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Famous Pursed Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Browning, Robert
...s eye
Askance to watch the working of his lie
On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford
Suppression of the glee, that pursed and scored
Its edge, at one more victim gained thereby.

What else should he be set for, with his staff?
What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare
All travellers who might find him posted there,
And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh
Would break, what crutch 'gin write my epitaph
For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare,

If at...Read more of this...



by Teasdale, Sara
...he pale moon like a petal
 Floats in the pearly dusk of spring,
Come with arms outstretched to take me,
 Come with lips pursed up to cling.

Come, for life is a frail moth flying,
 Caught in the web of the years that pass,
And soon we two, so warm and eager,
 Will be as the gray stones in the grass....Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...bade me keep it as of sovran use
'Gainst all enchantments, mildew blast, or damp,
Or ghastly Furies' apparition.
I pursed it up, but little reckoning made,
Till now that this extremity compelled.
But now I find it true; for by this means
I knew the foul enchanter, though disguised,
Entered the very lime-twigs of his spells,
And yet came off. If you have this about you
(As I will give you when we go), you may
Boldly assault the necromancer's hall;
Where if he be, ...Read more of this...

by Thomas, Dylan
...d,
And, crackling into the air, leave me half-blind.
Neither by night's ancient fear,
The parting of hat from hair,
Pursed lips at the receiver,
Shall I fall to death's feather.
By these I would not care to die,
Half convention and half lie....Read more of this...

by Roethke, Theodore
...r her pretty sake
(But what prodigious mowing did we make.)

Love likes a gander, and adores a goose:
Her full lips pursed, the errant note to seize;
She played it quick, she played it light and loose;
My eyes, they dazzled at her flowing knees;
Her several parts could keep a pure repose,
Or one hip quiver with a mobile nose
(She moved in circles, and those circles moved.)

Let seed be grass, and grass turn into hay:
I'm martyr to a motion not my own;
What's freedom f...Read more of this...



by Browning, Robert
...The moth's kiss, first!
Kiss me as if you made believe
You were not sure, this eve,
How my face, your flower, had pursed
Its petals up; so, here and there
You brush it, till I grow aware
Who wants me, and wide open I burst.

The bee's kiss, now!
Kiss me as if you enter'd gay
My heart at some noonday,
A bud that dares not disallow
The claim, so all is rendered up,
And passively its shattered cup
Over your head to sleep I bow....Read more of this...

by Levine, Philip
...new winds, and I believed
that before I knew it I'd be
swaggering to the candy store
for a Milky Way. M. Degas
pursed his lips, and the room
stilled until the long hand
of the clock moved to twenty one
as though in complicity with Gertrude,
who added confidently, "You've begun
to separate the dark from the dark."
I looked back for help, but now
the trees bucked and quaked, and I
knew this could go on forever....Read more of this...

by Hugo, Victor
...e troopers' bloody grip 
 Was deeply dug, while sharply challenged they: 
 "Were you one of this currish crew?"—pride pursed his lip, 
 As firm as bandog's, brought the bull to bay— 
 While answered he: "I fought with others. Yea!" 
 
 "Prepare then to be shot! Go join that death-doomed row." 
 As paced he pertly past, a volley rang— 
 And as he fell in line, mock mercies once more flow 
 Of man's lead-lightning's sudden scathing pang, 
 But to his home-turned thoug...Read more of this...

by Cummings, Edward Estlin (E E)
...ter wing
strong silent greens serenely lingering 
absolute lights like baths of golden snow.
This is the garden: pursed lips do blow
upon cool flutes within wide glooms and sing
(of harps celestial to the quivering string)
invisible faces hauntingly and slow.

This is the garden. Time shall surely reap
and on Death's blade lie many a flower curled 
in other lands where other songs be sung;
yet stand They here enraptured as among
The slow deep trees per...Read more of this...

by Piercy, Marge
...en seduction itself in college. 
She wriggled through bars like a satin eel, 
her hips and ass promising, her mouth pursed 
in the dark red lipstick of desire. 

She visited in '68 still wearing skirts 
tight to the knees, dark red lipstick, 
while I danced through Manhattan in mini skirt, 
lipstick pale as apricot milk, 
hair loose as a horse's mane. Oh dear, 
I thought in my superiority of the moment, 
whatever has happened to poor Cecile? 
She was out of fashio...Read more of this...

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