Famous Louis Poems by Famous Poets

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

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To Mesdames Zassetsky And Garschine

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 THE wind may blaw the lee-gang way
And aye the lift be mirk an' gray,
An deep the moss and steigh the brae
Where a' maun gang -
There's still an hoor in ilka day
For luve and sang.

And canty hearts are strangely steeled.
By some dikeside they'll find a bield,
Some couthy neuk by muir or field
They're sure to hit,
Where, frae the blatherin' wind concealed,
They'll...Read more of this...

Where Go the Boats?

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 Dark brown is the river,
Golden is the sand.
It flows along for ever,
With trees on either hand.

Green leaves a-floating,
Castles of the foam,
Boats of mine a-boating - 
Where will all come home?

On goes the river
And out past the mill,
Away down the valley,
Away down the hill.

Away down the river,
A hundred miles or more,
Other little children
Shall bring my boats ashore....Read more of this...

The Gardener

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 The gardener does not love to talk,
He makes me keep the gravel walk;
And when he puts his tools away,
He locks the door and takes the key.

Away behind the currant row
Where no one else but cook may go,
Far in the plots, I see him dig
Old and serious, brown and big.

He digs the flowers, green, red and blue,
Nor wishes to be...Read more of this...

To Miss Cornish

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 THEY tell me, lady, that to-day
On that unknown Australian strand -
Some time ago, so far away -
Another lady joined the band.
She joined the company of those
Lovelily dowered, nobly planned,
Who, smiling, still forgive their foes
And keep their friends in close command.

She, lady, as I learn, was one
Among the many rarely good;
And destined still to be a sun
Through every dark and...Read more of this...

A Thought

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 It is very nice to think 
The world is full of meat and drink, 
With little children saying grace 
In every Christian kind of place....Read more of this...

Since Thou Hast Given Me This Good Hope O God

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 SINCE thou hast given me this good hope, O God,
That while my footsteps tread the flowery sod
And the great woods embower me, and white dawn
And purple even sweetly lead me on
From day to day, and night to night, O God,
My life shall no wise miss the light of love;
But ever climbing, climb above
Man's one poor star, man's supine lands,
Into...Read more of this...

The Clocks Clear Voice Into The Clearer Air

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 THE cock's clear voice into the clearer air
Where westward far I roam,
Mounts with a thrill of hope,
Falls with a sigh of home.

A rural sentry, he from farm and field
The coming morn descries,
And, mankind's bugler, wakes
The camp of enterprise.

He sings the morn upon the westward hills
Strange and remote and wild;
He sings it in the land
Where once I was a child.

He...Read more of this...

My Bed is a Boat

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 My bed is like a little boat; 
Nurse helps me in when I embark; 
She girds me in my sailor's coat 
And starts me in the dark. 

At night I go on board and say 
Good-night to all my friends on shore; 
I shut my eyes and sail away 
And see and hear no more. 

And sometimes things to...Read more of this...

Soon Our Friends Perish

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 SOON our friends perish,
Soon all we cherish
Fades as days darken - goes as flowers go.
Soon in December
Over an ember,
Lonely we hearken, as loud winds blow....Read more of this...

Nest Eggs

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 Birds all the summer day 
Flutter and quarrel 
Here in the arbour-like 
Tent of the laurel. 

Here in the fork 
The brown nest is seated; 
For little blue eggs 
The mother keeps heated. 

While we stand watching her 
Staring like gabies, 
Safe in each egg are the 
Bird's little babies. 

Soon the frail eggs they shall 
Chip, and upspringing...Read more of this...

In Charidemum

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 YOU, Charidemus, who my cradle swung,
And watched me all the days that I was young;
You, at whose step the laziest slaves awake,
And both the bailiff and the butler quake;
The barber's suds now blacken with my beard,
And my rough kisses make the maids afeared;
But with reproach your awful eyebrows twitch,
And for the cane, I see, your fingers itch.
If something daintily...Read more of this...

Soap Suds

by Louis MacNeice
 This brand of soap has the same smell as once in the big
House he visited when he was eight: the walls of the bathroom open
To reveal a lawn where a great yellow ball rolls back through a hoop 
To rest at the head of a mallet held in the hands of a child.

And these were the joys of that...Read more of this...

The Bour-Tree Den

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 CLINKUM-CLANK in the rain they ride,
Down by the braes and the grey sea-side;
Clinkum-clank by stane and cairn,
Weary fa' their horse-shoe-airn!

Loud on the causey, saft on the sand,
Round they rade by the tail of the land;
Round and up by the Bour-Tree Den,
Weary fa' the red-coat men!

Aft hae I gane where they hae rade
And straigled in the gowden brooms -
Aft hae...Read more of this...

Waters Of Babylon

by Louis Untermeyer
What presses about us here in the evening
As you open a window and stare at a stone-gray sky,
And the streets give back the jangle of meaningless movement
That is tired of life and almost too tired to die.
Night comes on, and even the night is wounded;
There, on its breast, it carries a curved, white scar.
What will you find out there that...Read more of this...

Dedicatory Poem For Underwoods

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 TO her, for I must still regard her
As feminine in her degree,
Who has been my unkind bombarder
Year after year, in grief and glee,
Year after year, with oaken tree;
And yet betweenwhiles my laudator
In terms astonishing to me -
To the Right Reverend The Spectator
I here, a humble dedicator,
Bring the last apples from my tree.

In tones of love, in tones of warning,
She...Read more of this...

Henry James

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 Who comes to-night? We open the doors in vain.
Who comes? My bursting walls, can you contain
The presences that now together throng
Your narrow entry, as with flowers and song,
As with the air of life, the breath of talk?
Lo, how these fair immaculate women walk
Behind their jocund maker; and we see
Slighted De Mauves, and that far different she,
Gressie, the trivial sphynx;...Read more of this...

What Man May Learn What Man May Do

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 WHAT man may learn, what man may do,
Of right or wrong of false or true,
While, skipper-like, his course he steers
Through nine and twenty mingled years,
Half misconceived and half forgot,
So much I know and practise not.

Old are the words of wisdom, old
The counsels of the wise and bold:
To close the ears, to check the tongue,
To keep the pining spirit young;
To...Read more of this...

The Unseen Playmate

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 When children are playing alone on the green, 
In comes the playmate that never was seen. 
When children are happy and lonely and good, 
The Friend of the Children comes out of the wood. 

Nobody heard him, and nobody saw, 
His is a picture you never could draw, 
But he's sure to be present, abroad or at home, 
When...Read more of this...

Come From The Daisied Meadows

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 HOME from the daisied meadows, where you linger yet -
Home, golden-headed playmate, ere the sun is set;
For the dews are falling fast
And the night has come at last.
Home with you, home and lay your little head at rest,
Safe, safe, my little darling, on your mother's breast.
Lullaby, darling; your mother is watching you;
she'll be your guardian and shield.
Lullaby, slumber, my...Read more of this...

As One Who Having Wandered All Night Long

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 AS one who having wandered all night long
In a perplexed forest, comes at length
In the first hours, about the matin song,
And when the sun uprises in his strength,
To the fringed margin of the wood, and sees,
Gazing afar before him, many a mile
Of falling country, many fields and trees,
And cities and bright streams and far-off Ocean's smile:

I, O Melampus, halting,...Read more of this...

The Angler Rose He Took His Rod

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 THE angler rose, he took his rod,
He kneeled and made his prayers to God.
The living God sat overhead:
The angler tripped, the eels were fed...Read more of this...

Epitaphium Erotii

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 HERE lies Erotion, whom at six years old
Fate pilfered. Stranger (when I too am cold,
Who shall succeed me in my rural field),
To this small spirit annual honours yield!
Bright be thy hearth, hale be thy babes, I crave
And this, in thy green farm, the only grave....Read more of this...

My Love Was Warm

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 MY love was warm; for that I crossed
The mountains and the sea,
Nor counted that endeavour lost
That gave my love to me.

If that indeed were love at all,
As still, my love, I trow,
By what dear name am I to call
The bond that holds me now...Read more of this...

This Gloomy Northern Day

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 THIS gloomy northern day,
Or this yet gloomier night,
Has moved a something high
In my cold heart; and I,
That do not often pray,
Would pray to-night.

And first on Thee I call
For bread, O God of might!
Enough of bread for all, -
That through the famished town
Cold hunger may lie down
With none to-night.

I pray for hope no less,
Strong-sinewed hope, O Lord,
That to the struggling...Read more of this...

I WHo All The Winter Through

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 I WHO all the winter through
Cherished other loves than you,
And kept hands with hoary policy in marriage-bed and pew;
Now I know the false and true,
For the earnest sun looks through,
And my old love comes to meet me in the dawning and the dew.

Now the hedged meads renew
Rustic odour, smiling hue,
And the clean air shines and tinkles as the world...Read more of this...

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