Famous Near Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Draw up your chair near mine

by Emile Verhaeren
Draw up your chair near mine, and stretch your hands out towards the hearth that I may see between your fingers the old flame burning; and watch the fire quietly with your eyes that fear no light, that they may be for me still franker when a quick and flashing ray strikes to their depths, illuminating them.
Oh! how beautiful and...Read more of this...

Near The Wall Of A House

by Yehuda Amichai
 Near the wall of a house painted
to look like stone,
I saw visions of God.

A sleepless night that gives others a headache
gave me flowers
opening beautifully inside my brain.

And he who was lost like a dog
will be found like a human being
and brought back home again.

Love is not the last room: there are others
after it, the whole length of the corridor
that...Read more of this...

Psalm 45 part 2

by Isaac Watts
 Christ and his church.

The King of saints, how fair his face,
Adorned with majesty and grace!
He comes with blessings from above,
And wins the nations to his love.

At his right hand our eyes behold
The queen arrayed in purest gold;
The world admires her heav'nly dress,
Her robe of joy and righteousness.

He forms her beauties like his own;
He calls and seats her near his...Read more of this...

Written near a Port on a Dark Evening

by Charlotte Turner Smith
 Huge vapours brood above the clifted shore, 
Night on the ocean settles dark and mute, 
Save where is heard the repercussive roar 
Of drowsy billows on the rugged foot 
Of rocks remote; or still more distant tone 
Of seamen in the anchored bark that tell 
The watch relieved; or one deep voice alone 
Singing the hour, and bidding "Strike...Read more of this...

329. Verses on the destruction of the Woods near Drumlanrig

by Robert Burns
 AS on the banks o’ wandering Nith,
 Ae smiling simmer morn I stray’d,
And traced its bonie howes and haughs,
 Where linties sang and lammies play’d,
I sat me down upon a craig,
 And drank my fill o’ fancy’s dream,
When from the eddying deep below,
 Up rose the genius of the stream.


Dark, like the frowning rock, his brow,
 And troubled, like...Read more of this...

Lovers Gifts IV: She Is Near to My Heart

by Rabindranath Tagore
 She is near to my heart as the meadow-flower to the earth; she is
sweet to me as sleep is to tired limbs. My love for her is my life
flowing in its fullness, like a river in autumn flood, running with
serene abandonment. My songs are one with my love, like the murmur
of a stream, that sings with all its waves...Read more of this...

This Heart that Flutters Near My Heart

by James Joyce
 This heart that flutters near my heart 
My hope and all my riches is, 
Unhappy when we draw apart 
And happy between kiss and kiss: 
My hope and all my riches -- - yes! -- - 
And all my happiness. 

For there, as in some mossy nest 
The wrens will divers treasures keep, 
I laid those treasures I possessed...Read more of this...

Psalm 7

by Isaac Watts
 God's care of his people.

My trust is in my heav'nly Friend,
My hope in thee, my God;
Rise, and my helpless life defend
From those that seek my blood.

With insolence and fury they
My soul in pieces tear,
As hungry lions rend the prey,
When no deliverer's near.

If I had e'er provoked them first,
Or once abused my foe,
Then let him tread my life to dust,
And...Read more of this...

My Room

by Robert William Service
 I think the things I own and love
 Acquire a sense of me,
That gives them value far above
 The worth that others see.
My chattels are of me a part:
 This chair on which I sit
Would break its overstuffed old heart
 If I made junk of it.

To humble needs with which I live,
 My books, my desk, my bed,
A personality...Read more of this...

Song IV: Draw Near and Behold Me

by William Morris
 Love is enough: draw near and behold me
Ye who pass by the way to your rest and your laughter,
And are full of the hope of the dawn coming after;
For the strong of the world have bought me and sold me
And my house is all wasted from threshold to rafter.
--Pass by me, and hearken, and think of me not! 

Cry...Read more of this...

Sonnet 136: If thy soul check thee that I come so near

by William Shakespeare
 If thy soul check thee that I come so near,
Swear to thy blind soul that I was thy Will,
And will thy soul knows is admitted there;
Thus far for love, my love suit, sweet, fulfil.
Will will fulfil the treasure of thy love,
Ay, fill it full with wills, and my will one.
In things of great receipt with case we prove
Among a...Read more of this...

Stanzas Written in Dejection near Naples

by Percy Bysshe Shelley
THE sun is warm the sky is clear  
The waves are dancing fast and bright  
Blue isles and snowy mountains wear 
The purple noon's transparent might: 
The breath of the moist earth is light 5 
Around its unexpanded buds; 
Like many a voice of one delight¡ª 
The winds' the birds' the ocean-floods'¡ª 
The city's voice itself is soft...Read more of this...

Rome at the Pyramid of Cestius Near the Graves of Shelley and Keats

by Thomas Hardy
 Who, then, was Cestius, 
 And what is he to me? - 
Amid thick thoughts and memories multitudinous 
 One thought alone brings he. 

 I can recall no word 
 Of anything he did; 
For me he is a man who died and was interred 
 To leave a pyramid 

 Whose purpose was exprest 
 Not with...Read more of this...

The small happenings

by Emile Verhaeren
The small happenings, the thousand nothings, a letter, a date, a humble anniversary, a word said once again as in days long ago uplift your heart and mine in these long evenings.
And we celebrate for ourselves these simple things, and we count and recount our old treasures, so that the little of us that we still keep may remain steadfast...Read more of this...

Except the Heaven had come so near

by Emily Dickinson
 Except the Heaven had come so near --
So seemed to choose My Door --
The Distance would not haunt me so --
I had not hoped -- before --

But just to hear the Grace depart --
I never thought to see --
Afflicts me with a Double loss --
'Tis lost -- and lost to me --...Read more of this...

The Rebel Surprise Near Tamai

by William Topaz McGonagall
 'Twas on the 22nd of March, in the year 1885,
That the Arabs rushed like a mountain torrent in full drive,
And quickly attacked General M'Neill's transport-zereba,
But in a short time they were forced to withdraw. 

And in the suddenness of surprise the men were carried away,
Also camels, mules, and horses were thrown into wild disarray,
By thousands of the Arabs that...Read more of this...

Know You The River NEar To Grez

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 KNOW you the river near to Grez,
A river deep and clear?
Among the lilies all the way,
That ancient river runs to-day
From snowy weir to weir.

Old as the Rhine of great renown,
She hurries clear and fast,
She runs amain by field and town
From south to north, from up to down,
To present on from past.

The love I hold was borne by her;
And now,...Read more of this...

Near Keokuk

by Carl Sandburg
 THIRTY-TWO Greeks are dipping their feet in a creek.
Sloshing their bare feet in a cool flow of clear water.
All one midsummer day ten hours the Greeks
 stand in leather shoes shoveling gravel.
Now they hold their toes and ankles
 to the drift of running water.
Then they go to the bunk cars
 and eat mulligan and prune sauce,
Smoke one or two...Read more of this...

Near Avalon

by William Morris
 A ship with shields before the sun,
Six maidens round the mast,
A red-gold crown on every one,
A green gown on the last.

The fluttering green banners there
Are wrought with ladies' heads most fair,
And a portraiture of Guenevere
The middle of each sail doth bear.

A ship with sails before the wind,
And round the helm six knights,
Their heaumes are on, whereby, half blind,
They pass...Read more of this...

In A Eweleaze Near Weatherbury

by Thomas Hardy
 THE years have gathered grayly
Since I danced upon this leaze
With one who kindled gayly
Love's fitful ecstasies!
But despite the term as teacher,
I remain what I was then
In each essential feature
Of the fantasies of men.

Yet I note the little chisel
Of ever-napping Time,
Defacing ghast and grizzel
The blazon of my prime.
When at night he thinks me sleeping,
I feel him boring sly
Within my bones,...Read more of this...

Go not too near a House of Rose --

by Emily Dickinson
 Go not too near a House of Rose --
The depredation of a Breeze --
Or inundation of a Dew
Alarms its walls away --

Nor try to tie the Butterfly,
Nor climb the Bars of Ecstasy,
In insecurity to lie
Is Joy's insuring quality....Read more of this...

To Kate. (In Lieu Of A Valentine)

by Ellis Parker Butler
 Sweet Love and I had oft communed;
 We were, indeed, great friends,
And oft I sought his office, near
 Where Courtship Alley ends.

I used to sit with him, and smoke,
 And talk of your blue eyes,
And argue how I best might act
 To make your heart my prize.

He always seemed to have much time
 To hear me tell my joy,
So...Read more of this...

Mystic shadow bending near me

by Stephen Crane
 Mystic shadow, bending near me,
Who art thou?
Whence come ye?
And -- tell me -- is it fair
Or is the truth bitter as eaten fire?

Tell me!
Fear not that I should quaver.
For I dare -- I dare.
Then, tell me!...Read more of this...

Resentment Near the Jade Stairs

by Li Po
 Dew whitens the jade stairs.
This late, it soaks her gauze stockings.

She lowers her crystal blind to watch
the breaking, glass-clear moon of autumn....Read more of this...

Near But Far Away

by William Morris
 She wavered, stopped and turned, methought her eyes, 
The deep grey windows of her heart, were wet, 
Methought they softened with a new regret 
To note in mine unspoken miseries, 
And as a prayer from out my heart did rise 
And struggled on my lips in shame's strong net, 
She stayed me, and cried "Brother!" our lips met, 
Her...Read more of this...

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