Famous Perhaps Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Baby Dolly

by Mother Goose
Hush, baby, my dolly, I pray you don't cry,
And I'll give you some bread, and some milk by-and-by;
Or perhaps you like custard, or, maybe, a tart,
Then to either you're welcome, with all my heart....Read more of this...

Old Man

by Edward Thomas
 Old Man, or Lads-Love, - in the name there’s nothing
To one that knows not Lads-Love, or Old Man, 
The hoar green feathery herb, almost a tree, 
Growing with rosemary and lavender.
Even to one that knows it well, the names
Half decorate, half perplex, the thing it is: 
At least, what that is clings not to the names
In spite of time....Read more of this...

Sonnet 05 - I lift my heavy heart up solemnly

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
 I lift my heavy heart up solemnly,
As once Electra her sepulchral urn,
And, looking in thine eyes, I overturn
The ashes at thy feet. Behold and see
What a great heap of grief lay hid in me,
And how the red wild sparkles dimly burn
Through the ashen grayness. If thy foot in scorn
Could tread them out to darkness utterly,
It might be well perhaps....Read more of this...

Perhaps I asked too large

by Emily Dickinson
 Perhaps I asked too large --
I take -- no less than skies --
For Earths, grow thick as
Berries, in my native town --

My Basked holds -- just -- Firmaments --
Those -- dangle easy -- on my arm,
But smaller bundles -- Cram....Read more of this...

And now that the lofty leaves have fallen

by Emile Verhaeren
And now that the lofty leaves have fallen, that kept our garden sheltered beneath their shade, through the bare branches can be seen beyond them the roofs of the old villages climbing towards the horizon.
So long as summer poured out its gladness, none of us saw them grouped so near our door; but now that the flowers and the leaves...Read more of this...

Unusual Love

by Dejan Stojanovic
Our desires flew like birds in the mornings 
When we were waked by the bells of dreams 
Hypnotized and ready for another round of living 

We would walk down the street of a foreign city mesmerized 
By our own history seen on the streets and in the gardens 
Filled with exotic flowers and the grass; you loved the grass 

You...Read more of this...

My Last Duchess

by Robert Browning
That's my last duchess painted on the wall,
Looking as if she were alive.  I call 
That piece a wonder, now: Frà Pandolf's hands 
Worked busily a day, and there she stands. 
Will't please you sit and look at her?  I said 
"Frà Pandolf" by design, for never read 
Strangers like you that pictured countenance, 
The depth and passion...Read more of this...

Anonymous Drawing

by Donald Justice
 A delicate young ***** stands
With the reins of a horse clutched loosely in his hands;
So delicate, indeed, that we wonder if he can hold the spirited creature
beside him
Until the master shall arrive to ride him.
Already the animal's nostrils widen with rage or fear.
But if we imagine him snorting, about to rear,
This boy, who should know about such things better...Read more of this...

Birthday (Autobiography)

by Robinson Jeffers
 Seventy years ago my mother labored to bear me,
A twelve-pound baby with a big head,
Her first, it was plain torture. Finally they used the forceps
And dragged me out, with one prong
In my right eye, and slapped and banged me until I breathed.
I am not particularly grateful for it.

As to the eye: it remained invalid and now has a cataract.
It...Read more of this...

Perhaps you think me stooping

by Emily Dickinson
 Perhaps you think me stooping
I'm not ashamed of that
Christ -- stooped until He touched the Grave --
Do those at Sacrament

Commemorative Dishonor
Or love annealed of love
Until it bend as low as Death
Redignified, above?...Read more of this...

God Gave To Me A Child In Part

by Robert Louis Stevenson
 GOD gave to me a child in part,
Yet wholly gave the father's heart:
Child of my soul, O whither now,
Unborn, unmothered, goest thou?

You came, you went, and no man wist;
Hapless, my child, no breast you kist;
On no dear knees, a privileged babbler, clomb,
Nor knew the kindly feel of home.

My voice may reach you, O my dear-
A father's voice perhaps the...Read more of this...

Playthings

by Rabindranath Tagore
 Child, how happy you are sitting in the dust, playing with a broken twig all the morning. 
I smile at your play with that little bit of a broken twig. 
I am busy with my accounts, adding up figures by the hour. 
Perhaps you glance at me and think, "What a stupid game to spoil your morning with!" 
Child,...Read more of this...

Perhaps youd like to buy a flower

by Emily Dickinson
 Perhaps you'd like to buy a flower,
But I could never sell --
If you would like to borrow,
Until the Daffodil

Unties her yellow Bonnet
Beneath the village door,
Until the Bees, from Clover rows
Their Hock, and Sherry, draw,

Why, I will lend until just then,
But not an hour more!...Read more of this...

To Stella Who Collected and Transcribed His Poems

by Jonathan Swift
 As, when a lofty pile is raised,
We never hear the workmen praised,
Who bring the lime, or place the stones;
But all admire Inigo Jones:
So, if this pile of scattered rhymes
Should be approved in aftertimes;
If it both pleases and endures,
The merit and the praise are yours.
Thou, Stella, wert no longer young,
When first for thee my harp was strung,
Without one word of...Read more of this...

Wine has been prohibited, perhaps, but it is only prohibited

by Omar Khayyam
Wine has been prohibited, perhaps, but it is only prohibited
according to the person who drinks it, according
to the quantity drunk, and according to the individual
with whom we drink it. These points once observed,
who would drink it if not the wise?
324...Read more of this...

Infantile Influence

by Victor Hugo
 ("Lorsque l'enfant parait.") 
 
 {XIX., May 11, 1830.} 


 The child comes toddling in, and young and old 
 With smiling eyes its smiling eyes behold, 
 And artless, babyish joy; 
 A playful welcome greets it through the room, 
 The saddest brow unfolds its wrinkled gloom, 
 To greet the happy boy. 
 
 If June...Read more of this...

Stepping Backward

by Adrienne Rich
 Good-by to you whom I shall see tomorrow,
Next year and when I'm fifty; still good-by.
This is the leave we never really take.
If you were dead or gone to live in China
The event might draw your stature in my mind.
I should be forced to look upon you whole
The way we look upon the things we lose.
We see each other daily...Read more of this...

An Allusion to Horace

by John Wilmot
 Well Sir, 'tis granted, I said Dryden's Rhimes, 
Were stoln, unequal, nay dull many times: 
What foolish Patron, is there found of his, 
So blindly partial, to deny me this? 
But that his Plays, Embroider'd up and downe, 
With Witt, and Learning, justly pleas'd the Towne, 
In the same paper, I as freely owne: 
Yet haveing this allow'd, the...Read more of this...

What The Dog Perhaps Hears

by Lisel Mueller
 If an inaudible whistle
blown between our lips
can send him home to us, 
then silence is perhaps
the sound of spiders breathing
and roots mining the earth; 
it may be asparagus heaving, 
headfirst, into the light
and the long brown sound
of cracked cups, when it happens. 
We would like to ask the dog
if there is a continuous whir
because the child in the house...Read more of this...

Not Love Perhaps

by A S J Tessimond
 This is not Love, perhaps, 
Love that lays down its life, 
that many waters cannot quench, 
nor the floods drown, 
But something written in lighter ink, 
said in a lower tone, something, perhaps, especially our own.

A need, at times, to be together and talk, 
And then the finding we can walk 
More firmly through dark narrow places, 
And meet...Read more of this...

A Job for McGuinness

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 Oh, it's dreadful to think in a country like this 
With its chances for work - and enjoyment 
That a man like McGuinness was certain to miss 
Whenever he tried for employment. 

He wrote to employers from Bondi to Bourke, 
From Woolloomooloo to Glen Innes, 
But he found - though his wife could get plenty of work - 
There...Read more of this...

Bermudas

by Andrew Marvell
 Where the remote Bermudas ride
In th' Oceans bosome unespy'd,
From a small Boat, that row'd along,
The listning Winds receiv'd this Song.
What should we do but sing his Praise
That led us through the watry Maze,
Unto an Isle so long unknown,
And yet far kinder than our own?
Where he the huge Sea-Monsters wracks,
That lift the Deep upon their Backs.
He lands us on a...Read more of this...

To His Lovely Mistresses

by Robert Herrick
 One night i'th' year, my dearest Beauties, come,
And bring those dew-drink-offerings to my tomb;
When thence ye see my reverend ghost to rise,
And there to lick th' effused sacrifice,
Though paleness be the livery that I wear,
Look ye not wan or colourless for fear.
Trust me, I will not hurt ye, or once show
The least grim look, or cast a frown on...Read more of this...

Perhaps they do not go so far

by Emily Dickinson
 Perhaps they do not go so far
As we who stay, suppose --
Perhaps come closer, for the lapse
Of their corporeal clothes --

It may be know so certainly
How short we have to fear
That comprehension antedates
And estimates us there --...Read more of this...

Perhaps, when my last day comes

by Emile Verhaeren
Perhaps, when my last day comes, perhaps, if only for a moment, a frail and quavering sun will stoop down at my window.
My hands then, my poor faded hands, will even so be gilded once again by his glory; he will touch my mouth and my forehead a last time with his slow, bright, deep kiss; and the pale, but...Read more of this...

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