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Famous Points Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Shelley, Percy Bysshe
...Poet's blood,
That ever beat in mystic sympathy
With Nature's ebb and flow, grew feebler still;
And when two lessening points of light alone
Gleamed through the darkness, the alternate gasp
Of his faint respiration scarce did stir
The stagnate night:--till the minutest ray
Was quenched, the pulse yet lingered in his heart.
It paused--it fluttered. But when heaven remained
Utterly black, the murky shades involved 
An image silent, cold, and motionless,
As their own vo...Read more of this...



by Whitman, Walt
...e, free commerce, fisheries, whaling, gold-digging,
Wharf-hemm’d cities, railroad and steamboat lines, intersecting all points, 
Factories, mercantile life, labor-saving machinery, the north-east, north-west,
 south-west, 
Manhattan firemen, the Yankee swap, southern plantation life, 
Slavery—the murderous, treacherous conspiracy to raise it upon the ruins of all the
 rest; 
On and on to the grapple with it—Assassin! then your life or ours be the
 stake—and
 respite no more.<...Read more of this...

by Browning, Robert
...e and exclusive in its terms, 
To suit the world which gives us the good things. 
In every man's career are certain points 
Whereon he dares not be indifferent; 
The world detects him clearly, if he dare, 
As baffled at the game, and losing life. 
He may care little or he may care much 
For riches, honour, pleasure, work, repose, 
Since various theories of life and life's 
Success are extant which might easily 
Comport with either estimate of these; 
And whoso chooses...Read more of this...

by Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns)
...man and woman
And that of beasts. Feet rising and falling.
Eating and drinking. Dung and death.

 Dawn points, and another day
Prepares for heat and silence. Out at sea the dawn wind
Wrinkles and slides. I am here
Or there, or elsewhere. In my beginning.


II

What is the late November doing
With the disturbance of the spring
And creatures of the summer heat,
And snowdrops writhing under feet
And hollyhocks that aim too high
Red into grey and ...Read more of this...

by Ammons, A R
...reest
  "medium" should
  accept the firmest order)

and that
order
   diminishes toward the
periphery
 allowing at the points of contact
  entropy equal to entropy....Read more of this...



by Marvell, Andrew
...g, then 
The House of Commons clattering like the men. 
Describe the Court and Country, both set right 
On opp'site points, the black against the white. 
Those having lost the nation at tric-trac, 
These now adventuring how to win it back. 
The dice betwixt them must the fate divide 
(As chance doth still in multitudes decide). 
But here the Court does its advantage know, 
For the cheat Turner for them both must throw. 
As some from boxes, he so from the c...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...s to let reign, 
One over all with unsucceeded power. 
Shalt thou give law to God? shalt thou dispute 
With him the points of liberty, who made 
Thee what thou art, and formed the Powers of Heaven 
Such as he pleased, and circumscribed their being? 
Yet, by experience taught, we know how good, 
And of our good and of our dignity 
How provident he is; how far from thought 
To make us less, bent rather to exalt 
Our happy state, under one head more near 
United. But to ...Read more of this...

by Ashbery, John
...
"Gentleman," the Borghese "Young Prelate" and
The Naples "Antea" issue from Mannerist
Tensions, but here, as Freedberg points out,
The surprise, the tension are in the concept
Rather than its realization.
The consonance of the High Renaissance
Is present, though distorted by the mirror.
What is novel is the extreme care in rendering
The velleities of the rounded reflecting surface
(It is the first mirror portrait),
So that you could be fooled for a moment
Before you ...Read more of this...

by Browning, Robert
...woman's.
And under her brow, like a snail's horns newly
Come out as after the rain he paces,
Two unmistakeable eye-points duly
Live and aware looked out of their places.
So, we went and found Jacynth at the entry
Of the lady's chamber standing sentry;
I told the command and produced my companion,
And Jacynth rejoiced to admit any one,
For since last night, by the same token,
Not a single word had the lady spoken:
They went in both to the presence together,
While I in...Read more of this...

by Aiken, Conrad
...uld forget—
No matter where I go, how soft I tread,
This windy gesture menaces me with death.
Fatigue! it says, and points its finger at me;
Touches my throat and stops my breath.

My fans—my jewels—the portrait of my husband—
The torn certificate for my daughter's grave—
These are but mortal seconds in immortal time.
They brush me, fade away: like drops of water.
They signify no crime.

Let us retrace our steps: I have deceived you:
Nothing is here I coul...Read more of this...

by Scott, Sir Walter
...iest name was there,
     Had more of blasphemy than prayer.
     But when he shook above the crowd
     Its kindled points, he spoke aloud:—
     'Woe to the wretch who fails to rear
     At this dread sign the ready spear!
     For, as the flames this symbol sear,
     His home, the refuge of his fear,
          A kindred fate shall know;
     Far o'er its roof the volumed flame
     Clan-Alpine's vengeance shall proclaim,
     While maids and matrons on his name...Read more of this...

by Plath, Sylvia
...ky ----
Eight great tongues affirming the Resurrection
At the end, they soberly bong out their names.

The yew tree points up, it has a Gothic shape.
The eyes lift after it and find the moon.
The moon is my mother. She is not sweet like Mary.
Her blue garments unloose small bats and owls.
How I would like to believe in tenderness ----
The face of the effigy, gentled by candles,
Bending, on me in particular, its mild eyes.

I have fallen a long way....Read more of this...

by Pope, Alexander
...ndly interpos'd; 
Fate urg'd the Sheers, and cut the Sylph in twain,
(But Airy Substance soon unites again)
The meeting Points that sacred Hair dissever
From the fair Head, for ever and for ever!

Then flash'd the living Lightnings from her Eyes,
And Screams of Horror rend th' affrighted Skies.
Not louder Shrieks to pitying Heav'n are cast,
When Husbands or when Lap-dogs breath their last,
Or when rich China Vessels, fal'n from high,
In glittring Dust and painted Fragment...Read more of this...

by Wordsworth, William
...gher than a two years' child  It stands erect this aged thorn;  No leaves it has, no thorny points;  It is a mass of knotted joints,  A wretched thing forlorn.  It stands erect, and like a stone  With lichens it is overgrown. II.   Like rock or stone, it is o'ergrown  With lichens to the very top,  And hung with heavy tufts of moss,...Read more of this...

by Byron, George (Lord)
...freedom with which saints, angels, and spiritual persons discourse in this 'Vision.' But, for precedents upon such points, I must refer him to Fielding's 'Journey from the World to the next,' and to the Visions of myself, the said Quevedo, in Spanish or translated. The reader is also requested to observe, that no doctrinal tenets are insisted upon or discussed; that the person of the Deity is carefully withheld from sight, which is more than can be said for the Laure...Read more of this...

by Schiller, Friedrich von
...stately and beauteous appear.
All gives token of rule and choice, and all has its meaning,--
'Tis this uniform plan points out the Ruler to me.
Brightly the glittering domes in far-away distance proclaim him.
Out of the kernel of rocks rises the city's high wall.
Into the desert without, the fauns of the forest are driven,
But by devotion is lent life more sublime to the stone.
Man is brought into nearer union with man, and around him
Closer, more actively...Read more of this...

by Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns)
...m enclosed.
Footsteps shuffled on the stair.
Under the firelight, under the brush, her hair
Spread out in fiery points
Glowed into words, then would be savagely still. 
 "My nerves are bad to-night. Yes, bad. Stay with me.
"Speak to me. Why do you never speak. Speak.
 "What are you thinking of? What thinking? What?
"I never know what you are thinking. Think."
 I think we are in rats' alley
Where the dead men lost their bones.
 "...Read more of this...

by Miller, Alice Duer
...the only people 
Who licked them not only once, but twice. 
Never forget it-that's my advice. 
They have their points—they're honest and brave,
Loyal and sure—as sure as the grave; 
They make other nations seem pale and flighty, 
But they do think England is god almighty, 
And you must remind them now and then 
That other countries breed other men. 
From all of which you will think me rather 
Unjust. I am. Your devoted Father. 

XXVI 
I read, and saw ...Read more of this...

by Swift, Jonathan
...man breast:
"In all distresses of our friends,
We first consult our private ends;
While nature, kindly bent to ease us,
Points out some circumstance to please us."

If this perhaps your patience move,
Let reason and experience prove.
We all behold with envious eyes
Our equal raised above our size.
Who would not at a crowded show
Stand high himself, keep others low?
I love my friend as well as you:
But why should he obstruct my view?
Then let me have the higher pos...Read more of this...

by Byron, George (Lord)
...k of happiness 5 
Are driven o'er the shoals of guilt or ocean of excess: 
The magnet of their course is gone or only points in vain 
The shore to which their shiver'd sail shall never stretch again. 

Then the mortal coldness of the soul like death itself comes down; 
It cannot feel for others' woes it dare not dream its own; 10 
That heavy chill has frozen o'er the fountain of our tears  
And though the eye may sparkle still 'tis where the ice appears. 

T...Read more of this...

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Book: Shattered Sighs