Famous Long Romantic Poems

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

See also: Long Member Poems

 DAME DOWSON, was a granny grey,
Who, three score years and ten,
Had pass'd her busy hours away,
In talking of the Men !
They were her theme, at home, abroad,
At wake, and by the winter fire,
Whether it froze, or blew, or thaw'd,
In sunshine or in shade, her ire
Was never calm'd; for still she made
Scandal her pleasure--and her trade!

A Grand-daughter DAME DOWSON had--
As fair, as fair could be!
Lovely enough to make Men mad;
For, on her cheek's soft downy rose
LOVE seem'd in dimples to repose;
Her clear blue eyes look'd mildly bright
Like ether drops of liquid light,
Or sapphire gems,--which VENUS bore,
When, for the silver-sanded shore,
She left her native Sea!

ANNETTA, was the damsel's name;
A pretty, soft, romantic sound;
Such as a lover's heart may wound;
And set his fancy in a flame:
For had the maid been christen'd JOAN,
Or DEBORAH, or HESTER,--
The little God had coldly prest her,
Or, let her quite alone!
For magic is the silver sound--
Which, often, in a NAME is found!

ANNETTA was belov'd; and She
To WILLIAM gave her vows;
For WILLIAM was as brave a Youth,
As ever claim'd the meed of truth,
And, to reward such constancy,
Nature that meed allows.
But Old DAME DOWSON could not bear
A Youth so brave--a Maid so fair.

The GRANNY GREY, with maxims grave
Oft to ANNETTA...
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 Ah, stay thy treacherous hand, forbear to trace
Those faultless forms of elegance and grace!
Ah, cease to spread the bright transparent mass,
With Titian's pencil, o'er the speaking glass!
Nor steal, by strokes of art with truth combin'd,
The fond illusions of my wayward mind!
For long, enamour'd of a barbarous age,
A faithless truant to the classic page;
Long have I lov'd to catch the simple chime
Of minstrel-harps, and spell the fabling rime;
To view the festive rites, the knightly play,
That deck'd heroic Albion's elder day;
To mark the mouldering halls of barons bold,
And the rough castle, cast in giant mould;
With Gothic manners Gothic arts explore,
And muse on the magnificence of yore.

But chief, enraptur'd have I lov'd to roam,
A lingering votary, the vaulted dome,
Where the tall shafts, that mount in massy pride,
Their mingling branches shoot from side to side;
Where elfin sculptors, with fantastic clew,
O'er the long roof their wild embroidery drew;
Where Superstition with capricious hand
In many a maze the wreathed window plann'd,
With hues romantic ting'd the gorgeous pane,
To fill with holy light the wondrous fane;
To aid the builder's model, richly rude,
By no Vitruvian symmetry subdu'd;
To suit the genius of the mystic pile:
Whilst as around the far-retiring aisle,
And fretted shrines, with hoary trophies hung,
Her dark illumination wide she...
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 It was the steamer Alice May that sailed the Yukon foam.
And touched in every river camp from Dawson down to Nome.
It was her builder, owner, pilot, Captain Silas Geer,
Who took her through the angry ice, the last boat of the year;
Who patched her cracks with gunny sacks and wound her pipes with wire,
And cut the spruce upon the banks to feed her boiler fire;
Who headed her into the stream and bucked its mighty flow,
And nosed her up the little creeks where no one else would go;
Who bragged she had so small a draft, if dew were on the grass,
With gallant heart and half a start his little boat would pass.
Aye, ships might come and ships might go, but steady every year
The Alice May would chug away with Skipper Silas Geer.

Now though Cap geer had ne'er a fear the devil he could bilk,
He owned a gastric ulcer and his grub was mostly milk.
He also owned a Jersey cow to furnish him the same,
So soft and sleek and mild and meek, and Kathleen was her name.
And so his source of nourishment he got to love her so
That everywhere the captain went the cow would also go;
And though his sleeping quarters were...
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 When I die
I don't care what happens to my body
throw ashes in the air, scatter 'em in East River
bury an urn in Elizabeth New Jersey, B'nai Israel Cemetery
But l want a big funeral
St. Patrick's Cathedral, St. Mark's Church, the largest synagogue in 
 Manhattan
First, there's family, brother, nephews, spry aged Edith stepmother 
 96, Aunt Honey from old Newark,
Doctor Joel, cousin Mindy, brother Gene one eyed one ear'd, sister-
 in-law blonde Connie, five nephews, stepbrothers & sisters 
 their grandchildren,
companion Peter Orlovsky, caretakers Rosenthal & Hale, Bill Morgan--
Next, teacher Trungpa Vajracharya's ghost mind, Gelek Rinpoche, 
 there Sakyong Mipham, Dalai Lama alert, chance visiting 
 America, Satchitananda Swami 
Shivananda, Dehorahava Baba, Karmapa XVI, Dudjom Rinpoche, 
 Katagiri & Suzuki Roshi's phantoms
Baker, Whalen, Daido Loorie, Qwong, Frail White-haired Kapleau 
 Roshis, Lama Tarchen --
Then, most important, lovers over half-century
Dozens, a hundred, more, older fellows bald & rich
young boys met naked recently in bed, crowds surprised to see each 
 other, innumerable, intimate, exchanging memories
"He taught me to meditate, now I'm an old veteran of the thousand
 day retreat --"
"I played music on subway platforms, I'm straight but loved him he 
 loved me"
"I felt more love from him at 19...
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Can that be you, la mouche? Wait till I lift
This palsied eye-lid and make sure... Ah, true.
Come in, dear fly, and pardon my delay
In thus existing; I can promise you
Next time you come you'll find no dying poet—
Without sufficient spleen to see me through,
The joke becomes too tedious a jest.
I am afraid my mind is dull to-day;
I have that—something—heavier on my chest
And then, you see, I've been exchanging thoughts
With Doctor Franz. He talked of Kant and Hegel
As though he'd nursed them both through whooping cough
And, as he left, he let his finger shake
Too playfully, as though to say, "Now off
With that long face—you've years and years to live."
I think he thinks so. But, for Heaven's sake,
Don't credit it—and never tell Mathilde.
Poor dear, she has enough to bear already....
This was a month! During my lonely weeks
One person actually climbed the stairs
To seek a cripple. It was Berlioz—
But Berlioz always was original.

Meissner was also here; he caught me unawares,
Scribbling to my old mother. "What!" he cried,
"Is the old lady of the Dammthor still alive?
And do you write her still?" "Each month or so."
"And is she not unhappy then, to find
How wretched you must be?" "How can she know?
You see," I laughed, "she...
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 From time to time, lifting his eyes, he sees
The soft blue starlight through the one small window,
The moon above black trees, and clouds, and Venus,—
And turns to write . . . The clock, behind ticks softly.

It is so long, indeed, since I have written,—
Two years, almost, your last is turning yellow,—
That these first words I write seem cold and strange.
Are you the man I knew, or have you altered?
Altered, of course—just as I too have altered—
And whether towards each other, or more apart,
We cannot say . . . I've just re-read your letter—
Not through forgetfulness, but more for pleasure—

Pondering much on all you say in it
Of mystic consciousness—divine conversion—
The sense of oneness with the infinite,—
Faith in the world, its beauty, and its purpose . . .
Well, you believe one must have faith, in some sort,
If one's to talk through this dark world contented.
But is the world so dark? Or is it rather
Our own brute minds,—in which we hurry, trembling,
Through streets as yet unlighted? This, I think.

You have been always, let me say, "romantic,"—
Eager for color, for beauty, soon discontented
With a world of dust and stones and flesh too ailing:
Even before the question grew to problem
And drove you bickering into...
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 It was pleasant up the country, City Bushman, where you went, 
For you sought the greener patches and you travelled like a gent; 
And you curse the trams and buses and the turmoil and the push, 
Though you know the squalid city needn't keep you from the bush; 
But we lately heard you singing of the `plains where shade is not', 
And you mentioned it was dusty -- `all was dry and all was hot'. 

True, the bush `hath moods and changes' -- and the bushman hath 'em, too, 
For he's not a poet's dummy -- he's a man, the same as you; 
But his back is growing rounder -- slaving for the absentee -- 
And his toiling wife is thinner than a country wife should be. 
For we noticed that the faces of the folks we chanced to meet 
Should have made a greater contrast to the faces in the street; 
And, in short, we think the bushman's being driven to the wall, 
And it's doubtful if his spirit will be `loyal thro' it all'. 

Though the bush has been romantic and it's nice to sing about, 
There's a lot of patriotism that the land could do without...
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 Shall the great soul of Newton quit this earth, 
To mingle with his stars; and every muse,
Astonish'd into silence, shun the weight
Of honours due to his illustrious name?
But what can man?--Even now the sons of light,
In strains high-warbled to seraphic lyre,
Hail his arrival on the coast of bliss.
Yet am not I deterr'd, though high the theme,
And sung to harps of angels, for with you,
Ethereal flames! ambitious, I aspire
In Nature's general symphony to join. 

And what new wonders can ye show your guest!
Who, while on this dim spot, where mortals toil
Clouded in dust, from motion's simple laws,
Could trace the secret hand of Providence,
Wide-working through this universal frame. 

Have ye not listen'd while he bound the suns
And planets to their spheres! th' unequal task
Of humankind till then. Oft had they roll'd
O'er erring man the year, and oft disgrac'd
The pride of schools, before their course was known
Full in its causes and effects to him,
All-piercing sage! who sat not down and dream'd
Romantic schemes, defended by the din
Of specious words, and tyranny of names;
But, bidding his amazing mind attend,
And with heroic patience years on years
Deep-searching, saw at last the system dawn,
And shine, of all his race, on him alone. 

What were his raptures then!...
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 THE SUN had clos’d the winter day,
The curless quat their roarin play,
And hunger’d maukin taen her way,
 To kail-yards green,
While faithless snaws ilk step betray
 Whare she has been.


The thresher’s weary flingin-tree,
The lee-lang day had tired me;
And when the day had clos’d his e’e,
 Far i’ the west,
Ben i’ the spence, right pensivelie,
 I gaed to rest.


There, lanely by the ingle-cheek,
I sat and ey’d the spewing reek,
That fill’d, wi’ hoast-provoking smeek,
 The auld clay biggin;
An’ heard the restless rattons squeak
 About the riggin.


All in this mottie, misty clime,
I backward mus’d on wasted time,
How I had spent my youthfu’ prime,
 An’ done nae thing,
But stringing blethers up in rhyme,
 For fools to sing.


Had I to guid advice but harkit,
I might, by this, hae led a market,
Or strutted in a bank and clarkit
 My cash-account;
While here, half-mad, half-fed, half-sarkit.
 Is a’ th’ amount.


I started, mutt’ring, “blockhead! coof!”
And heav’d on high my waukit loof,
To swear by a’ yon starry roof,
 Or some rash aith,
That I henceforth wad be rhyme-proof
 Till my last breath—


When click! the string the snick did draw;
An’ jee! the door gaed to the wa’;
An’ by my ingle-lowe I saw,
 Now bleezin bright,
A tight, outlandish hizzie, braw,
 Come full in...
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 NOTHING so true as what you once let fall, 
"Most Women have no Characters at all." 
Matter too soft a lasting mark to bear, 
And best distinguish'd by black, brown, or fair. 

How many pictures of one Nymph we view, 
All how unlike each other, all how true! 
Arcadia's Countess, here, in ermin'd pride, 
Is, there, Pastora by a fountain side. 
Here Fannia, leering on her own good man, 
And there, a naked Leda with a Swan. 
Let then the Fair one beautifully cry, 
In Magdalen's loose hair and lifted eye, 
Or drest in smiles of sweet Cecilia shine, 
With simpering Angels, Palms, and Harps divine; 
Whether the Charmer sinner it, or saint it, 
If Folly grow romantic, I must paint it. 

Come then, the colours and the ground prepare! 
Dip in the Rainbow, trick her off in Air; 
Choose a firm Cloud, before it fall, and in it 
Catch, ere she change, the Cynthia of this minute. 

Rufa, whose eye quick-glancing o'er the Park, 
Attracts each light gay meteor of a Spark, 
Agrees as ill with Rufa studying Locke, 
As Sappho's diamonds with her dirty smock; 
Or Sappho at her toilet's greasy task, 
With Sappho fragrant at an...
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 UPON that night, when fairies light
 On Cassilis Downans 2 dance,
Or owre the lays, in splendid blaze,
 On sprightly coursers prance;
Or for Colean the rout is ta’en,
 Beneath the moon’s pale beams;
There, up the Cove, 3 to stray an’ rove,
 Amang the rocks and streams
 To sport that night;


Amang the bonie winding banks,
 Where Doon rins, wimplin, clear;
Where Bruce 4 ance rul’d the martial ranks,
 An’ shook his Carrick spear;
Some merry, friendly, countra-folks
 Together did convene,
To burn their nits, an’ pou their stocks,
 An’ haud their Halloween
 Fu’ blythe that night.


The lasses feat, an’ cleanly neat,
 Mair braw than when they’re fine;
Their faces blythe, fu’ sweetly kythe,
 Hearts leal, an’ warm, an’ kin’:
The lads sae trig, wi’ wooer-babs
 Weel-knotted on their garten;
Some unco blate, an’ some wi’ gabs
 Gar lasses’ hearts gang startin
 Whiles fast at night.


Then, first an’ foremost, thro’ the kail,
 Their stocks 5 maun a’ be sought ance;
They steek their een, and grape an’ wale
 For muckle anes, an’ straught anes.
Poor hav’rel Will fell aff the drift,
 An’ wandered thro’ the bow-kail,
An’ pou’t for want o’ better shift
 A runt was like a sow-tail
 Sae bow’t that night.


Then, straught or crooked, yird or nane,
 They roar...
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 AGAINST THE GRAIN



“Oxford be silent, I this truth must write

Leeds hath for rarities undone thee quite.”

 - William Dawson of Hackney, Nov.7th 1704



“The repressed becomes the poem”

 Louise Bogan





1



Well it’s Friday the thirteenth

So I’d better begin with luck

As I prepare for a journey to

The north, the place where I began

And I was lucky even before I

Was born for the red-hot shrapnel fell

And missed my mother by an inch

As she walked through the Blitz

In Bradford in nineteen forty-one.



Sydney Graham this poem is for you,

Although we never met, your feet

Have walked on the waters of poetic faith,

Hold out a hand for me to grasp,

A net to catch the dancing reflections

Of the midnight stars and smooth

The green tongue of the seawave

When it speaks to me as I slide

From my mother’s turning side.



For years I lived in the gardens

Of fire and flames robed time in

Memory and desire, icicles climbed

Six inches up the kitchen window

Then six inches down and six feet

Of snow lay against the POW’s as they

Marched with hefted shovels from

Knostrop’s cottage camp with curling

Smoke signalling from crooked stacks.





2



Yards from where I lay Hendry and

Moore sat in their attic conceiving

The Apocalypse and my natal stars

Were their ineffable words.

Shut off the telephone, I hear

Another...
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 This is a day of happiness, sweet peace, 
And heavenly sunshine; upon which conven'd 
In full assembly fair, once more we view, 
And hail with voice expressive of the heart, 
Patrons and sons of this illustrious hall. 
This hall more worthy of its rising fame 
Than hall on mountain or romantic hill, 
Where Druid bards sang to the hero's praise, 
While round their woods and barren heaths was heard 
The shrill calm echo of th' enchanting shell. 
Than all those halls and lordly palaces 
Where in the days of chivalry, each knight, 
And baron brave in military pride 
Shone in the brass and burning steel of war; 
For in this hall more worthy of a strain 
No envious sound forbidding peace is heard, 
Fierce song of battle kindling martial rage 
And desp'rate purpose in heroic minds: 
But sacred truth fair science and each grace 
Of virtue born; health, elegance and ease 
And temp'rate mirth in social intercourse 
Convey rich pleasure to the mind; and oft 
The sacred muse in heaven-breathing song 
Doth wrap the soul in extasy divine, 
Inspiring joy and sentiment which not 
The tale of war or song of Druids gave. 
The song of Druids or the...
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 LEANDER. 
No more of Memphis and her mighty kings, 
Or Alexandria, where the Ptolomies. 
Taught golden commerce to unfurl her falls, 
And bid fair science smile: No more of Greece 
Where learning next her early visit paid, 
And spread her glories to illume the world, 
No more of Athens, where she flourished, 
And saw her sons of mighty genius rise 
Smooth flowing Plato, Socrates and him 
Who with resistless eloquence reviv'd 
The Spir't of Liberty, and shook the thrones 
Of Macedon and Persia's haughty king. 
No more of Rome enlighten'd by her beams, 
Fresh kindling there the fire of eloquence, 
And poesy divine; imperial Rome! 
Whose wide dominion reach'd o'er half the globe; 
Whose eagle flew o'er Ganges to the East, 
And in the West far to the British isles. 
No more of Britain, and her kings renown'd, 
Edward's and Henry's thunderbolts of war; 
Her chiefs victorious o'er the Gallic foe; 
Illustrious senators, immortal bards, 
And wise philosophers, of these no more. 
A Theme more new, tho' not less noble claims 
Our ev'ry thought on this auspicious day 
The rising glory of this western world, 
Where now the dawning light of science spreads 
Her orient ray, and wakes the...
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 PART I

On Susquehanna's side, fair Wyoming!
Although the wild-flower on thy ruin'd wall,
And roofless homes, a sad remembrance bring,
Of what thy gentle people did befall;
Yet thou wert once the loveliest land of all
That see the Atlantic wave their morn restore.
Sweet land! may I thy lost delights recall,
And paint thy Gertrude in her bowers of yore,
Whose beauty was the love of Pennsylvania's shore!

Delightful Wyoming! beneath thy skies,
The happy shepherd swains had nought to do
But feed their flocks on green declivities,
Or skim perchance thy lake with light canoe,
From morn till evening's sweeter pastimes grew,
With timbrel, when beneath the forests brown,
Thy lovely maidens would the dance renew;
And aye those sunny mountains half-way down
Would echo flageolet from some romantic town.

Then, where of Indian hills the daylight takes
His leave, how might you the flamingo see
Disporting like a meteor on the lakes--
And playful squirrel on his nut-grown tree:
And every sound of life was full of glee,
From merry mock-bird's song, or hum of men;
While hearkening, fearing naught their revelry,
The wild deer arch'd his neck from glades, and then,
Unhunted, sought his woods and wilderness again.

And scarce had Wyoming of war or crime
Heard, but in transatlantic story rung,
For here the exile met from every clime,
And spoke in friendship every...
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