Famous Plying Poems by Famous Poets

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

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248. Pegasus at Wanlockhead

...WITH Pegasus upon a day,
 Apollo, weary flying,
Through frosty hills the journey lay,
 On foot the way was plying.


Poor slipshod giddy Pegasus
 Was but a sorry walker;
To Vulcan then Apollo goes,
 To get a frosty caulker.


Obliging Vulcan fell to work,
 Threw by his coat and bonnet,
And did Sol’s business in a crack;
 Sol paid him with a sonnet.


Ye Vulcan’s sons of Wanlockhead,
 Pity my sad disaster;
My Pegasus is poorly shod,
 I’ll pay you like my master....Read more of this...
by Burns, Robert


A Moments Indulgence

...toil in a shoreless sea of toil. 

Today the summer has come at my window with its sighs and murmurs; and 
the bees are plying their minstrelsy at the court of the flowering grove. 

Now it is time to sit quite, face to face with thee, and to sing 
dedication of life in this silent and overflowing leisure....Read more of this...
by Tagore, Rabindranath

Andrea del Sarto

...,
All his court round him, seeing with his eyes,
Such frank French eyes, and such a fire of souls
Profuse, my hand kept plying by those hearts,--
And, best of all, this, this, this face beyond,
This in the background, waiting on my work,
To crown the issue with a last reward!
A good time, was it not, my kingly days?
And had you not grown restless... but I know--
'Tis done and past: 'twas right, my instinct said:
Too live the life grew, golden and not grey,
And I'm the weak-ey...Read more of this...
by Browning, Robert

Ballad of Dead Friends

...
Life awakes and burns, 
Age and death defying, 
Till at last it learns 
All but Love is dying; 
Love's the trade we're plying, 
God has willed it so; 
Shrouds are what we're buying 
For friends that come and go. 

Man forever yearns 
For the thing that's flying. 
Everywhere he turns, 
Men to dust are drying, -- 
Dust that wanders, eying 
(With eyes that hardly glow) 
New faces, dimly spying 
For friends that come and go. 

ENVOY

And thus we all are nighing 
The truth we fea...Read more of this...
by Robinson, Edwin Arlington

Eighty Not Out

...with joy for I love to be talking,
Although I have nothing important to say.
I cheer the old grannies whose needles are plying;
I watch the wee kiddies awhoop at their play:
When sunny the sky is, you'll not be denying
The morning's the bonniest bit of the day.
With hair that is silver the look should be smiling,
And lips that are ageful should surely be wise;
And so I go gaily with gentle beguiling,
Abidding for cheer in the bright of your eyes.
I look at the vines and the b...Read more of this...
by Service, Robert William


Fragment of a Greek Tragedy

...y as much.

ALCMAEON: I journeyed hither a Boetian road.
CHORUS: Sailing on horseback, or with feet for oars?
ALCMAEON: Plying with speed my partnership of legs.
CHORUS: Beneath a shining or a rainy Zeus?
ALCMAEON: Mud's sister, not himself, adorns my shoes.
CHORUS: To learn your name would not displease me much.
ALCMAEON: Not all that men desire do they obtain.
CHORUS: Might I then hear at what thy presence shoots.
ALCMAEON: A shepherd's questioned mouth informed me that--
C...Read more of this...
by Housman, A E

In falling Timbers buried --

...In falling Timbers buried --
There breathed a Man --
Outside -- the spades -- were plying --
The Lungs -- within --

Could He -- know -- they sought Him --
Could They -- know -- He breathed --
Horrid Sand Partition --
Neither -- could be heard --

Never slacked the Diggers --
But when Spades had done --
Oh, Reward of Anguish,
It was dying -- Then --

Many Things -- are fruitless --
'Tis a Baffling Earth --
But there is no Gratitude
Like th...Read more of this...
by Dickinson, Emily

Medusa

...e sticks,
Ears cupping the sea's incoherences,
You house your unnerving head -- God-ball,
Lens of mercies,
Your stooges
Plying their wild cells in my keel's shadow,
Pushing by like hearts,
Red stigmata at the very center,
Riding the rip tide to the nearest point of
departure,

Dragging their Jesus hair.
Did I escape, I wonder?
My mind winds to you
Old barnacled umbilicus, Atlantic cable,
Keeping itself, it seems, in a state of miraculous
repair.

In any case, you are always t...Read more of this...
by Bogan, Louise

Moments Indulgence

...toil in a shoreless sea of toil. 

Today the summer has come at my window with its sighs and murmurs; and 
the bees are plying their minstrelsy at the court of the flowering grove. 

Now it is time to sit quite, face to face with thee, and to sing 
dedication of life in this silent and overflowing leisure...Read more of this...
by Tagore, Rabindranath

My Hour

...Day after day behold me plying
My pen within an office drear;
The dullest dog, till homeward hieing,
Then lo! I reign a king of cheer.
A throne have I of padded leather,
A little court of kiddies three,
A wife who smiles whate'er the weather,
A feast of muffins, jam and tea.

The table cleared, a romping battle,
A fairy tale, a "Children, bed,"
A kiss, a hug, a hush of prattle
(God...Read more of this...
by Service, Robert William

On a Forenoon of Spring

...shine to our circling net 
From the black gunwale; tend these milky kine 
Up their rough path; sit by yon cottage-door 
Plying the diligent thread; take wings and soar-- 
O hark how with the season's laureate 
Joy culminates in song! If such a song were mine!...Read more of this...
by Allingham, William

Preference

...Forms a green arch overhead,
Sits thy rival thoughtful bending
O'er a stand with papers spread­
Motionless, his fingers plying 
That untired, unresting pen; 
Time and tide unnoticed flying, 
There he sits­the first of men ! 
Man of conscience­man of reason; 
Stern, perchance, but ever just; 
Foe to falsehood, wrong, and treason, 
Honour's shield, and virtue's trust ! 
Worker, thinker, firm defender 
Of Heaven's truth­man's liberty; 
Soul of iron­proof to slander, 
Rock where ...Read more of this...
by Bronte, Charlotte

Sonnet CXLVII

...ere its course, nor shifting there,Upon the favouring gale it joys to glide;Plying its wings toward the laurel's pride,In spite of sails or oars, of sea or air.Monarch of floods, magnificent and strong,That meet'st the sun as he leads on the day,But in the west dost quit a fairer light;Thy curvèd course this body wafts along...Read more of this...
by Petrarch, Francesco

The Ballad of the White Horse

...es.

Even so he had watched and wondered,
Knowing neither less nor more,
Till all his lords lay dying,
And axes on axes plying,
Flung him, and drove him flying
Like a pirate to the shore.

Wise he had been before defeat,
And wise before success;
Wise in both hours and ignorant,
Knowing neither more nor less.

As he went down to the river-hut
He knew a night-shade scent,
Owls did as evil cherubs rise,
With little wings and lantern eyes,
As though he sank through the under-skie...Read more of this...
by Chesterton, G K

The Prosperous Voyage

...heaven,
Whilst AEolus loosens
Our anguish-fraught bond.
The zephyrs are sighing,
Alert is the sailor.
Quick! nimbly be plying!
The billows are riven,
The distance approaches;
I see land beyond!

 1795....Read more of this...
by von Goethe, Johann Wolfgang

The Song of the Shirt

...With fingers weary and worn, 
With eyelids heavy and red, 
A woman sat, in unwomanly rags, 
Plying her needle and thread-- 
Stitch! stitch! stitch! 
In poverty, hunger, and dirt, 
And still with a voice of dolorous pitch 
She sang the "Song of the Shirt."

"Work! work! work! 
While the cock is crowing aloof! 
And work — work — work, 
Till the stars shine through the roof! 
It's Oh! to be a slave 
Along with the barbarous Turk, 
Where woman has neve...Read more of this...
by Hood, Thomas

The Song Of The Soldier-Born

...th a soldier's passion.

For I hold as a simple faith there's no denying:
The trade of a soldier's the only trade worth plying;
The death of a soldier's the only death worth dying.

So let me go and leave your safety behind me;
Go to the spaces of hazard where nothing shall bind me;
Go till the word is War -- and then you will find me.

Then you will call me and claim me because you will need me;
Cheer me and gird me and into the battle-wrath speed me. . . .
And when it's ove...Read more of this...
by Service, Robert William

Winter Stores

...wers bloomed round our feet,­
While many a bud of joy before us
Unclosed its petals sweet,­ 

An unseen work within was plying;
Like honey-seeking bee,
From flower to flower, unwearied, flying,
Laboured one faculty,­ 

Thoughtful for Winter's future sorrow,
Its gloom and scarcity;
Prescient to-day, of want to-morrow,
Toiled quiet Memory. 

'Tis she that from each transient pleasure 
Extracts a lasting good;
'Tis she that finds, in summer, treasure 
To serve for winter's food....Read more of this...
by Bronte, Charlotte

Ye Flags of Picadilly

...elf so often
Well away from you and town--

Are the people walking quietly
And steady on their feet,
Cabs and omnibuses plying
Just as usual in the street?

Do the houses look as upright
As of old they used to be,
And does nothing seem affected
By the pitching of the sea?

Through the Green Park iron railings
Do the quick pedestrians pass?
Are the little children playing
Round the plane-tree in the grass?

This squally wild northwester
With which our vessel fights,
Does it me...Read more of this...
by Clough, Arthur Hugh

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