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Famous Replies Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Dryden, John
...so when Hell's dire agent found,
While fainting virtue scarce maintain'd her ground,
He pours fresh forces in, and thus replies:

Th'eternal God, supremely good and wise,
Imparts not these prodigious gifts in vain;
What wonders are reserv'd to bless your reign?
Against your will your arguments have shown,
Such virtue's only giv'n to guide a throne.
Not that your father's mildness I contemn;
But manly force becomes the diadem.
'Tis true, he grants the people all they c...Read more of this...



by Yeats, William Butler
...I

I walk through the long schoolroom questioning;
A kind old nun in a white hood replies;
The children learn to cipher and to sing,
To study reading-books and histories,
To cut and sew, be neat in everything
In the best modern way - the children's eyes
In momentary wonder stare upon
A sixty-year-old smiling public man.

 II

I dream of a Ledaean body, bent
Above a sinking fire. a tale that she
Told of a harsh reproof, or trivial ...Read more of this...

by Blake, William
...reasons
Are the fruits of the two seasons.
The questioner who sits so sly
Shall never know how to reply.
He who replies to words of doubt
Doth put the light of knowledge out.
The strongest poison ever known
Came from Caesar's laurel crown.
Nought can deform the human race
Like to the armour's iron brace.
When gold and gems adorn the plough
To peaceful arts shall Envy bow.
A riddle or the cricket's cry
Is to doubt a fit reply.
The emmet's inch and e...Read more of this...

by Browning, Robert
...bility 
For joy, spread round about us, meant for us, 
Inviting us; and still the soul craves all, 
And still the flesh replies, "Take no jot more 
Than ere thou clombst the tower to look abroad! 
Nay, so much less as that fatigue has brought 
Deduction to it." We struggle, fain to enlarge 
Our bounded physical recipiency, 
Increase our power, supply fresh oil to life, 
Repair the waste of age and sickness: no, 
It skills not! life's inadequate to joy, 
As the soul sees j...Read more of this...

by Wilcox, Ella Wheeler
...
And places her at wondering Custer's side, 
Invoking choicest blessings on the bride
And all unwilling groom, who thus replies.
'Fair is the Indian maid, with bright bewildering eyes, 



XXVIII.
'But fairer still is one who, year on year, 
Has borne man's burdens, conquered woman's fear; 
And at my side rode mile on weary mile, 
And faced all deaths, all dangers, with a smile, 
Wise as Minerva, as Diana brave, 
Is she whom generous gods in kindness gave
To share the...Read more of this...



by Shakespeare, William
...r clamorous cry till they have singled 
With much ado the cold fault cleanly out;
Then do they spend their mouths: Echo replies,
As if another chase were in the skies.

"By this, poor Wat, far off upon a hill,
Stands on his hinder legs with listening ear,
To hearken if his foes pursue him still:
Anon their loud alarums he doth hear;
And now his grief may be compared well
To one sore sick that hears the passing-bell.

"Then shalt thou see the dew-bedabbled wretch
Turn,...Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...is mine; thy kitchen-knave am I, 
And mighty through thy meats and drinks am I." 
Then Arthur all at once gone mad replies, 
"Go therefore," and so gives the quest to him-- 
Him--here--a villain fitter to stick swine 
Than ride abroad redressing women's wrong, 
Or sit beside a noble gentlewoman.' 

Then half-ashamed and part-amazed, the lord 
Now looked at one and now at other, left 
The damsel by the peacock in his pride, 
And, seating Gareth at another board, 
Sat ...Read more of this...

by Walker, Alice
...t from being frantic
and alone?


'How long does it take you to love someone?'
I ask her.
'A hot second,' she replies.
'And how long do you love them?'
'Oh, anywhere up to several months.'
'And how long does it take you
to get over loving them?'
'Three weeks,' she said, 'tops.'


Did I mention I am also
turning gray?
It is because I *adore* this woman
who thinks of love
in this way. ...Read more of this...

by Nash, Ogden
...ut to asphyxiate
or drown,
And she says Quick get up and get my hairbrushes off the
windowsill, it's raining in, and he replies Oh they're all right,

it's only raining straight down.
That is why marriage is so much more interesting than divorce,
Because it's the only known example of the happy meeting of
the immovable object and the irresistible force.
So I hope husbands and wives will continue to debate and
combat over everything debatable and combatable,
Because I ...Read more of this...

by Alighieri, Dante
...er, like a small and distant star, 
 A beacon answered. 
 "What before us lies? 
 Who signals our approach, and who replies?" 
 I asked, and answered he who all things knew, 
 "Already, if the swamp's dank fumes permit, 
 The outcome of their beacon shows in view, 
 Severing the liquid filth." 
 No shaft can slit 
 Impalpable air, from any corded bow, 
 As came that craft towards us, cleaving so, 
 And with incredible speed, the miry wave. 
 To where we paused its...Read more of this...

by Moore, Marianne
...;
equally positive in demanding a commotion
and in stipulating quiet:
"I should like to be alone;"
to which the visitor replies,
"I should like to be alone;
why not be alone together?"
Below the incandescent stars
below the incandescent fruit,
the strange experience of beauty;
its existence is too much;
it tears one to pieces
and each fresh wave of consciousness
is poison.
"See her, see her in this common world,"
the central flaw
in that first crystal-fine experiment,
thi...Read more of this...

by Southey, Robert
...ed to die.


XVIII.

"Curse the hat!" he exclaims. "Nay come on and first hide
"The dead body," his comrade replies.
She beheld them in safety pass on by her side,
She seizes the hat, fear her courage supplied,
And fast thro' the Abbey she flies.


XIX.

She ran with wild speed, she rush'd in at the door,
She gazed horribly eager around,
Then her limbs could support their faint burthen no more,
And exhausted and breathless she sunk on the floor
Unable ...Read more of this...

by Housman, A E
...lads and dead and rotten; 
None that go return again. 

Far the calling bugles hollo, 
High the screaming fife replies, 
Gay the files of scarlet follow: 
Woman bore me, I will rise.
...Read more of this...

by Byron, George (Lord)
...-sheathed ataghan;
The foremost of the band is seen
An emir by his garb of green:
‘Ho! Who art thou?’ - ‘This low salam
Replies of Moslem faith I am.’
‘The burden ye so gently bear,
Seems one that claims your utmost care,
And, doubtless, holds some precious freight,
My humble bark would gladly wait.’


‘Thou speakest sooth; they skiff unmoor,
And waft us from the silent shore;
Nay, leave the sail still furled, and ply
The nearest oar that’s scattered by,
And midway to...Read more of this...

by Hughes, Ted
...ke a gold doubloon. 
The harvest moon has come,
Booming softly through heaven, like a bassoon.
And the earth replies all night, like a deep drum. 

So people can't sleep,
So they go out where elms and oak trees keep
A kneeling vigil, in a religious hush.
The harvest moon has come! 

And all the moonlit cows and all the sheep
Stare up at her petrified, while she swells
Filling heaven, as if red hot, and sailing
Closer and closer like the end of the...Read more of this...

by Thompson, Francis
...which I strayed
In face of Man or Maid.
But still within the little childrens' eyes
Seems something, something that replies,
They at least are for me, surely for me.
But just as their young eyes grew sudden fair,
With dawning answers there,
Their angel plucked them from me by the hair.
Come then, ye other children, Nature's
Share with me, said I, your delicate fellowship.
Let me greet you lip to lip,
Let me twine with you caresses,
Wantoning with our Lady Moth...Read more of this...

by Byron, George (Lord)
...of death; 
Fast whirl the fragments from the wall, 
Which crumbles with the ponderous ball; 
And from that wall the foe replies, 
O'er dusty plain and smoky skies, 
With fires that answer fast and well 
The summons of the Infidel. 

III. 

But near and nearest to the wall 
Of those who wish and work its fall, 
With deeper skill in war's black art 
Than Othman's sons, and high of heart 
As any chief that ever stood 
Triumphant in the fields of blood; 
From post to post...Read more of this...

by Carroll, Lewis
...e was anything but clear,
And most unpleasantly severe;
Her epithets were very *****. 

"And yet, so grand were her replies,
I could not choose but deem her wise;
I did not dare to criticise; 

"Nor did I leave her, till she went
So deep in tangled argument
That all my powers of thought were spent." 

A little whisper inly slid,
"Yet truth is truth: you know you did."
A little wink beneath the lid. 

And, sickened with excess of dread,
Prone to the dust he ben...Read more of this...

by Alighieri, Dante
...,
‘who comes here to seduce our intellect?
Is his power so great we must reject
every other intellectual art?
The heart replies ‘O, meditative mind
this is love’s messenger and newly sent
to bring me all Love’s words and desires.
His life, and all the strength that he can find,
from her sweet eyes are mercifully lent,
who feels compassion for our inner fires.’...Read more of this...

by Shakespeare, William
...'Gainst venom'd sores the only sovereign plaster;
And here she meets another sadly scowling,
To whom she speaks, and he replies with howling.

When he hath ceas'd his ill-resounding noise,
Another flap-mouth'd mourner, black and grim,
Against the welkin volleys out his voice;
Another, and another, answer him,
Clapping their proud tails to the ground below,
Shaking their scratch'd ears, bleeding as they go.

Look, how the world's poor people are amazed
At apparitions, ...Read more of this...

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Book: Reflection on the Important Things