Famous Slow Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Slow poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous slow poems. These examples illustrate what a famous slow poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Emily Dickinson
The Day came slow -- till Five o'clock --
Then sprang before the Hills
Like Hindered Rubies -- or the Light
A Sudden Musket -- spills --
The Purple could not keep the East --
The Sunrise shook abroad
Like Breadths of Topaz -- packed a Night --
The Lady just unrolled --
The Happy Winds -- their Timbrels took --
The Birds -- in docile Rows
Arranged themselves...Read more of this...
by
Emile Verhaeren
Come with slow steps and sit near the gardenbed, whose flowers of tranquil light are shut by evening; let the great night filter through you: we are too happy for our prayer to be disturbed by its sea of dread.
Above, the pure crystal of the stars is lit up; behold the firmament clearer and more translucent than a blue pond...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
As we pass Houses musing slow
If they be occupied
So minds pass minds
If they be occupied...Read more of this...
by
Thomas Hardy
(an Incident of Froom Valley)
"THY husband--poor, poor Heart!--is dead--
Dead, out by Moreford Rise;
A bull escaped the barton-shed,
Gored him, and there he lies!"
--"Ha, ha--go away! 'Tis a tale, methink,
Thou joker Kit!" laughed she.
"I've known thee many a year, Kit Twink,
And ever hast thou fooled me!"
--"But, Mistress Damon--I can swear
Thy goodman John is dead!
And soon th'lt hear their feet who bear
His...Read more of this...
by
D. H. Lawrence
The elephant, the huge old beast,
is slow to mate;
he finds a female, they show no haste
they wait
for the sympathy in their vast shy hearts
slowly, slowly to rouse
as they loiter along the river-beds
and drink and browse
and dash in panic through the brake
of forest with the herd,
and sleep in massive silence, and wake
together, without a...Read more of this...
by
Charles Sorley
There where the rusty iron lies,
The rooks are cawing all the day.
Perhaps no man, until he dies,
Will understand them, what they say.
The evening makes the sky like clay.
The slow wind waits for night to rise.
The world is half content. But they
Still trouble all the trees with cries,
That know, and cannot put away,
The yearning to the soul that flies
From day...Read more of this...
by
G K Chesterton
Under what withering leprous light
The very grass as hair is grey,
Grass in the cracks of the paven courts
Of gods we graved but yesterday.
Senate, republic, empire, all
We leaned our backs on like a wall
And blessed as stron as strong and blamed as stolid--
Can it be these that waver and fall?
And what is this like a ghost returning,
A dream grown strong...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
'Twas the old -- road -- through pain --
That unfrequented -- one --
With many a turn -- and thorn --
That stops -- at Heaven --
This -- was the Town -- she passed --
There -- where she -- rested -- last --
Then -- stepped more fast --
The little tracks -- close prest --
Then -- not so swift --
Slow -- slow...Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
On the wide veranda white,
In the purple failing light,
Sits the master while the sun is lowly burning;
And his dreamy thoughts are drowned
In the softly flowing sound
Of the corn-songs of the field-hands slow returning.
Oh, we hoe de co'n
Since de ehly mo'n;
Now de sinkin' sun
Says de day is done.
O'er the fields with heavy tread,
Light of heart and high of head,
Though the halting...Read more of this...
by
William Lisle Bowles
Languid, and sad, and slow, from day to day
I journey on, yet pensive turn to view
(Where the rich landscape gleams with softer hue)
The streams and vales, and hills, that steal away.
So fares it with the children of the earth:
For when life's goodly prospect opens round,
Their spirits beat to tread that fairy ground,
Where...Read more of this...
by
Thomas Moore
As slow our ship her foamy track
Against the wind was cleaving,
Her trembling pennant still look'd back
To that dear isle 'twas leaving.
So loath we part from all we love,
From all the links that bind us;
So turn our hearts as on we rove,
To those we've left behind us.
When, round the bowl, of vanish'd...Read more of this...
by
William Lisle Bowles
Languid, and sad, and slow, from day to day
I journey on, yet pensive turn to view
(Where the rich landscape gleams with softer hue)
The streams and vales, and hills, that steal away.
So fares it with the children of the earth:
For when life's goodly prospect opens round,
Their spirits beat to tread that fairy ground,
Where every vale sounds to the pipe of...Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
Slow moves the pageant of a climbing race;
Their footsteps drag far, far below the height,
And, unprevailing by their utmost might,
Seem faltering downward from each hard won place.
No strange, swift-sprung exception we; we trace
A devious way thro' dim, uncertain light,—
Our hope, through the long vistaed years, a sight
Of that our Captain's soul sees face to face.
Who, faithless, faltering that the road...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
They talk as slow as Legends grow
No mushroom is their mind
But foliage of sterility
Too stolid for the wind --
They laugh as wise as Plots of Wit
Predestined to unfold
The point with bland prevision
Portentously untold....Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Go slow, my soul, to feed thyself
Upon his rare approach --
Go rapid, lest Competing Death
Prevail upon the Coach --
Go timid, should his final eye
Determine thee amiss --
Go boldly -- for thou paid'st his price
Redemption -- for a Kiss --...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
I made slow Riches but my Gain
Was steady as the Sun
And every Night, it numbered more
Than the preceding One
All Days, I did not earn the same
But my perceiveless Gain
Inferred the less by Growing than
The Sum that it had grown....Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
It's hot to-day. The bees is buzzin'
Kinder don't-keer-like aroun'
An' fur off the warm air dances
O'er the parchin' roofs in town.
In the brook the cows is standin';
Childern hidin' in the hay;
Can't keep none of 'em a workin',
'Cause it's hot to-day.
It's hot to-day. The sun is blazin'
Like a great big ball o' fire;
Seems as ef instead o' settin'
It keeps mountin' higher an'...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
This slow Day moved along --
I heard its axles go
As if they could not hoist themselves
They hated motion so --
I told my soul to come --
It was no use to wait --
We went and played and came again
And it was out of sight --...Read more of this...
by
William Lisle Bowles
EVENING, as slow thy placid shades descend,
Veiling with gentlest hush the landscape still,
The lonely battlement, and farthest hill
And wood; I think of those that have no friend;
Who now perhaps, by melancholy led,
From the broad blaze of day, where pleasure flaunts,
Retiring, wander 'mid thy lonely haunts
Unseen; and mark the tints that o'er thy...Read more of this...
by
Robert Graves
I’ve watched the Seasons passing slow, so slow,
In the fields between La Bass?e and Bethune;
Primroses and the first warm day of Spring,
Red poppy floods of June,
August, and yellowing Autumn, so
To Winter nights knee-deep in mud or snow,
And you’ve been everything.
Dear, you’ve been everything that I most lack
In these soul-deadening trenches—pictures, books,...Read more of this...
by
Denise Levertov
A night that cuts between you and you
and you and you and you
and me : jostles us apart, a man elbowing
through a crowd. We won't
look for each other, either-
wander off, each alone, not looking
in the slow crowd. Among sideshows
under movie signs,
pictures made of a million lights,
giants that move and again move
again, above a cloud of thick smells,
franks, roasted nutmeats-
Or...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
Thus can my love excuse the slow offence
Of my dull bearer, when from thee I speed:
From where thou art, why should I haste me thence?
Till I return, of posting is no need.
O, what excuse will my poor beast then find
When swift extremity can seem but slow?
Then should I spur, though mounted on the wind;
In wingèd speed no motion shall...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
It ceased to hurt me, though so slow
I could not feel the Anguish go --
But only knew by looking back --
That something -- had benumbed the Track --
Nor when it altered, I could say,
For I had worn it, every day,
As constant as the Childish frock --
I hung upon the Peg, at night.
But not the Grief -- that nestled close
As...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
How slow the Wind --
how slow the sea --
how late their Fathers be!...Read more of this...
by
Katharine Tynan
O year, grow slowly. Exquisite, holy,
The days go on
With almonds showing the pink stars blowing
And birds in the dawn.
Grow slowly, year, like a child that is dear,
Or a lamb that is mild,
By little steps, and by little skips,
Like a lamb or a child....Read more of this...
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