Famous Presence Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Presence poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous presence poems. These examples illustrate what a famous presence poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
ALL things give token of thee!
As soon as the bright sun is shining,
Thou too wilt follow, I trust.
When in the garden thou walk'st,
Thou then art the rose of all roses,
Lily of lilies as well.
When thou dost move in the dance,
Then each constellation moves also;
With thee and round thee they move.
Night! oh, what bliss were the night!
For then thou o'ershadow'st...Read more of this...
by
Rainer Maria Rilke
O trees of life, oh, what when winter comes?
We are not of one mind. Are not like birds
in unison migrating. And overtaken,
overdue, we thrust ourselves into the wind
and fall to earth into indifferent ponds.
Blossoming and withering we comprehend as one.
And somewhere lions roam, quite unaware,
in their magnificence, of any weaknesss.
But we, while wholly concentrating on one thing,
already feel the...Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
A maiden wept and, as a comforter,
Came one who cried, "I love thee," and he seized
Her in his arms and kissed her with hot breath,
That dried the tears upon her flaming cheeks.
While evermore his boldly blazing eye
Burned into hers; but she uncomforted
Shrank from his arms and only wept the more.
Then one came and gazed mutely in her face
With wide and...Read more of this...
by
Algernon Charles Swinburne
Send the stars light, but send not love to me.
Shelley.
I
Out of the dawning heavens that hear
Young wings and feet of the new year
Move through their twilight, and shed round
Soft showers of sound,
Soothing the season with sweet rain,
If greeting come to make me fain,
What is it I can send again?
2
I know not if the year shall send
Tidings to usward as...Read more of this...
by
Robert Herrick
Chorus.
What sweeter music can we bring,
Than a Carol, for to sing
The Birth of this our heavenly King?
Awake the Voice! Awake the String!
Heart, Ear, and Eye, and every thing
Awake! the while the active Finger
Runs division with the Singer.
From the Flourish they came to the Song.
Voice 1:
Dark and dull night, fly hence away,
And give...Read more of this...
by
Elizabeth Bishop
At four o'clock
in the gun-metal blue dark
we hear the first crow of the first cock
just below
the gun-metal blue window
and immediately there is an echo
off in the distance,
then one from the backyard fence,
then one, with horrible insistence,
grates like a wet match
from the broccoli patch,
flares,and all over town begins to catch.
Cries galore
come from the water-closet door,
from the dropping-plastered henhouse floor,
where...Read more of this...
by
Hafez
Peace, for whose presence did we erewhile call
With cry sincere, vowing (God knoweth, those
Prótests how passionate were) to love thee all,
Yet when thou camest, pander’d to thy foes
Weaklier than ever, now again the throes
Convulse our being; now, Peace, may’st thou see,
This lust-devoted land is not for thee.
Farewell! Small wonder is it if thou flee
Such faithlessness, yet doth thy memory still
Dwell...Read more of this...
by
D. H. Lawrence
I wonder, can the night go by;
Can this shot arrow of travel fly
Shaft-golden with light, sheer into the sky
Of a dawned to-morrow,
Without ever sleep delivering us
From each other, or loosing the dolorous
Unfruitful sorrow!
What is it then that you can see
That at the window endlessly
You watch the red sparks whirl and flee
And...Read more of this...
by
Edmund Spenser
VNquiet thought, whom at the first I bred,
Of th'inward bale of my loue pined hart:
and sithens haue with sighes and sorrowes fed,
till greater then my wombe thou woxen art.
Breake forth at length out of the inner part,
in which thou lurkest lyke to vipers brood:
and seeke some succour both to ease my smart
and also to sustayne thy selfe with food.
But...Read more of this...
by
Andrew Marvell
Luxurious Man, to bring his Vice in use,
Did after him the World seduce:
And from the Fields the Flow'rs and Plants allure,
Where Nature was most plain and pure.
He first enclos'd within the Gardens square
A dead and standing pool of Air:
And a more luscious Earth for them did knead,
Which stupifi'd them while it fed.
The Pink grew then as double as his...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
The flowers are in blossom, O cupbearer! bring wine.
Leave thy acts of worship, O cupbearer! Ere the angel
of death put a watch upon us, come, and with a cup of
ruby wine in hand, let us rejoice while yet there are
some days with the sweet presence of the friend [the
Divinity]....Read more of this...
by
Isaac Watts
Now I 'm convinced the Lord is kind
To men of heart sincere;
Yet once my foolish thoughts repined,
And bordered on despair.
I grieved to see the wicked thrive,
And spoke with angry breath,
"How pleasant and profane they live !
How peaceful is their death !
"With well-fed flesh and haughty eyes,
They lay their fears to sleep;
Against the heav'ns their slanders rise,
While saints in silence...Read more of this...
by
Anne Sexton
The summer sun ray
shifts through a suspicious tree.
though I walk through the valley of the shadow
It sucks the air
and looks around for me.
The grass speaks.
I hear green chanting all day.
I will fear no evil, fear no evil
The blades extend
and reach my way.
The sky breaks.
It sags and breathes upon my face.
In the presence of mine enemies, mine enemies
The world is...Read more of this...
by
Jean Delville
Becalmed the profane noise of the crowd.
Toward the risen Moon, the symbolic Bronzes
Curve, in the blue night, their antique nudity
In the sphinx-like majesty of attitudes.
A dream of incense symphonies the lustral Lake,
Enchanted by the sidereal presence of Swans,
Elegiacally swooning their silver-pale lines,
Beneath the sacred music of astral infinitude.
Drunken with silence, the aching lawns
Grow languid in the brightness of calm reveries;
Amid...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Some say goodnight -- at night --
I say goodnight by day --
Good-bye -- the Going utter me --
Goodnight, I still reply --
For parting, that is night,
And presence, simply dawn --
Itself, the purple on the height
Denominated morn....Read more of this...
by
William Cullen Bryant
HOW shall I know thee in the sphere which keeps
The disembodied spirits of the dead
When all of thee that time could wither sleeps
And perishes among the dust we tread?
For I shall feel the sting of ceaseless pain 5
If there I meet thy gentle presence not;
Nor hear the voice I love nor read again...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
He outstripped Time with but a Bout,
He outstripped Stars and Sun
And then, unjaded, challenged God
In presence of the Throne.
And He and He in mighty List
Unto this present, run,
The larger Glory for the less
A just sufficient Ring....Read more of this...
by
Friedrich von Schiller
Does pleasant spring return once more?
Does earth her happy youth regain?
Sweet suns green hills are shining o'er;
Soft brooklets burst their icy chain:
Upon the blue translucent river
Laughs down an all-unclouded day,
The winged west winds gently quiver,
The buds are bursting from the spray;
While birds are blithe on every tree;
The Oread from the mountain-shore
Sighs, "Lo! thy flowers come back to thee--
Thy child,...Read more of this...
by
William Topaz McGonagall
Ye sons of Germany, your noble Emperor William now is dead.
Who oft great armies to battle hath led;
He was a man beloved by his subjects all,
Because he never tried them to enthral.
The people of Germany have cause now to mourn,
The loss of their hero, who to them will ne'er return;
But his soul I hope to Heaven has fled...Read more of this...
by
Pablo Neruda
Thinking, tangling shadows in the deep solitude.
You are far away too, oh farther than anyone.
Thinking, freeing birds, dissolving images,
burying lamps.
Belfry of fogs, how far away, up there!
Stifling laments, milling shadowy hopes,
taciturn miller,
night falls on you face downward, far from the city.
Your presence is foreign, as strange to me as a thing.
I think, I explore great tracts of my life...Read more of this...
by
Isaac Watts
v.1,3,5-7,11
C. M.
Christ's incarnation, and the last judgment.
Ye islands of the northern sea,
Rejoice, the Savior reigns;
His word, like fire, prepares his way,
And mountains melt to plains.
His presence sinks the proudest hills,
And makes the valleys rise;
The humble soul enjoys his smiles,
The haughty sinner dies.
The heav'ns his rightful power proclaim,
The idol-gods around
Fill their own worshippers with shame,
And totter to the ground.
Adoring...Read more of this...
by
Friedrich von Schiller
Ah! happy he, upon whose birth each god
Looks down in love, whose earliest sleep the bright
Idalia cradles, whose young lips the rod
Of eloquent Hermes kindles--to whose eyes,
Scarce wakened yet, Apollo steals in light,
While on imperial brows Jove sets the seal of might!
Godlike the lot ordained for him to share,
He wins the garland ere he runs the race;
He learns life's...Read more of this...
by
Christopher Marlowe
1 On Hellespont, guilty of true love's blood,
2 In view and opposite two cities stood,
3 Sea-borderers, disjoin'd by Neptune's might;
4 The one Abydos, the other Sestos hight.
5 At Sestos Hero dwelt; Hero the fair,
6 Whom young Apollo courted for her hair,
7 And offer'd as a dower his burning throne,
8 Where she could sit for men to gaze upon.
9 The...Read more of this...
by
Robert Creeley
1)
Sleeping birds, lead me,
soft birds, be me
inside this black room,
back of the white moon.
In the dark night
sight frightens me.
2)
Who is it nuzzles there
with furred, round headed stare?
Who, perched on the skin,
body's float, is holding on?
What other one stares still,
plays still, on and on?
3)
Stand upright, prehensile,
squat, determined,
small guardians of the painful
outside coming in --
in stuck in vials with needles,
bleeding life...Read more of this...
by
Isaac Watts
Governing power and goodness; or, Our graces tried by afflictions.
Sing, all ye nations, to the Lord,
Sing with a joyful noise;
With melody of sound record
His honors and your joys.
Say to the Power that shakes the sky,
"How terrible art thou!
Sinners before thy presence fly,
Or at thy feet they bow."
[Come, see the wonders of our God,
How glorious are his ways!
In Moses' hand...Read more of this...
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