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Famous Sovereign Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Bradstreet, Anne
...he seems to be,
72 See glorious Adam there made Lord of all,
73 Fancies the Apple dangle on the Tree
74 That turn'd his Sovereign to a naked thrall,
75 Who like a miscreant's driven from that place
76 To get his bread with pain and sweat of face.
77 A penalty impos'd on his backsliding Race. 

12 

78 Here sits our Grand-dame in retired place
79 And in her lap her bloody Cain new born.
80 The weeping Imp oft looks her in the face,
81 Bewails his unknown hap and fa...Read More



by Dickinson, Emily
...ad stood—a Loaded Gun—
In Corners—till a Day
The Owner passed—identified—
And carried Me away—

And now We roam in Sovereign Woods—
And now We hunt the Doe—
And every time I speak for Him—
The Mountains straight reply—

And do I smile, such cordial light
Upon the Valley glow—
It is as a Vesuvian face
Had let its pleasure through—

And when at Night—Our good Day done—
I guard My Master's Head—
'Tis better than the Eider-Duck's
Deep Pillow—to have shared—

T...Read More

by Keats, John
...pride of June,
Had I been used to pass my weary eves;
The rather for the sun unwilling leaves
So dear a picture of his sovereign power,
And I could witness his most kingly hour,
When he doth lighten up the golden reins,
And paces leisurely down amber plains
His snorting four. Now when his chariot last
Its beams against the zodiac-lion cast,
There blossom'd suddenly a magic bed
Of sacred ditamy, and poppies red:
At which I wondered greatly, knowing well
That but one night...Read More

by Hugo, Victor
...could plead 
 Than Ladisläus did. 
 
 But not a word 
 Said now the figure motionless, with sword 
 In hand. This sovereign soul seemed to commune 
 With self beneath his metal sheath; yet soon 
 And suddenly, with tranquil voice said he, 
 "Princes, your craven spirit wearies me. 
 No phantom—only man am I. Arise! 
 I like not to be dreaded otherwise 
 Than with the fear to which I'm used; know me, 
 For it is Eviradnus that you see!" 
 
 XVII. 
 
 THE CLUB....Read More

by Alighieri, Dante
...My guide 
 Before I questioned told, "That first ye see, 
 With hand that fits the swordhilt, mark, for he 
 Is Homer, sovereign of the craft we tried, 
 Leader and lord of even the following three, - 
 Horace, and Ovid, and Lucan. The voice ye heard, 
 That hailed me, caused them by one impulse stirred 
 Approach to do me honour, for these agree 
 In that one name we boast, and so do well 
 Owning it in me." There was I joyed to meet 
 Those shades, who closest to h...Read More



by Marvell, Andrew
...age, what grief) 
He saw seized, and could give her no relief! 
That sacred keel which had, as he, restored 
His exiled sovereign on its happy board, 
And thence the British Admiral became, 
Crowned, for that merit, with their master's name; 
That pleasure-boat of war, in whose dear side 
Secure so oft he had this foe defied, 
Now a cheap spoil, and the mean victor's slave, 
Taught the Dutch colours from its top to wave; 
Of former glories the reproachful thought 
With presen...Read More

by Emerson, Ralph Waldo
...end in clowns the mountain-folk,
In tavern cheer and tavern joke,—
Sink, O mountain! in the swamp,
Hide in thy skies, O sovereign lap!
Perish like leaves the highland breed!
No sire survive, no son succeed!

Soft! let not the offended muse
Toil's hard hap with scorn accuse.
Many hamlets sought I then,
Many farms of mountain men;—
Found I not a minstrel seed,
But men of bone, and good at need.
Rallying round a parish steeple
Nestle warm the highland people,
Coarse and ...Read More

by Milton, John
...he seat 
That we must change for Heaven?--this mournful gloom 
For that celestial light? Be it so, since he 
Who now is sovereign can dispose and bid 
What shall be right: farthest from him is best 
Whom reason hath equalled, force hath made supreme 
Above his equals. Farewell, happy fields, 
Where joy for ever dwells! Hail, horrors! hail, 
Infernal world! and thou, profoundest Hell, 
Receive thy new possessor--one who brings 
A mind not to be changed by place or time.Read More

by Milton, John
...celebrate his throne 
With warbled hyms, and to his Godhead sing 
Forced hallelujahs, while he lordly sits 
Our envied sovereign, and his altar breathes 
Ambrosial odours and ambrosial flowers, 
Our servile offerings? This must be our task 
In Heaven, this our delight. How wearisome 
Eternity so spent in worship paid 
To whom we hate! Let us not then pursue, 
By force impossible, by leave obtained 
Unacceptable, though in Heaven, our state 
Of splendid vassalage; but rat...Read More

by Stevens, Wallace
...I 

The World without Imagination 

1 Nota: man is the intelligence of his soil, 
2 The sovereign ghost. As such, the Socrates 
3 Of snails, musician of pears, principium 
4 And lex. Sed quaeritur: is this same wig 
5 Of things, this nincompated pedagogue, 
6 Preceptor to the sea? Crispin at sea 
7 Created, in his day, a touch of doubt. 
8 An eye most apt in gelatines and jupes, 
9 Berries of villages, a barber's eye, 
10 An...Read More

by Homer,
...shore,
  Devouring dogs and hungry vultures tore.(41)
  Since great Achilles and Atrides strove,
  Such was the sovereign doom, and such the will of Jove!(42)

  Declare, O Muse! in what ill-fated hour(43)
  Sprung the fierce strife, from what offended power
  Latona's son a dire contagion spread,(44)
  And heap'd the camp with mountains of the dead;
  The king of men his reverent priest defied,(45)
  And for the king's offence the people died.

  For Chr...Read More

by Chaucer, Geoffrey
...chambers
That hight the great temple of Mars in Thrace,
In thilke* cold and frosty region, *that
There as Mars hath his sovereign mansion.
In which there dwelled neither man nor beast,
With knotty gnarry* barren trees old *gnarled
Of stubbes sharp and hideous to behold;
In which there ran a rumble and a sough*, *groaning noise
As though a storm should bursten every bough:
And downward from an hill under a bent* *slope
There stood the temple of Mars Armipotent,
Wrought all...Read More

by Scott, Sir Walter
...that of maiden fear.
     It may not be,—forgive her,
     Chief, Nor hazard aught for our relief.
     Against his sovereign, Douglas ne'er
     Will level a rebellious spear.
     'T was I that taught his youthful hand
     To rein a steed and wield a brand;
     I see him yet, the princely boy!
     Not Ellen more my pride and joy;
     I love him still, despite my wrongs
     By hasty wrath and slanderous tongues.
     O. seek the grace you well may find,
   ...Read More

by Chaucer, Geoffrey
...the child Maurice
Did this message unto the emperor:
But, as I guess, Alla was not so nice,* *foolish
To him that is so sovereign of honor
As he that is of Christian folk the flow'r,
Send any child, but better 'tis to deem
He went himself; and so it may well seem.

This emperor hath granted gentilly
To come to dinner, as he him besought:
And well rede* I, he looked busily *guess, know
Upon this child, and on his daughter thought.
Alla went to his inn, and as him ought...Read More

by Dryden, John
...on her breast. 
But when this fatal counsel, found too late, 
Exposed its author to the public hate, 
When his just sovereign by no impious way 
Could be seduced to arbitrary sway, 
Forsaken of that hope, he shifts his sail, 
Drives down the current with the popular gale, 
And shows the fiend confessed without a veil. 
He preaches to the crowd that power is lent, 
But not conveyed to kingly government, 
That claims successive bear no binding force, 
That coronation oa...Read More

by Petrarch, Francesco
...SPAN>Over that face, which oft in triumph ledMy subject thoughts; and beauty's sovereign light,Retiring, left the world immersed in night;The Phantom, with a frown that chill'd the heart,Seem'd with his gloomy pageant to depart,[Pg 382]Exulting in his formidable arms,Read More

by Byron, George (Lord)
...ird! See also how personal Savage becometh, when he hath a mind. The following is his portrait of our late gracious sovereign: 

(Prince Gebir having descended into the infernal regions, the shades of his royal ancestors are, at his request, called up to his view; and he exclaims to
his ghostly guide) — 

'Aroar, what wretch that nearest us? what wretch 
Is that with eyebrows white and slanting brow? 
Listen! him yonder who, bound down supine, 
Shrinks yelling from that s...Read More

by Masefield, John
...d the ships, 
Hoping to see her well-remembered form 
Come with a curl of bubbles at her lips 
Bright to her berth, the sovereign of the storm. 

I never did, and many years went by, 
Then, near a Southern port, one Christmas Eve, 
I watched a gale go roaring through the sky, 
Making the cauldrons of clouds upheave. 

Then the wrack tattered and the stars appeared, 
Millions of stars that seemed to speak in fire; 
A byre cock cried aloud that morning neared, 
The swin...Read More

by Chaucer, Geoffrey
...and also.
I made him burn his book anon right tho.* *then
And when that I had gotten unto me
By mast'ry all the sovereignety,
And that he said, "Mine owen true wife,
Do *as thee list,* the term of all thy life, *as pleases thee*
Keep thine honour, and eke keep mine estate;
After that day we never had debate.
God help me so, I was to him as kind
As any wife from Denmark unto Ind,
And also true, and so was he to me:
I pray to God that sits in majesty
So bless his so...Read More

by Trumbull, John
...heav'nly light.
To view that form of angel make,
Again Ixion would mistake,[2]
And justly deem so fair a prize,
The sovereign Mistress of the skies,"


He said, and drew a mazy line,
With crimson touch his pencils shine,
The mingling colours sweetly fade,
And justly temper light and shade.


He look'd; the swelling Cloud on high
With wider circuit spread the sky,
Stretch'd to the sun an ampler train,
And pour'd new glories on the main.
As quick, effacing every gro...Read More

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