Famous Naming Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Naming poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous naming poems. These examples illustrate what a famous naming poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Burns, Robert
...will hold the thread: demand, “Wha hauds?” i. e., who holds? and answer will be returned from the kiln-pot, by naming the Christian and surname of your future spouse.—R. B. [back]
Note 10. Take a candle and go alone to a looking-glass; eat an apple before it, and some traditions say you should comb your hair all the time; the face of your conjungal companion, to be, will be seen in the glass, as if peeping over your shoulder.—R. B. [back]
...Read more of this...
by
Dryden, John
...ows;
Who dare be such, must be the people's foes:
Yet some there were, ev'n in the worst of days;
Some let me name, and naming is to praise.
In this short file Barzillai first appears;
Barzillai crown'd with honour and with years:
Long since, the rising rebels he withstood
In regions waste, beyond the Jordan's flood:
Unfortunately brave to buoy the state;
But sinking underneath his master's fate:
In exile with his god-like prince he mourn'd:
For him he suffer'd, and with...Read more of this...
by
Clampitt, Amy
...
cold water in the basin
these walls' rough plaster
imageless
after the hammering
of so much insistence
on the need for naming
after the travesties
that passed as faces,
grace: the unction
of sheer nonexistence
upwelling in this
hyacinthine freshet
of the unnamed
the faceless...Read more of this...
by
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
...e from his pocket the notary drew his papers and inkhorn,
Wrote with a steady hand the date and the age of the parties,
Naming the dower of the bride in flocks of sheep and in cattle.
Orderly all things proceeded, and duly and well were completed,
And the great seal of the law was set like a sun on the margin.
Then from his leathern pouch the farmer threw on the table
Three times the old man's fee in solid pieces of silver;
And the notary rising, and blessing the brid...Read more of this...
by
Carroll, Lewis
...he sty
Be yours the pay: be theirs the praise:
We will not rob them of their due,
Nor vex the ghosts of other days
By naming them along with you.
They sought and found undying fame:
They toiled not for reward nor thanks:
Their cheeks are hot with honest shame
For you, the modern mountebanks!
Who preach of Justice - plead with tears
That Love and Mercy should abound -
While marking with complacent ears
The moaning of some tortured hound:
Who prate of Wisdom - nay, ...Read more of this...
by
Browning, Robert
...near upon cock-crow, we keep it yet.
XVI.
``Thou! if thou wast He, who at mid-watch came,
``By the starlight, naming a dubious name!
``And if, too heavy with sleep---too rash
``With fear---O Thou, if that martyr-gash
``Fell on Thee coming to take thine own,
``And we gave the Cross, when we owed the Throne---
XVII.
``Thou art the Judge. We are bruised thus.
``But, the Judgment over, join sides with us!
``Thine too is the cause! and not more thine
``Than...Read more of this...
by
Eliot, George
..."I grant you ample leave
To use the hoary formula 'I am'
Naming the emptiness where thought is not;
But fill the void with definition, 'I'
Will be no more a datum than the words
You link false inference with, the 'Since' & 'so'
That, true or not, make up the atom-whirl.
Resolve your 'Ego', it is all one web
With vibrant ether clotted into worlds:
Your subject, self, or self-assertive 'I'
Turns nought b...Read more of this...
by
Levine, Philip
...o longer distinguish
the presence of silence or
what the silence is there for...
No one can begin anew
naming by turn beast, fowl,
and bush with the exact word.
Beyond the fence the sparse wood Yields;
light enters; nighthawk, owl,
and weasel have fled. To know
the complete absence of fear,
not to fear what is not there
becomes the end, the last brute
quiver of instinct. One moves,
or tries to move, among facts,
naming one's self and on...Read more of this...
by
Frost, Robert
...and pale pink about her feet.
But its age kept them from considering this one.
Twenty-five years ago at Maple's naming
It hardly could have been a two-leaved seedling
The next cow might have licked up out at pasture.
Could it have been another maple like it?
They hovered for a moment near discovery,
Figurative enough to see the symbol,
But lacking faith in anything to mean
The same at different times to different people.
Perhaps a filial diffidence partly kept...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...sumed.
O, by what name, for thou above all these,
Above mankind, or aught than mankind higher,
Surpassest far my naming; how may I
Adore thee, Author of this universe,
And all this good to man? for whose well being
So amply, and with hands so liberal,
Thou hast provided all things: But with me
I see not who partakes. In solitude
What happiness, who can enjoy alone,
Or, all enjoying, what contentment find?
Thus I presumptuous; and the Vision bright,
As with...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...t
The tongue not made for speech to speak thy praise:
Thy praise he also, who forbids thy use,
Conceals not from us, naming thee the tree
Of knowledge, knowledge both of good and evil;
Forbids us then to taste! but his forbidding
Commends thee more, while it infers the good
By thee communicated, and our want:
For good unknown sure is not had; or, had
And yet unknown, is as not had at all.
In plain then, what forbids he but to know,
Forbids us good, forbids us t...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
..., kingdoms, glory,
Have been before contemned, and may again.
Therefore, to know what more thou art than man,
Worth naming the Son of God by voice from Heaven,
Another method I must now begin."
So saying, he caught him up, and, without wing
Of hippogrif, bore through the air sublime,
Over the wilderness and o'er the plain,
Till underneath them fair Jerusalem,
The Holy City, lifted high her towers,
And higher yet the glorious Temple reared
Her pile, far off appearing...Read more of this...
by
Spenser, Edmund
...l the world was Rome,
And if things nam'd their names do equalize,
When land and sea ye name, then name ye Rome;
And naming Rome ye land and sea comprise:
For th' ancient plot of Rome displayéd plain,
The map of all the wide world doth contain.
27
Thou that at Rome astonish'd dost behold
The antique pride, which menaced the sky,
These haughty heaps, these palaces of old,
These walls, these arcs, these baths, these temples hie;
Judge by these ample ruins' vie...Read more of this...
by
Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...imself for true;
Whose pious talk, when most his heart was dry,
Made wet the crafty crowsfoot round his eye;
Who, never naming God except for gain,
So never took that useful name in vain;
Made Him his catspaw and the Cross his tool,
And Christ the bait to trap his dupe and fool;
Nor deeds of gift, but gifts of grace he forged,
And snakelike slimed his victim ere he gorged;
And oft at Bible meetings, o'er the rest
Arising, did his holy oily best,
Dropping the too rough H in He...Read more of this...
by
Atwood, Margaret
...uth.
This is a metaphor.
*
How do you learn to spell?
Blood, sky & the sun,
your own name first,
your first naming, your first name,
your first word....Read more of this...
by
Holmes, Oliver Wendell
...ustice," but now he's "The Squire."
And there's a nice youngster of excellent pith,--
Fate tried to conceal him by naming him Smith;
But he shouted a song for the brave and the free,
Just read on his medal, "My country," "of thee!"
You hear that boy laughing?-- You think he's all fun;
But the angels laugh, too, at the good he has done;
The children laugh loud as they troop to his call,
And the poor man that knows him laughs loudest of all!
Yes, we're boys, --always pla...Read more of this...
by
Pope, Alexander
...
They cry, 'Behold the mighty Hector's wife!'
Some haughty Greek, who lives thy tears to see,
Embitters all thy woes by naming me.
The thoughts of glory past and present shame,
A thousand griefs, shall waken at the name!
May I lie cold before that dreadful day,
Press'd with a load of monumental clay!
Thy Hector, wrapp'd in everlasting sleep,
Shall neither hear thee sigh, nor see thee weep."
Thus having spoke, th' illustrious chief of Troy
Stretch'd his fond arms to c...Read more of this...
by
Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns)
...The Naming of Cats is a difficult matter,
It isn't just one of your holiday games;
You may think at first I'm as mad as a hatter
When I tell you, a cat must have THREE DIFFERENT NAMES.
First of all, there's the name that the family use daily,
Such as Peter, Augustus, Alonzo or James,
Such as Victor or Jonathan, George or Bill Bailey--
All of them sensible ev...Read more of this...
by
Stojanovic, Dejan
...'breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing'
My thoughts, my longings, my love
For something that didn't need naming
In the misty mornings, recognizing
The dew on the petal, alive yet sleepy;
I was a dreamer, I admit, thinking,
April is the cruelest month, flying
Thoughts about some distant teaching,
Seeing invisible in the visible, loving
Wild thoughts making love, searching
To find it; love was a secret hard to decode—
Sacred to me. Student...Read more of this...
by
Ginsberg, Allen
...persuade,
and separate listed, those who drop Amphetamine with
military, gossip, argue, and persuade
suggesting policy naming language proposing strategy, this
done for fee as ambassadors to Pentagon, consul-
tants to military, paid by their industry:
and these are the names of the generals & captains mili-
tary, who know thus work for war goods manufactur-
ers;
and above these, listed, the names of the banks, combines,
investment trusts that control these industries:
a...Read more of this...
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