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Famous Ply Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Burns, Robert
...n turn’d on empty space,
 Beam’d keen with honour.


Down flow’d her robe, a tartan sheen,
Till half a leg was scrimply seen;
An’ such a leg! my bonie Jean
 Could only peer it;
Sae straught, sae taper, tight an’ clean—
 Nane else came near it.


Her mantle large, of greenish hue,
My gazing wonder chiefly drew:
Deep lights and shades, bold-mingling, threw
 A lustre grand;
And seem’d, to my astonish’d view,
 A well-known land.


Here, rivers in the sea were lost;
Th...Read more of this...



by Dryden, John
...ifty Sanhedrin shall keep him poor:
And every shekel which he can receive,
Shall cost a limb of his prerogative.
To ply him with new plots, shall be my care;
Or plunge him deep in some expensive war;
Which, when his treasure can no more supply,
He must, with the remains of kingship, buy.
His faithful friends, our jealousies and fears
Call Jebusites; and Pharaoh's pensioners:
Whom, when our fury from his aid has torn,
He shall be naked left to public scorn.
The nex...Read more of this...

by Robinson, Edwin Arlington
...grim degrees to pick and spade, 
As one by one the phantoms go. 

But then, what though the mystic Three 
Around me ply their merry trade? -- 
And Charon soon may carry me 
Across the gloomy Stygian glade? -- 

Be up, my soul! nor be afraid 
Of what some unborn year may show; 
But mind your human debts are paid, 
As one by one the phantoms go. 

ENVOY

Life is the game that must be played: 
This truth at least, good friend, we know; 
So live and laugh, nor be dismayed...Read more of this...

by Byron, George (Lord)
...old and weary sleep — 
I could not; and to view alone 
The fairest scenes of land and deep, 
With none to listen and reply 
To thoughts with which my heart beat high 
Were irksome — for whate'er my mood, 
In sooth I love not solitude; 
I on Zuleika's slumber broke, 
And as thou knowest that for me 
Soon turns the Haram's grating key, 
Before the guardian slaves awoke 
We to the cypress groves had flown, 
And made earth, main, and heaven our own! 
There linger'd we, beguil'd ...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...or homely features to keep home;
They had their name thence: coarse complexions
And cheeks of sorry grain will serve to ply
The sampler, and to tease the huswife's wool.
What need a vermeil-tinctured lip for that,
Love-darting eyes, or tresses like the morn?
There was another meaning in these gifts;
Think what, and be advised; you are but young yet.
 LADY. I had not thought to have unlocked my lips
In this unhallowed air, but that this juggler
Would think to charm...Read more of this...



by Gray, Thomas
...,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.

For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening-care;
No children run to lisp their sire's return,
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.

Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,
Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke:
How jocund did they drive their team afield!
How bowed the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys...Read more of this...

by Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
...y his Majesty's orders.
Clement and kind has he been; but how you have answered his kindness,
Let your own hearts reply! To my natural make and my temper
Painful the task is I do, which to you I know must be grievous.
Yet must I bow and obey, and deliver the will of our monarch;
Namely, that all your lands, and dwellings, and cattle of all kinds
Forfeited be to the crown; and that you yourselves from this province
Be transported to other lands. God grant you may d...Read more of this...

by Campbell, Thomas
...ulf profound,
That fluctuates when the storms of El Dorado sound.

Pleased with his guest, the good man still would ply
Each earnest question, and his converse court;
But Gertrude, as she eyed him, knew not why
A strange and troubling wonder stopt her short.
"In England thou hast been,--and, by report,
An orphan's name (quoth Albert) may'st have known.
Sad tale!--when latest fell our frontier fort,--
One innocent--one soldier's child--alone
Was spared, and brought...Read more of this...

by Pope, Alexander
...whom vanity's light bark conveys
On fame's mad voyage by the wind of praise,
With what a shifting gale your course you ply,
For ever sunk too low, or borne too high!
Who pants for glory finds but short repose,
A breath revives him, or a breath o'erthrows.
Farewell the stage! if just as thrives the play,
The silly bard grows fat, or falls away.


There still remains, to mortify a wit,
The many-headed monster of the pit:
A senseless, worthless, and unhonour'd crowd;
Wh...Read more of this...

by Alighieri, Dante
...with shame I bent 
 My downward eyes, and no more spake until 
 The bank we reached, and on the stream beheld 
 A bark ply toward us. 
 Of exceeding eld, 
 And hoary showed the steersman, screaming shrill, 
 With horrid glee the while he neared us, "Woe 
 To ye, depraved! - Is here no Heaven, but ill 
 The place where I shall herd ye. Ice and fire 
 And darkness are the wages of their hire 
 Who serve unceasing here - But thou that there 
 Dost wait though live, depa...Read more of this...

by Carman, Bliss
...e spirit’s sphere. 
The summer sunset’s scarlet-yellow wings 
Are tinged with the same dye 
That paints the tulip’s ply. 
And what is colour but the soul of things? 

(The earth was without form; 
God moulded it with storm, 
Ice, flood, and tempest, gleaming tint and hue; 
Lest it should come to ill 
For lack of spirit still, 
He gave it colour,—let the love shine through.)… 

Of old, men said, ‘Sin not; 
By every line and jot 
Ye shall abide; man’s heart is false...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...e for us all. This enterprise 
None shall partake with me." Thus saying, rose 
The Monarch, and prevented all reply; 
Prudent lest, from his resolution raised, 
Others among the chief might offer now, 
Certain to be refused, what erst they feared, 
And, so refused, might in opinion stand 
His rivals, winning cheap the high repute 
Which he through hazard huge must earn. But they 
Dreaded not more th' adventure than his voice 
Forbidding; and at once with him they ...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...ing voice; that done, partake 
The season prime for sweetest scents and airs: 
Then commune, how that day they best may ply 
Their growing work: for much their work out-grew 
The hands' dispatch of two gardening so wide, 
And Eve first to her husband thus began. 
Adam, well may we labour still to dress 
This garden, still to tend plant, herb, and flower, 
Our pleasant task enjoined; but, till more hands 
Aid us, the work under our labour grows, 
Luxurious by restraint; wh...Read more of this...

by Stevenson, Robert Louis
...o,
And the steady breezes blow,
Bearing perfume, bearing love.
Breezes hasten, swallows fly,
Towered clouds forever ply,
And at noonday, you and I
See the same sunshine above.

Dew and rain fall everywhere,
Harvests ripen, flowers are fair,
And the whole round earth is bare
To the moonshine and the sun;
And the live air, fanned with wings,
Bright with breeze and sunshine, brings
Into contact distant things,
And makes all the countries one.

Let us wander where we ...Read more of this...

by Byron, George (Lord)
...old and weary sleep — 
I could not; and to view alone 
The fairest scenes of land and deep, 
With none to listen and reply 
To thoughts with which my heart beat high 
Were irksome — for whate'er my mood, 
In sooth I love not solitude; 
I on Zuleika's slumber broke, 
And as thou knowest that for me 
Soon turns the Haram's grating key, 
Before the guardian slaves awoke 
We to the cypress groves had flown, 
And made earth, main, and heaven our own! 
There linger'd we, beguil'd ...Read more of this...

by Wordsworth, William
...eet with such another.   His father said, that to a distant town  He must repair, to ply the artist's trade.  What tears of bitter grief till then unknown?  What tender vows our last sad kiss delayed!  To him we turned:—we had no other aid.  Like one revived, upon his neck I wept,  And her whom he had loved in joy, he said  He well could love in grief: his fa...Read more of this...

by Byron, George (Lord)
...r>’


‘Thou speakest sooth; they skiff unmoor,
And waft us from the silent shore;
Nay, leave the sail still furled, and ply
The nearest oar that’s scattered by,
And midway to those rocks where sleep
The channeled waters dark and deep.
Rest from your task - so - bravely done,
Of course had been right swiftly run;
Yet ‘tis the longest voyage, I trow,
That one of -


Sullen it plunged, and slowly sank,
The calm wave rippled to the bank;
I watched it as it sank, methought
Som...Read more of this...

by Lanier, Sidney
..., they lap the stream
That trickles from the regal vestments down,
And, lapping, smack their heated chaps for more,
And ply their daggers for it, till the kings
All die and lie in a crooked sprawl of death,
Ungainly, foul, and stiff as any heap
Of villeins rotting on a battle-field.
'Tis true, that when these things have come to pass
Then never a king shall rule again in France,
For every villein shall be king in France:
And who hath lordship in him, whether born
In hedge...Read more of this...

by Scott, Sir Walter
...And o'er the lake the shallop flew;
     With heads erect and whimpering cry,
     The hounds behind their passage ply.
     Nor frequent does the bright oar break
     The darkening mirror of the lake,
     Until the rocky isle they reach,
     And moor their shallop on the beach.
     XXV.

     The stranger viewed the shore around;
     'T was all so close with copsewood bound,
     Nor track nor pathway might declare
     That human foot frequented there,
...Read more of this...

by Rossetti, Christina
...er mine own, while moons and seasons bring
From crudeness ripeness mellow and sanitive;
Ever mine own, till Death shall ply his sieve;
And still mine own, when saints break grave and sing.
And this myself as king unto my King
I give, to Him Who gave Himself for me;
Who gives Himself to me, and bids me sing
A sweet new song of His redeemed set free;
he bids me sing: O death, where is thy sting?
And sing: O grave, where is thy victory?...Read more of this...

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