down to pass the time,
An’ spin a verse or twa o’ rhyme,
 In hamely, westlin jingle.
While frosty winds blaw in the drift,
 Ben to the chimla lug,
I grudge a wee the great-folk’s gift,
 That live sae bien an’ snug:
 I tent less, and want less
 Their roomy fire-side;
 But hanker, and canker,
 To see their cursed pride.


It’s hardly in a body’s pow’r
To keep, at times, frae being sour,
 To see how things are shar’d;
How best o’ chiels are whiles in want,
While coofs on countless thousands rant,
 And ken na how to wair’t;
But, Davie, lad, ne’er fash your head,
 Tho’ we hae little gear;
We’re fit to win our daily bread,
 As lang’s we’re hale and fier:
 “Mair spier na, nor fear na,” 1
 Auld age ne’er mind a feg;
 The last o’t, the warst o’t
 Is only but to beg.


To lie in kilns and barns at e’en,
When banes are craz’d, and bluid is thin,
 Is doubtless, great distress!
Yet then content could make us blest;
Ev’n then, sometimes, we’d snatch a taste
 Of truest happiness.
The honest heart that’s free frae a’
 Intended...
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 I.

Dead ! One of them shot by the sea in the east,
And one of them shot in the west by the sea.
Dead ! both my boys ! When you sit at the feast
And are wanting a great song for Italy free,
Let none look at me !

II.
Yet I was a poetess only last year,
And good at my art, for a woman, men said ;
But this woman, this, who is agonized here,
-- The east sea and west sea rhyme on in her head
For ever instead.

III.
What art can a woman be good at ? Oh, vain !
What art is she good at, but hurting her breast
With the milk-teeth of babes, and a smile at the pain ?
Ah boys, how you hurt ! you were strong as you pressed,
And I proud, by that test.

IV.
What art's for a woman ? To hold on her knees
Both darlings ! to feel all their arms round her throat,
Cling, strangle a little ! to sew by degrees
And 'broider the long-clothes and neat little coat ;
To dream and to doat.

V.
To teach them ... It stings there ! I made them indeed
Speak plain the word country. I taught them, no doubt, 
That a country's a thing men should die for...
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 Old Deuteronomy's lived a long time;
He's a Cat who has lived many lives in succession.
He was famous in proverb and famous in rhyme
A long while before Queen Victoria's accession.
Old Deuteronomy's buried nine wives
And more--I am tempted to say, ninety-nine;
And his numerous progeny prospers and thrives
And the village is proud of him in his decline.
At the sight of that placid and bland physiognomy,
When he sits in the sun on the vicarage wall,
The Oldest Inhabitant croaks: "Well, of all . . .
Things. . . Can it be . . . really! . . . No!. . . Yes!. . .
Ho! hi!
Oh, my eye!
My mind may be wandering, but I confess
I believe it is Old Deuteronomy!"

Old Deuteronomy sits in the street,
He sits in the High Street on market day;
The bullocks may bellow, the sheep they may bleat,
But the dogs and the herdsmen will turn them away.
The cars and the lorries run over the kerb,
And the villagers put up a notice: ROAD CLOSED--
So that nothing untoward may chance to distrub
Deuteronomy's rest when he feels so disposed
Or when he's engaged in domestic economy:
And the Oldest Inhabitant croaks: "Well, of all . . .
Things. . . Can it be . . . really! . ....
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 I love all sights of earth and skies, 
From flowers that glow to stars that shine; 
The comet and the penny show, 
All curious things, above, below, 
Hold each in turn my wandering eyes: 
I claim the Christian Pagan's line, 
Humani nihil, -- even so, -- 
And is not human life divine? 
When soft the western breezes blow, 
And strolling youths meet sauntering maids, 
I love to watch the stirring trades 
Beneath the Vallombrosa shades 
Our much-enduring elms bestow; 
The vender and his rhetoric's flow, 
That lambent stream of liquid lies; 
The bait he dangles from his line, 
The gudgeon and his gold-washed prize. 
I halt before the blazoned sign 
That bids me linger to admire 
The drama time can never tire, 
The little hero of the hunch, 
With iron arm and soul of fire, 
And will that works his fierce desire, -- 
Untamed, unscared, unconquered Punch! 
My ear a pleasing torture finds 
In tones the withered sibyl grinds, -- 
The dame sans merci's broken strain, 
Whom I erewhile, perchance, have known, 
When Orleans filled the Bourbon throne, 
A siren singing by the Seine. 

But most I love the tube that spies 
The orbs celestial in their march; 
That...
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