Famous Onyx Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Behind a Wall

by Amy Lowell
 I own a solace shut within my heart,
A garden full of many a quaint delight
And warm with drowsy, poppied sunshine; bright,
Flaming with lilies out of whose cups dart
Shining things
With powdered wings.
Here terrace sinks to terrace, arbors close
The ends of dreaming paths; a wanton wind
Jostles the half-ripe pears, and then, unkind,
Tumbles a-slumber in a pillar rose,
With content
Grown indolent.
By night my...Read more of this...

The Vanity of All Worldly Things

by Anne Bradstreet
 As he said vanity, so vain say I,
Oh! Vanity, O vain all under sky;
Where is the man can say, "Lo, I have found
On brittle earth a consolation sound"?
What isn't in honor to be set on high?
No, they like beasts and sons of men shall die,
And whilst they live, how oft doth turn their fate;
He's now a captive that was...Read more of this...

The Fairy Goldsmith

by Elinor Wylie
 Here's a wonderful thing, 
A humming-bird's wing 
In hammered gold, 
And store well chosen 
Of snowflakes frozen 
In crystal cold.

Black onyx cherries 
And mistletoe berries 
Of chrysoprase, 
Jade buds, tight shut, 
All carven and cut 
In intricate ways.

Here, if you please 
Are little gilt bees 
In amber drops 
Which look like honey, 
Translucent and sunny, 
From clover-tops.

Here's an elfin...Read more of this...

Like trains of cars on tracks of plush

by Emily Dickinson
Like trains of cars on tracks of plush
I hear the level bee:
A jar across the flowers goes,
Their velvet masonry

Withstands until the sweet assault
Their chivalry consumes,
While he, victorious, tilts away
To vanquish other blooms.

His feet are shod with gauze,
His helmet is of gold;
His breast, a single onyx
With chrysoprase, inlaid.

His labor is a chant,
His idleness a tune;
Oh, for a bee's experience
Of clovers and...Read more of this...

The Mountain Tomb

by William Butler Yeats
 Pour wine and dance if manhood still have pride,
Bring roses if the rose be yet in bloom;
The cataract smokes upon the mountain side,
Our Father Rosicross is in his tomb.

Pull down the blinds, bring fiddle and clarionet
That there be no foot silent in the room
Nor mouth from kissing, nor from wine unwet;
Our Father Rosicross is in his tomb.

In vain, in...Read more of this...

The Evening Sky was as Green as Jade

by Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
   The evening sky was as green as Jade,
      As Emerald turf by Lotus lake,
   Behind the Kafila far she strayed,
      (The Pearls are lost if the Necklace break!)

   A lingering freshness touched the air
      From palm-trees, clustered around...Read more of this...

Strayed Reveller The

by Matthew Arnold
 The Youth

Faster, faster,
O Circe, Goddess,
Let the wild, thronging train
The bright procession
Of eddying forms,
Sweep through my soul!
Thou standest, smiling
Down on me! thy right arm,
Lean'd up against the column there,
Props thy soft cheek;
Thy left holds, hanging loosely,
The deep cup, ivy-cinctured,
I held but now.
Is it, then, evening
So soon? I see, the night-dews,
Cluster'd in thick beads, dim
The agate brooch-stones
On thy white shoulder;
The cool...Read more of this...

The Hands of the Betrothed

by D. H. Lawrence
 Her tawny eyes are onyx of thoughtlessness, 
Hardened they are like gems in ancient modesty; 
Yea, and her mouth’s prudent and crude caress 
Means even less than her many words to me. 

Though her kiss betrays me also this, this only
Consolation, that in her lips her blood at climax clips
Two wild, dumb paws in anguish on the lonely 
Fruit...Read more of this...

His Feet are shod with Gauze --

by Emily Dickinson
 His Feet are shod with Gauze --
His Helmet, is of Gold,
His Breast, a Single Onyx
With Chrysophrase, inlaid.

His Labor is a Chant --
His Idleness -- a Tune --
Oh, for a Bee's experience
Of Clovers, and of Noon!...Read more of this...

The Present

by Philip Levine
 The day comes slowly in the railyard 
behind the ice factory. It broods on 
one cinder after another until each 
glows like lead or the eye of a dog 
possessed of no inner fire, the brown 
and greasy pointer who raises his muzzle 
a moment and sighing lets it thud 
down on the loading dock. In no time 
the...Read more of this...

The Strayed Reveller

by Matthew Arnold
 1 Faster, faster, 
2 O Circe, Goddess,
3 Let the wild, thronging train 
4 The bright procession 
5 Of eddying forms, 
6 Sweep through my soul! 

7 Thou standest, smiling
8 Down on me! thy right arm,
9 Lean'd up against the column there,
10 Props thy soft cheek;
11 Thy left holds, hanging loosely,
12 The deep cup, ivy-cinctured,
13 I held but now. 

14...Read more of this...

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