Famous Not Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Not poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous not poems. These examples illustrate what a famous not poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Robert Herrick
Shut not so soon; the dull-eyed night
Has not as yet begun
To make a seizure on the light,
Or to seal up the sun.
No marigolds yet closed are;
No shadows great appear;
Nor doth the early shepherds' star
Shine like a spangle here.
Stay but till my Julia close
Her life-begetting eye,
And let the whole world then dispose
Itself to live or die....Read more of this...
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...
by
Emily Dickinson
I would not paint -- a picture --
I'd rather be the One
Its bright impossibility
To dwell -- delicious -- on --
And wonder how the fingers feel
Whose rare -- celestial -- stir --
Evokes so sweet a Torment --
Such sumptuous -- Despair --
I would not talk, like Cornets --
I'd rather be the One
Raised softly to the Ceilings --
And out, and easy on...Read more of this...
by
Robert Frost
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as...Read more of this...
by
Robert Frost
They sent him back to her. The letter came
Saying... And she could have him. And before
She could be sure there was no hidden ill
Under the formal writing, he was in her sight,
Living. They gave him back to her alive
How else? They are not known to send the dead
And not disfigured visibly. His face?
His hands? She had to look, and...Read more of this...
by
Thomas Moore
Oh! blame not the bard, if he fly to the bowers
Where Pleasure lies, carelessly smiling at Fame;
He was born for much more, and in happier hours
His soul might have burn'd with a holier flame.
The string, that now languishes loose o'er the lyre,
Might have bent a proud bow to the warrior's dart;
And the lip, which...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Facts will not change to humour man's caprice,
So vaunt not human powers, but hold your peace;
Here must we stay, weighed down with grief for this,
That we were born so late, so soon decease....Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
I had not minded -- Walls --
Were Universe -- one Rock --
And far I heard his silver Call
The other side the Block --
I'd tunnel -- till my Groove
Pushed sudden thro' to his --
Then my face take her Recompense --
The looking in his Eyes --
But 'tis a single Hair --
A filament -- a law --
A Cobweb -- wove in Adamant...Read more of this...
by
Sir Philip Sidney
Not at first sight, nor with a dribbed shot
Love gave the wound, which while I breathe will bleed;
But known worth did in mine of time proceed,
Till by degrees it had full conquest got:
I saw and liked, I liked but loved not;
I lov'd, but straight did not what Love decreed.
At length to love's decrees...Read more of this...
by
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
When we met first and loved, I did not build
Upon the event with marble. Could it mean
To last, a love set pendulous between
Sorrow and sorrow? Nay, I rather thrilled,
Distrusting every light that seemed to gild
The onward path, and feared to overlean
A finger even. And, though I have grown serene
And strong since then, I think that God has willed
A still...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
O Wheel of Heaven, thy circular course does not satisfy
me. Deliver me from it, for I am unworthy of thy
chain. If thy good pleasure consists in according thy
favors only to the poor in mind, to idiots, I am neither
intelligent enough or wise enough [to be confounded
by it]....Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Not at Home to Callers
Says the Naked Tree --
Bonnet due in April --
Wishing you Good Day --...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Not so the infinite Relations -- Below
Division is Adhesion's forfeit -- On High
Affliction but a Speculation -- And Woe
A Fallacy, a Figment, We knew --...Read more of this...
by
Gerard Manley Hopkins
I wake and feel the fell of dark, not day.
What hours, O what black hours we have spent
This night! what sights you, heart, saw; ways you went!
And more must, in yet longer light's delay.
With witness I speak this. But where I say
Hours I mean years, mean life. And my lament
Is cries countless, cries like dead letters sent
To dearest him...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
Let not my love be called idolatry,
Nor my belovèd as an idol show,
Since all alike my songs and praises be
To one, of one, still such, and ever so.
Kind is my love today, tomorrow kind,
Still constant in a wondrous excellence;
Therefore my verse to constancy confined,
One thing expressing, leaves out difference.
"Fair, kind, and true" is all my argument,
"Fair, kind, and true"...Read more of this...
by
Dylan Thomas
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
O you who tremble not at fires of hell,
Nor wash in water of remorse's well,
When winds of death shall quench your vital torch,
Beware lest earth your guilty dust expel....Read more of this...
by
Charles Bukowski
I pick up the skirt,
I pick up the sparkling beads
in black,
this thing that moved once
around flesh,
and I call God a liar,
I say anything that moved
like that
or knew
my name
could never die
in the common verity of dying,
and I pick
up her lovely
dress,
all her loveliness gone,
and I speak to all the gods,
Jewish gods, Christ-gods,
chips of blinking things,
idols, pills, bread,
fathoms, risks,
knowledgeable surrender,
rats...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
To knaves Thy secret we must not confide,
To comprehend it is to fools denied,
See then to what hard case Thou doomest men,
Our hopes from one and all perforce we hide....Read more of this...
by
Vachel Lindsay
A little colt — broncho, loaned to the farm
To be broken in time without fury or harm,
Yet black crows flew past you, shouting alarm,
Calling "Beware," with lugubrious singing...
The butterflies there in the bush were romancing,
The smell of the grass caught your soul in a trance,
So why be a-fearing the spurs and the traces,
O broncho that would not be broken...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
I could not prove the Years had feet --
Yet confident they run
Am I, from symptoms that are past
And Series that are done --
I find my feet have further Goals --
I smile upon the Aims
That felt so ample -- Yesterday --
Today's -- have vaster claims --
I do not doubt the self I was
Was competent to me --
But something awkward in...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Become not a prey to sorrow in this world of iniquity;
recall not to thy soul the memory of those who are no
longer here; give up thy heart only to a friend with sweet
lips and fairy-like in form and never be deprived of
wine, or throw life to the winds....Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
What I see not, I better see --
Through Faith -- my Hazel Eye
Has periods of shutting --
But, No lid has Memory --
For frequent, all my sense obscured
I equally behold
As someone held a light unto
The Features so beloved ---
And I arise -- and in my Dream --
Do Thee distinguished Grace --
Till jealous Daylight interrupt --
And mar thy perfectness --...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
My country need not change her gown,
Her triple suit as sweet
As when 'twas cut at Lexington,
And first pronounced "a fit."
Great Britain disapproves, "the stars";
Disparagement discreet, --
There's something in their attitude
That taunts her bayonet....Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
A heart which does not contain in itself complete abstinence
[from things here below] is to be pitied, for it is
at all times the prey of regret. It is only the heart free
from care that can be joyous; all that exists beyond this
is but a subject of torment....Read more of this...
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