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Famous Sights Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Shakespeare, William
..., 'twas beautiful and hard,
Whereto his invised properties did tend;
The deep-green emerald, in whose fresh regard
Weak sights their sickly radiance do amend;
The heaven-hued sapphire and the opal blend
With objects manifold: each several stone,
With wit well blazon'd, smiled or made some moan.

''Lo, all these trophies of affections hot,
Of pensived and subdued desires the tender,
Nature hath charged me that I hoard them not,
But yield them up where I myself must render,...Read more of this...



by Whitman, Walt
...ng native persons—the increasing density there—the
 habitans,
 friendly, threatening, ironical, scorning invaders; 
All sights, South, North, East—all deeds, promiscuously done at all times, 
All characters, movements, growths—a few noticed, myriads unnoticed, 
Through Mannahatta’s streets I walking, these things gathering;
On interior rivers, by night, in the glare of pine knots, steamboats wooding up; 
Sunlight by day on the valley of the Susquehanna, and on the valleys of ...Read more of this...

by Sidney, Sir Philip
...losde-vp sence
Was held, in opend sense it flies away,
Leauing me nought but wayling eloquence.
I, seeing better sights in sights decay,
Cald it anew, and wooed Sleepe again;
But him, her host, that vnkind guest had slain. 
XXXIX 

Come, Sleepe! O Sleepe, the certaine knot of peace,
The baiting-place of wit, the balme of woe,
The poor mans wealth, the prisoners release,
Th' indifferent iudge betweene the high and low!
With shield of proofe shield me from o...Read more of this...

by Browning, Robert
...ne star, its chrysolite!

XXXVIII.

We two stood there with never a third,
But each by each, as each knew well:
The sights we saw and the sounds we heard,
The lights and the shades made up a spell
Till the trouble grew and stirred.

XXXIX.

Oh, the little more, and how much it is!
And the little less, and what worlds away!
How a sound shall quicken content to bliss,
Or a breath suspend the blood's best play,
And life be a proof of this!

XL.

Had she willed it...Read more of this...

by Coleridge, Samuel Taylor
...the touch and pain!
She shrunk and shuddered, and saw again-
(Ah, woe is me! Was it for thee,
Thou gentle maid! such sights to see?)
Again she saw that bosom old,
Again she felt that bosom cold,
And drew in her breath with a hissing sound:
Whereat the Knight turned wildly round,
And nothing saw, but his own sweet maid
With eyes upraised, as one that prayed.

The touch, the sight, had passed away,
And in its stead that vision blest,
Which comforted her after-r...Read more of this...



by Whitman, Walt
...cherous seducer of young women; 
I mark the ranklings of jealousy and unrequited love, attempted to be hid—I see these
 sights on
 the earth;
I see the workings of battle, pestilence, tyranny—I see martyrs and prisoners; 
I observe a famine at sea—I observe the sailors casting lots who shall be
 kill’d, to
 preserve the lives of the rest; 
I observe the slights and degradations cast by arrogant persons upon laborers, the poor,
 and
 upon
 *******, and the like; 
All these—All...Read more of this...

by Alighieri, Dante
...r> 
 There is no fear nor any hurt in Hell, 
 Except that it be powerful. God in me 
 Is gracious, that the piteous sights I see 
 I share not, nor myself can shrink to feel 
 The flame of all this burning. One there is 
 In height among the Holiest placed, and she 
 - Mercy her name - among God's mysteries 
 Dwells in the midst, and hath the power to see 
 His judgments, and to break them. This sharp 
 I tell thee, when she saw, she called, that so 
 Leaned Lucia...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...nd, 
As one great furnace flamed; yet from those flames 
No light; but rather darkness visible 
Served only to discover sights of woe, 
Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace 
And rest can never dwell, hope never comes 
That comes to all, but torture without end 
Still urges, and a fiery deluge, fed 
With ever-burning sulphur unconsumed. 
Such place Eternal Justice has prepared 
For those rebellious; here their prison ordained 
In utter darkness, and their portion...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...richer seat 
Of Atabalipa; and yet unspoiled 
Guiana, whose great city Geryon's sons 
Call El Dorado. But to nobler sights 
Michael from Adam's eyes the film removed, 
Which that false fruit that promised clearer sight 
Had bred; then purged with euphrasy and rue 
The visual nerve, for he had much to see; 
And from the well of life three drops instilled. 
So deep the power of these ingredients pierced, 
Even to the inmost seat of mental sight, 
That Adam, now enforced...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...1
O TAKE my hand, Walt Whitman! 
Such gliding wonders! such sights and sounds! 
Such join’d unended links, each hook’d to the next! 
Each answering all—each sharing the earth with all. 

What widens within you, Walt Whitman?
What waves and soils exuding? 
What climes? what persons and lands are here? 
Who are the infants? some playing, some slumbering? 
Who are the girls? who are the married women? 
Who are the g...Read more of this...

by Whittier, John Greenleaf
...dow-frame, 
And through the glass the clothes-line posts 
Looked in like tall and sheeted ghosts. 
The old familiar sights of ours 
Took marvellous shapes; strange domes and towers 
Rose up where sty or corn-crib stood, 
Or garden-wall, or belt of wood; 
A smooth white mound the brush-pile showed, 
A fenceless drift what once was road; 
The bridle-post an old man sat 
With loose-flung coat and high cocked hat; 
The well-curb had a Chinese roof; 
And even the long sweep, h...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...’d the streets of inland Chicago—whatever streets I have roam’d;
Or cities, or silent woods, or peace, or even amid the sights of war; 
Wherever I have been, I have charged myself with contentment and triumph. 

I sing the Equalities, modern or old, 
I sing the endless finales of things; 
I say Nature continues—Glory continues;
I praise with electric voice; 
For I do not see one imperfection in the universe; 
And I do not see one cause or result lamentable at last in the ...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...ass amid and upon,
To be lean’d, and to lean on. 

Strong shapes, and attributes of strong shapes—masculine trades, sights and sounds; 
Long varied train of an emblem, dabs of music; 
Fingers of the organist skipping staccato over the keys of the great organ. 

2
Welcome are all earth’s lands, each for its kind;
Welcome are lands of pine and oak; 
Welcome are lands of the lemon and fig; 
Welcome are lands of gold; 
Welcome are lands of wheat and maize—welcome those of...Read more of this...

by Wordsworth, William
...; Circled with evil, till his very soul  Unmoulds its essence, hopelessly deformed  By sights of ever more deformity!   With other ministrations thou, O nature!'  Healest thy wandering and distempered child:  Thou pourest on him thy soft influences.  Thy sunny hues, fair forms, and breathing sheets,  Thy melodies of woods, and winds, and waters,  Till he...Read more of this...

by Bridges, Robert Seymour
...ced and worshippeth. 
I have no care for what was most my care,
But all around me see fresh beauty born,
And common sights grown lovelier than they were:
I dream of love, and in the light of morn
Tremble, beholding all things very fair
And strong with strength that puts my strength to scorn. 

34
O my goddess divine sometimes I say
Now let this word for ever and all suffice;
Thou art insatiable, and yet not twice
Can even thy lover give his soul away:
And for my acts,...Read more of this...

by Service, Robert William
...It's good the great green earth to roam,
Where sights of awe the soul inspire;
But oh, it's best, the coming home,
The crackle of one's own hearth-fire!
You've hob-nobbed with the solemn Past;
You've seen the pageantry of kings;
Yet oh, how sweet to gain at last
The peace and rest of Little Things!

Perhaps you're counted with the Great;
You strain and strive with mighty men;
Your hand is on the helm of ...Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...o loyal knight and true, 
The Lady of Shalott. 

But in her web she still delights 
To weave the mirror's magic sights, 65 
For often thro' the silent nights 
A funeral, with plumes and lights, 
And music, went to Camelot: 
Or when the moon was overhead, 
Came two young lovers lately wed; 70 
'I am half sick of shadows,' said 
The Lady of Shalott. 

PART III
A bow-shot from her bower-eaves,

He rode between the barley-sheaves, 
The sun came dazzling t...Read more of this...

by Dryden, John
...Of all our antic sights and pageantry 
Which English idiots run in crowds to see, 
The Polish Medal bears the prize alone; 
A monster, more the favourite of the town 
Than either fairs or theatres have shown. 
Never did art so well with nature strive, 
Nor ever idol seemed so much alive; 
So like the man, so golden to the sight, 
So base within, so counterfeit and light....Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...nd of The States, will in their turn be convuls’d, and serve
 other
 parturitions and transitions, 
And how all people, sights, combinations, the Democratic masses, too, serve—and how
 every
 fact, and war itself, with all its horrors, serves, 
And how now, or at any time, each serves the exquisite transition of death. 

2
OF seeds dropping into the ground—of birth,
Of the steady concentration of America, inland, upward, to impregnable and swarming
 places, 
Of what India...Read more of this...

by Brecht, Bertolt
...t was given to me on this Earth.

Our forces were slight and small,
Our goal lay in the far distance
Clearly in our sights,
If for me myself beyond my reaching.
That's how I passed my time that was given to me on this Earth.

II

You who will come to the surface
From the flood that's overwhelmed us and drowned us all
Must think, when you speak of our weakness in times of darkness
That you've not had to face:

Days when we were used to changing countries
More often...Read more of this...

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