Famous Perplexity Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Perplexity poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous perplexity poems. These examples illustrate what a famous perplexity poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Jarrell, Randall
..., for seed, by farmers,
Has felt a longing, lorn urbanity
Jailed in his breast; and, just as I,
Has grunted, in his old perplexity,
A standing plea.
From the tar of the blazing square
The eyes shift, in their taciturn
And unavowing, unavailable sorrow.
Yet the intonation of a name confesses
Some secrets that they never meant
To let out to a soul; and what words would not dim
The bowed and weathered heads above the denim
Or the once-too-often washed wash dresses?
They ...Read more of this...
by
Lanier, Sidney
...me, pacing to and fro,
With head far down inclined.
`A wraith' (I thought) `that walks the shore
To solve some old perplexity.'
Full heavy hung the draggled gown he wore;
His hair flew all awry.
He waited not (as ghosts oft use)
To be `dearheaven'd!' and `oh'd!'
But briskly said: "Good-evenin'; what's the news?
Consumption? After boa'd?
"Or mebbe you're intendin' of
Investments? Orange-plantin'? Pine?
Hotel? or Sanitarium? What above
This yea'th CAN be your lin...Read more of this...
by
Raleigh, Sir Walter
...
From his distracted looks and broken sighs
That though the purple bowl was circling free,
His mind was prey to black perplexity.
At last, while others thoughtless joys invoke,
Fierce from his breast the laboured utterance broke;
"Alas!" he cried, "and what to me the gain
Though I am king of all this fair domain,
Though Ceres minister her plenteous hoard,
And Bacchus with his bounty crowns my board,
If Neptune still, reluctant to obey,
Neglects my sceptre and d...Read more of this...
by
Strode, William
...e bright
Than could the witnesses or Act in sight.
Who did soe breifely, soe perspicuously
Untie the knots of darke perplexity
That words appear'd like thoughts, and might derive
To dull Eares Knowledge most Intuitive.
A Judge soe weigh'd that Freinde and one of Us
Were heard like Titius and Sempronius.
All Eare, no Eie, noe Hande; oft being par'd
The Eies Affections and the Hands Reward.
Whose Barre and Conscience were but two in Name,
Sentence and Closet-C...Read more of this...
by
Khayyam, Omar
...Arise! and come, and of thy courtesy
Resolve my weary heart's perplexity,
And fill my goblet, so that I may drink,
Or e'er they make their goblets out of me....Read more of this...
by
Sidney, Sir Philip
...t;
Silence in both displaies his sullen might;
Slow heauinesse in both holds one degree
That full of doubts, thou of perplexity;
Thy teares expresse Nights natiue moisture right;
In both amazeful solitarinesse:
In night, of sprites, the gastly powers do stur;
In thee or sprites or sprited gastlinesse.
But, but (alas) Nights side the ods hath fur:
For that, at length, yet doth inuite some rest;
Thou, though still tired, yet still doost it detest.
XCVII
...Read more of this...
by
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor
...Now heaven be praised if all be well!'
And in low faltering tones, yet sweet,
Did she the lofty lady greet
With such perplexity of mind
As dreams too lively leave behind.
So quickly she rose, and quickly arrayed
Her maiden limbs, and having prayed
That He, who on the cross did groan,
Might wash away her sins unknown,
She forthwith led fair Geraldine
To meet her sire, Sir Leoline.
The lovely maid and the lady tall
Are pacing both into the hall,
And pacin...Read more of this...
by
Brown, Thomas Edward
...; with swerving of the blast
We go,
Our Captain last—
Demands
‘Who fired that shot?’ Each silent stands—
Ah, sweet perplexity!
This too was He.
I have an arbour wherein came a toad
Most hideous to see—
Immediate, seizing staff or goad,
I smote it cruelly.
Then all the place with subtle radiance glowed—
I looked, and it was He!...Read more of this...
by
Keats, John
...han Endymion.
His heart leapt up as to its rightful throne,
To that fair shadow'd passion puls'd its way--
Ah, what perplexity! Ah, well a day!
So fond, so beauteous was his bed-fellow,
He could not help but kiss her: then he grew
Awhile forgetful of all beauty save
Young Phoebe's, golden hair'd; and so 'gan crave
Forgiveness: yet he turn'd once more to look
At the sweet sleeper,--all his soul was shook,--
She press'd his hand in slumber; so once more
He could not help bu...Read more of this...
by
Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns)
...and drugs, and features of the press:
And always will be, some of them especially
When there is distress of nations and perplexity
Whether on the shores of Asia, or in the Edgware Road.
Men's curiosity searches past and future
And clings to that dimension. But to apprehend
The point of intersection of the timeless
With time, is an occupation for the saint—
No occupation either, but something given
And taken, in a lifetime's death in love,
Ardour and selflessness and s...Read more of this...
by
Wordsworth, William
...
And now, with gleams of half-extinguished thought,
With many recognitions dim and faint,
And somewhat of a sad perplexity,
The picture of the mind revives again;
While here I stand, not only with the sense
Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts
That in this moment there is life and food
For future years. And so I dare to hope,
Though changed, no doubt, from what I was when first
I came among these hills; when like a roe
I bounded o'er the mounta...Read more of this...
by
Dickinson, Emily
...--
Involving statelier sums.
I check my busy pencil,
My figures file away.
Wherefore, my baffled fingers
They perplexity?...Read more of this...
by
Khayyam, Omar
...O thou who art the result of the four [elements] and
the seven [heavens], I see you in perplexity amongst
these four and seven. Drink wine, for, as I have said
to you more than four times, you will return no more;
once departed, you are gone indeed....Read more of this...
by
Khayyam, Omar
...Ofttimes I plead my foolishness to Thee,
My heart contracted with perplexity;
I gird me with the Magian zone, and why?
For shame so poor a Musulman to be....Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...re, deliverance is at hand;
The kingdom shall to Israel be restored:'
Thus we rejoiced, but soon our joy is turned
Into perplexity and new amaze.
For whither is he gone? what accident
Hath rapt him from us? will he now retire
After appearance, and again prolong
Our expectation? God of Israel,
Send thy Messiah forth; the time is come.
Behold the kings of the earth, how they oppress
Thy Chosen, to what highth their power unjust
They have exalted, and behind them cast
A...Read more of this...
by
von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang
...son straight.
Oh accursed story, truly!
For a hero, what a fate!
Can my patience such things weather?
Great is my perplexity.
Women, debts, and foes together,--
Ah, no knight escapes scot free!
1803.*...Read more of this...
by
Yeats, William Butler
...g in the dark.
When all that story's finished, what's the news?
In luck or out the toil has left its mark:
That old perplexity an empty purse,
Or the day's vanity, the night's remorse....Read more of this...
by
Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...to hear the dully sound
Of human footsteps fall.
As in strange lands a traveller walking slow,
In doubt and great perplexity,
A little before moon-rise hears the low
Moan of an unknown sea;
And knows not if it be thunder, or a sound
Of rocks thrown down, or one deep cry
Of great wild beasts; then thinketh, "I have found
A new land, but I die."
She howl'd aloud, "I am on fire within.
There comes no murmur of reply.
What is it that will take away my sin,
A...Read more of this...
by
Thomson, James
...Nature hears
Th'Almighty Trumpet's Voice, and starts to Life,
Renew'd, unfading. Now, th'Eternal Scheme,
That Dark Perplexity, that Mystic Maze,
Which Sight cou'd never trace, nor Heart conceive,
To Reason's Eye, refin'd, clears up apace.
Angels, and Men, astonish'd, pause -- and dread
To travel thro' the Depths of Providence,
Untry'd, unbounded. Ye vain Learned! see,
And, prostrate in the Dust, adore that Power,
And Goodness, oft arraign'd. See now the Cause...Read more of this...
by
Khayyam, Omar
...Why ponder thus the future to foresee,
And jade thy brain to vain perplexity?
Cast off thy care, leave Allah's plans to him,
He formed them all without consulting thee....Read more of this...
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