Famous Set Up Poems by Famous Poets

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

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There was set before me a mighty hill

by Stephen Crane
 There was set before me a mighty hill,
And long days I climbed
Through regions of snow.
When I had before me the summit-view,
It seemed that my labour
Had been to see gardens
Lying at impossible distances....Read more of this...

He found my Being -- set it up --

by Emily Dickinson
 He found my Being -- set it up --
Adjusted it to place --
Then carved his name -- upon it --
And bade it to the East

Be faithful -- in his absence --
And he would come again --
With Equipage of Amber --
That time -- to take it Home --...Read more of this...

Opening the Geode

by Julie Hill Alger
 When the molten earth seethed 
in its whirling cauldron 
nobody watched the pot 
from a tall wooden stool 
set out in windy space 
beyond flame's reach;

and when the spattering mush 
steamed, gurgled, boiled over, 
mounded up in smoking hills
no giant mixing spoon 
smoothed out the lumps and bubbles 
as the pottage cooled to rock. 

No kitchen timer ticked 
precisely...Read more of this...

The Philosophers

by Barry Tebb
 Lavender musk rose from the volume I was reading through,

The college crest impressed in gold, tooled gold lettering on the spine.

It was not mine but my son’s, jammed in the corner of a cardboard box

With dozens more; just one box of a score, stored in a heap

Across my ex-wife’s floor, our son gone far, as far as Samarkand and...Read more of this...

The Crickets sang

by Emily Dickinson
 The Crickets sang
And set the Sun
And Workmen finished one by one
Their Seam the Day upon.

The low Grass loaded with the Dew
The Twilight stood, as Strangers do
With Hat in Hand, polite and new
To stay as if, or go.

A Vastness, as a Neighbor, came,
A Wisdom, without Face, or Name,
A Peace, as Hemispheres at Home
And so the Night became....Read more of this...

Hiawathas Wooing

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
 "As unto the bow the cord is, 
So unto the man is woman; 
Though she bends him, she obeys him, 
Though she draws him, yet she follows; 
Useless each without the other!"
Thus the youthful Hiawatha 
Said within himself and pondered, 
Much perplexed by various feelings, 
Listless, longing, hoping, fearing, 
Dreaming still of Minnehaha, 
Of the lovely Laughing Water, 
In...Read more of this...

On Love

by Bliss Carman
 TO the assembled folk 
At great St. Kavin’s spoke 
Young Brother Amiel on Christmas Eve; 
I give you joy, my friends, 
That as the round year ends, 
We meet once more for gladness by God’s leave. 

On other festal days 
For penitence or praise 
Or prayer we meet, or fullness of thanksgiving; 
To-night we calendar 
The rising of that...Read more of this...

Hatred of Sin

by William Cowper
 Holy Lord God! I love Thy truth,
Nor dare Thy least commandment slight;
Yet pierced by sin the serpent's tooth,
I mourn the anguish of the bite.

But though the poison lurks within,
Hope bids me still with patience wait;
Till death shall set me free from sin,
Free from the only thing I hate.

Had I a throne above the rest,
Where angels and archangels dwell,
One sin,...Read more of this...

Baby Tortoise

by D. H. Lawrence
 You know what it is to be born alone,
Baby tortoise!
The first day to heave your feet little by little from the shell,
Not yet awake,
And remain lapsed on earth,
Not quite alive.

A tiny, fragile, half-animate bean.

To open your tiny beak-mouth, that looks as if it would never open,

Like some iron door;
To lift the upper hawk-beak from the lower base
And reach your...Read more of this...

The Building

by Philip Larkin
 Higher than the handsomest hotel
The lucent comb shows up for miles, but see,
All round it close-ribbed streets rise and fall
Like a great sigh out of the last century.
The porters are scruffy; what keep drawing up
At the entrance are not taxis; and in the hall
As well as creepers hangs a frightening smell.

There are paperbacks, and tea at so much a...Read more of this...

The Revenge Of Hamish

by Sidney Lanier
 It was three slim does and a ten-tined buck in the bracken lay;
And all of a sudden the sinister smell of a man,
Awaft on a wind-shift, wavered and ran
Down the hill-side and sifted along through the bracken and passed that way.

Then Nan got a-tremble at nostril; she was the daintiest doe;
In the print of her velvet flank on the...Read more of this...

Kingdom of Love

by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
 In the dawn of the day when the sea and the earth
Reflected the sunrise above,
I set forth with a heart full of courage and mirth
To seek for the Kingdom of Love.
I asked of a Poet I met on the way
Which cross-road would lead me aright.
And he said: "Follow me, and not long you shall see
Its glittering turrets of light."...Read more of this...

Sonnet 88: When thou shalt be disposed to set me light

by William Shakespeare
 When thou shalt be disposed to set me light
And place my merit in the eye of scorn,
Upon thy side, against myself I'll fight,
And prove thee virtuous, though thou art forsworn.
With mine own weakness being best acquainted,
Upon thy part I can set down a story
Of faults concealed, wherein I am attainted,
That thou in losing me shalt win much glory.
And I...Read more of this...

284. Song—Ca' the Yowes to the Knowes (older set)

by Robert Burns
 Chorus.—Ca’ the yowes to the knowes,
Ca’ them where the heather grows,
Ca’ them where the burnie rowes,
 My bonie dearie


AS I gaed down the water-side,
There I met my shepherd lad:
He row’d me sweetly in his plaid,
 And he ca’d me his dearie.
 Ca’ the yowes, &c.


Will ye gang down the water-side,
And see the waves sae sweetly glide
Beneath the hazels spreading...Read more of this...

To Robin Goodfellow

by Eugene Field
 I see you, Maister Bawsy-brown,
Through yonder lattice creepin';
You come for cream and to gar me dream,
But you dinna find me sleepin'.
The moonbeam, that upon the floor
Wi' crickets ben a-jinkin',
Now steals away fra' her bonnie play--
Wi' a rosier blie, I'm thinkin'.

I saw you, Maister Bawsy-brown,
When the blue bells went a-ringin'
For the merrie fays o' the banks an' braes,
And I kenned...Read more of this...

It was not death for I stood up

by Emily Dickinson
It was not death, for I stood up,
And all the dead lie down;
It was not night, for all the bells
Put out their tongues, for noon.

It was not frost, for on my flesh
I felt siroccos crawl,--
Nor fire, for just my marble feet
Could keep a chancel cool.

And yet it tasted like them all;
The figures I have seen
Set orderly, for burial,
Reminded me of...Read more of this...

A Minor Poet

by Amy Levy
 "What should such fellows as I do,
Crawling between earth and heaven?"


Here is the phial; here I turn the key
Sharp in the lock. Click!--there's no doubt it turned.
This is the third time; there is luck in threes--
Queen Luck, that rules the world, befriend me now
And freely I'll forgive you many wrongs!
Just as the draught began to work, first time,
Tom Leigh,...Read more of this...

A Pastoral Upon The Birth Of Prince Charles:presented To The King And Set By Mr Nic. Laniere

by Robert Herrick
 A PASTORAL UPON THE BIRTH OF PRINCE CHARLES:
PRESENTED TO THE KING, AND SET BY MR NIC. LANIERE

THE SPEAKERS: MIRTILLO, AMINTAS, AND AMARILLIS

AMIN. Good day, Mirtillo. MIRT. And to you no less;
And all fair signs lead on our shepherdess.
AMAR. With all white luck to you. MIRT. But say,
What news
Stirs in our sheep-walk? AMIN. None, save that my
ewes,
My wethers, lambs, and...Read more of this...

Morning Song

by Sylvia Plath
Love set you going like a fat gold watch.
The midwife slapped your footsoles, and your bald cry
Took its place among the elements.

Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue.
In a drafty museum, your nakedness
Shadows our safety. We stand round blankly as walls.

I'm no more your mother
Than the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slow
Effacement at the wind's...Read more of this...

When I Set Out For Lyonnesse

by Thomas Hardy
 When I set out for Lyonnesse,
A hundred miles away,
The rime was on the spray,
And starlight lit my lonesomeness
When I set out for Lyonnesse
A hundred miles away.

What would bechance at Lyonnesse
While I should sojourn there
No prophet durst declare,
Nor did the wisest wizard guess
What would bechance at Lyonnesse
While I should sojourn there.

When I came back from Lyonnesse
With magic in my eyes,
All...Read more of this...

So set its Sun in Thee

by Emily Dickinson
 So set its Sun in Thee
What Day be dark to me --
What Distance -- far --
So I the Ships may see
That touch -- how seldomly --
Thy Shore?...Read more of this...

In Allah's name, say, wherefore set the wise

by Omar Khayyam
In Allah's name, say, wherefore set the wise
Their hearts upon this house of vanities?
Whene'er they think to rest them from their toils,
Death takes them by the hand, and says, «Arise.»...Read more of this...

Youve seen Balloons set -- Havent You?

by Emily Dickinson
 You've seen Balloons set -- Haven't You?
So stately they ascend --
It is as Swans -- discarded You,
For Duties Diamond --

Their Liquid Feet go softly out
Upon a Sea of Blonde --
They spurn the Air, as t'were too mean
For Creatures so renowned --

Their Ribbons just beyond the eye --
They struggle -- some -- for Breath --
And yet the Crowd applaud, below...Read more of this...

Sonnet 83: I never saw that you did painting need

by William Shakespeare
 I never saw that you did painting need,
And therefore to your fair no painting set;
I found, or thought I found, you did exceed
That barren tender of a poet's debt;
And therefore have I slept in your report,
That you yourself being extant well might show
How far a modern quill doth come too short,
Speaking of worth, what worth in you doth grow.
This...Read more of this...

The Sun Has Set

by Emily Brontë
 The sun has set, and the long grass now 
Waves dreamily in the evening wind; 
And the wild bird has flown from that old gray stone 
In some warm nook a couch to find.

In all the lonely landscape round 
I see no light and hear no sound, 
Except the wind that far away 
Come sighing o'er the healthy sea....Read more of this...

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