Famous Refusing Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Refusing poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous refusing poems. These examples illustrate what a famous refusing poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Marvell, Andrew
...uld never pierce:
Pitty it seem'd to hurt him more that felt
Each wound himself which he to others delt,
Danger it self refusing to offend
So loose an enemy so fast a freind.
Friendship that sacred versue long das claime
The first foundation of his house and name.
But within one its narrow limitts fall
His tendernesse extended unto all:
And that deep soule through every chanell flows
Where kindly nature loves it self to lose.
More strong affections never reason se...Read more of this...
by
Hughes, Ted
...eyed, challenging, he climbed and with a glare
Of hair on end finally met fear.
His eyes sealed up with shock, refusing to see.
With all his strength he struck. He felt the blow.
Horrified, he fell. ...Read more of this...
by
Wilcox, Ella Wheeler
...that true hero, lover, son and friend
Whose faithful heart in his last choice was shown-
Death with the comrades dear, refusing flight alone.
IV.
He who was born for battle and for strife
Like some caged eagle frets in peaceful life;
So Custer fretted when detained afar
From scenes of stirring action and of war.
And as the captive eagle in delight,
When freedom offers, plumes himself for flight
And soars away to thunder clouds on high,
With palpitating wings...Read more of this...
by
Iqbal, Allama Muhammad
...the air
Pity arose in the fly when heard this flattery
It said 'I wish not to cause you any agony'
The habit of refusing I believe is bad
To break one's heart is in fact bad!
Saying this, it flew from its place
When it came near, the Spider jumped to lay the seize
Hungry was the Spider for many days
But now sitting at home,
The fly was flown to its place!...Read more of this...
by
Whitman, Walt
...o my city;
Day upon day, and year upon year, O city, walking your streets,
Where you hold me enchain’d a certain time, refusing to give me up;
Yet giving to make me glutted, enrich’d of soul—you give me forever faces;
(O I see what I sought to escape, confronting, reversing my cries;
I see my own soul trampling down what it ask’d for.)
2
Keep your splendid, silent sun;
Keep your woods, O Nature, and the quiet places by the woods;
Keep your fields of clover and timo...Read more of this...
by
Jong, Erica
...ing Jew--
WASP that he was--
but with the Jew's
outsider's hunger. . .
face pressed up
to the glass of sex
refusing every passion
but the passion to write
the words grew
more & more complex
& convoluted
until they utterly imprisoned him
in their fairytale brambles.
Language for me
is meant to be
a transparency,
clear water gleaming
under a covered bridge. . .
I love his spiritual sister
because she snatched clarity
from her murky history.
To...Read more of this...
by
Masters, Edgar Lee
...y girls could have married a decent man,
I should not have walked in the rain
And jumped into bed with clothes all wet,
Refusing medical aid....Read more of this...
by
Moore, Marianne
...ou will find
that `a wife is a coffin,'
that severe object
with the pleasing geometry
stipulating space and not people,
refusing to be buried
and uniquely disappointing,
revengefully wrought in the attitude
of an adoring child
to a distinguished parent."
She says, "This butterfly,
this waterfly, this nomad
that has `proposed
to settle on my hand for life.' --
What can one do with it?
There must have been more time
in Shakespeare's day
to sit and watch a play.
You ...Read more of this...
by
Larkin, Philip
...om a bluff the tiny, clear
Sparkling armada of promises draw near.
How slow they are! And how much time they waste,
Refusing to make haste!
Yet still they leave us holding wretched stalks
Of disappointment, for, though nothing balks
Each big approach, leaning with brasswork prinked,
Each rope distinct,
Flagged, and the figurehead wit golden ****
Arching our way, it never anchors; it's
No sooner present than it turns to past.
Right to the last
We think each one will...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...culty or danger, could deter
Me from attempting. Wherefore do I assume
These royalties, and not refuse to reign,
Refusing to accept as great a share
Of hazard as of honour, due alike
To him who reigns, and so much to him due
Of hazard more as he above the rest
High honoured sits? Go, therefore, mighty Powers,
Terror of Heaven, though fallen; intend at home,
While here shall be our home, what best may ease
The present misery, and render Hell
More tolerable; if t...Read more of this...
by
Ashbery, John
..., in the refined, assimilable state.
But what is this universe the porch of
As it veers in and out, back and forth,
Refusing to surround us and still the only
Thing we can see? Love once
Tipped the scales but now is shadowed, invisible,
Though mysteriously present, around somewhere.
But we know it cannot be sandwiched
Between two adjacent moments, that its windings
Lead nowhere except to further tributaries
And that these empty themselves into a vague
Sense of somethi...Read more of this...
by
Tagore, Rabindranath
...
but cruelly thou hidest thyself from before me.
Day by day thou art making me worthy of thy full acceptance by
refusing me ever and anon, saving me from perils of weak, uncertain desire....Read more of this...
by
McGonagall, William Topaz
...shot, and fell to rise no more.
Nothing could be more disastrous to the Prince that day,
Owing to the Macdonalds refusing to join in the deadly fray;
Because if they had all shown their wonted courage that day,
The proud Duke of Cumberland's army would have been forced to run away.
And, owing to the misconduct of the Macdonalds, the Highlanders had to yield,
And General O'Sullivan laid hold of Charles's horse, and led him off the field,
As the whole army was now ...Read more of this...
by
Marvell, Andrew
...ver pierce.
Pity it seemed to hurt him more that felt
Each wound himself which he to others dealt;
Danger itself refusing to offend
So loose an enemy, so fast a friend.
Friendship, that sacred virtue, long does claim
The first foundation of his house and name:
But within one its narrow limits fall,
His tenderness extended unto all.
And that deep soul through every channel flows,
Where kindly nature loves itself to lose.
More strong affections never...Read more of this...
by
Belloc, Hilaire
...r call on the phone;
But nothing breaks the silence,
Of these walls made of stone.
*****
I punish myself,
By refusing to eat:
Depression is silent,
I hear my heart beat.
*****
Where can I go,
Or should I stay:
Shy to choose,
In bed I lay.
*****
Time will pass,
And the dark sets in;
Laying there wishing,
I could still touch your skin.
*****
Lying there hurting,
I wish I could die;
Missing you so much,
Again I start to cry.
*****
Somet...Read more of this...
by
Gregory, Rg
...assion)
she wouldn't talk to him without a tie on
one such occasion burst the bubble
he spoke (no tie on) she demurred
refusing one further word
and so the trouble
piebald went white all over
muttered about being her lover
then shouted in a rage
(nelly whispered be your age)
i - two headed janus -
now pingo your anus
(less janus - i should have thought - than mars)
and pinched the dear frail lady on the ****
who died a second then exploded
swung a punch so loaded
poor old pi...Read more of this...
by
Sandburg, Carl
...o Die
TAKE your fill of intimate remorse, perfumed sorrow,
Over the dead child of a millionaire,
And the pity of Death refusing any check on the bank
Which the millionaire might order his secretary to
scratch off
And get cashed.
Very well,
You for your grief and I for mine.
Let me have a sorrow my own if I want to.
I shall cry over the dead child of a stockyards hunky.
His job is sweeping blood off the floor.
He gets a dollar seventy cents a day when he...Read more of this...
by
Jackson, Laura Riding
...
What they ordain alone
Cannot be known
The ordinary way of eyes and ears
But only prophesied
If an unnatural mind, refusing to divide,
Dies immediately
Of too plain beauty
Foreseen within too suddenly,
And lips break open of astonishment
Upon the living mouth and rehearse
Death, that seems a simple verse
And, of all ways to know,
Dead or alive, easiest....Read more of this...
by
Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...th
To mould it into action pure as theirs.
Fairer thy fate than mine, if life's best end
Be to end well! and thou refusing this,
Unvenerable will thy memory be
While men shall move the lips; but if thou dare‹
Thou, one of these, the race of Cadmus‹then
No stone is fitted in yon marble girth
Whose echo shall not tongue thy glorious doom,
Nor in this pavement but shall ring thy name
To every hoof that clangs it, and the springs
Of Dirce laving yonder battle-plain,...Read more of this...
by
Subraman, Belinda
...with him for two years
and now he is dying.
“Are you in pain, Paul?” I ask.
“I AM pain,” he said.
But he is refusing medication
although his cancer has spread
from his kidneys to his lungs, brain and bones.
Somehow bearing this pain to the grave
is his last act of defiance/bravery/repentance.
My hands are tied.
My job now is to protect his choice
and later as promised
to collect his ashes,
read his poems in my garden
then set him free in the wind
where...Read more of this...
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