Famous Novice Poems by Famous Poets

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

See also:

Ii

by Victor Hugo
 To prayer, my child! and O, be thy first prayer 
 For her who, many nights, with anxious care, 
 Rocked thy first cradle; who took thy infant soul 
 From heaven and gave it to the world; then rife 
 With love, still drank herself the gall of life, 
 And left for thy young lips the honeyed...Read more of this...

The Glove

by Robert Browning
 (PETER RONSARD _loquitur_.)

``Heigho!'' yawned one day King Francis,
``Distance all value enhances!
``When a man's busy, why, leisure
``Strikes him as wonderful pleasure:
`` 'Faith, and at leisure once is he?
``Straightway he wants to be busy.
``Here we've got peace; and aghast I'm
``Caught thinking war the true pastime.
``Is there a reason in metre?
``Give us your speech, master Peter!''
I who, if mortal dare say so,
Ne'er...Read more of this...

The Monk's Walk

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
In this sombre garden close
What has come and passed, who knows?
What red passion, what white pain
Haunted this dim walk in vain?
Underneath the ivied wall,
Where the silent shadows fall,[Pg 210]
Lies the pathway chill and damp
Where the world-quit dreamers tramp.
Just across, where sunlight burns,
Smiling at the mourning ferns,
Stand the roses, side by side,
Nodding in their useless pride.
Ferns and roses, who...Read more of this...

Sonnet X: To Nothing Fitter

by Michael Drayton
 To nothing fitter can I thee compare 
Than to the son of some rich penny-father, 
Who, having now brought on his end with care, 
Leaves to his son all he had heap'd together; 
This new rich novice, lavish of his chest, 
To one man gives, doth on another spend, 
Then here he riots, yet among the rest 
Haps to...Read more of this...

The Mystery

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
I was not; now I am—a few days hence
I shall not be; I fain would look before
And after, but can neither do; some Power
Or lack of power says "no" to all I would.
I stand upon a wide and sunless plain,[Pg 18]
Nor chart nor steel to guide my steps aright.
Whene'er, o'ercoming fear, I dare to move,
I grope without direction...Read more of this...

The Faerie Queene: Book I Canto I

by Edmund Spenser
Lo I the man, whose Muse whilome did maske,
As time her taught in lowly Shepheards weeds,
Am now enforst a far unfitter taske,
For trumpets sterne to chaunge mine Oaten reeds,
And sing of Knights and Ladies gentle deeds;
Whose prayses having slept in silence long,
Me, all too meane, the sacred Muse areeds
To blazon broad emongst her learned throng:
Fierce warres and faithful loves shall...Read more of this...

Tom Mays Death

by Andrew Marvell
 As one put drunk into the Packet-boat,
Tom May was hurry'd hence and did not know't.
But was amaz'd on the Elysian side,
And with an Eye uncertain, gazing wide,
Could not determine in what place he was,
For whence in Stevens ally Trees or Grass.
Nor where the Popes head, nor the Mitre lay,
Signs by which still he found and lost his way.
At last...Read more of this...

Father Rileys Horse

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 'Twas the horse thief, Andy Regan, that was hunted like a dog 
By the troopers of the upper Murray side, 
They had searched in every gully -- they had looked in every log, 
But never sight or track of him they spied, 
Till the priest at Kiley's Crossing heard a knocking very late 
And a whisper "Father Riley --...Read more of this...

Those Names

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 The shearers sat in the firelight, hearty and hale and strong, 
After the hard day's shearing, passing the joke along: 
The "ringer" that shore a hundred, as they never were shorn before, 
And the novice who, toiling bravely, had tommy-hawked half a score, 
The tarboy, the cook and the skushy, the sweeper that swept the board, 
The picker-up, and...Read more of this...

Love and the Novice

by Thomas Moore
 "Here we dwell, in holiest bowers, 
Where angels of light o'er our orisans bend; 
Where sighs of devotion and breathings of flowers 
To heaven in mingled odour ascend. 
Do not disturb our calm, oh Love! 
So like is thy form to the cherubs above, 
It well might deceive such hearts as ours." 

Love stood near the Novice and listen'd,...Read more of this...

The Shepherd And The Calm

by Anne Kingsmill Finch
 Soothing his Passions with a warb'ling Sound, 
A Shepherd-Swain lay stretch'd upon the Ground;
Whilst all were mov'd, who their Attention lent,
Or with the Harmony in Chorus went,
To something less than Joy, yet more than dull Content. 
(Between which two Extreams true Pleasure lies, 
O'er-run by Fools, unreach'd-at by the Wise )
But yet, a fatal Prospect to the Sea
Wou'd often...Read more of this...

Dont forget to view our wonderful member Novice poems.

Get a Premium Membership
Turn off ads, get more exposure for your poetry, and get more features with a Premium Membership.
Book: Diverse Voices: The Poetry of Human Rights and the Pursuit of Peace