Famous Still Life Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Still Life poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous still life poems. These examples illustrate what a famous still life poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Tupac Shakur
Life through my bloodshot eyes
would scare a square 2 death
poverty,murder,violence
and never a moment 2 rest
Fun and games are few
but treasured like gold 2 me
cuz I realize that I must return
2 my spot in poverty
But mock my words when I say
my heart will not exist
unless my destiny comes through
and puts an end 2 all of this ...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Life, void of wine, and minstrels with their lutes,
And the soft murmurs of Irakian flutes,
Were nothing worth: I scan the world and see:
Save pleasure, life yields only bitter fruits....Read more of this...
by
Edmund Spenser
Most glorious Lord of life, that on this day,
Didst make thy triumph over death and sin:
And having harrow'd hell, didst bring away
Captivity thence captive, us to win:
This joyous day, dear Lord, with joy begin,
And grant that we for whom thou diddest die,
Being with thy dear blood clean wash'd from sin,
May live for ever in felicity.
And that thy love we...Read more of this...
by
Emile Verhaeren
To see beauty in all, is to lift our own Soul
Up to loftier heights than do chose who aspire
Through culpable suffering, vanquished desire.
Harsh Reality, dread and ineffable Whole,
Distils her red draught, enough tonic and stern
To intoxicate heads and to make the heart burn.
O clean and pure grain, whence are purged all the tares!
Clear torch, chosen out amid many whose flame;
Though...Read more of this...
by
Walter Savage Landor
Soon, O Ianthe! life is o'er,
And sooner beauty's heavenly smile:
Grant only (and I ask no more),
Let love remain that little while....Read more of this...
by
William Drummond
This Life, which seems so fair,
Is like a bubble blown up in the air
By sporting children's breath,
Who chase it everywhere
And strive who can most motion it bequeath.
And though it sometimes seem of its own might
Like to an eye of gold to be fixed there,
And firm to hover in that empty height,
That only is because it is so light.
But in...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Make haste! soon must you quit this life below,
And pass the veil, and Allah's secrets know,
Make haste to take your pleasure while you may,
You wot not whence you come, nor whither go....Read more of this...
by
Anne Sexton
Here,
in the room of my life
the objects keep changing.
Ashtrays to cry into,
the suffering brother of the wood walls,
the forty-eight keys of the typewriter
each an eyeball that is never shut,
the books, each a contestant in a beauty contest,
the black chair, a dog coffin made of Naugahyde,
the sockets on the wall
waiting like a cave of bees,
the gold rug
a conversation of heels...Read more of this...
by
Robert Browning
I
Room after room,
I hunt the house through
We inhabit together.
Heart, fear nothing, for, heart, thou shalt find her,
Next time, herself!—not the trouble behind her
Left in the curtain, the couch's perfume!
As she brushed it, the cornice-wreath blossomed anew,—
Yon looking-glass gleamed at the wave of her feather.
II
Yet the day wears,
And door succeeds door;
I try the fresh fortune—
Range the wide house...Read more of this...
by
John Wilmot
All my past life is mine no more,
The flying hours are gone,
Like transitory dreams giv'n o'er,
Whose images are kept in store
By memory alone.
The time that is to come is not;
How can it then be mine?
The present moment's all my lot;
And that, as fast as it is got,
Phyllis, is only thine.
Then talk not of inconstancy,
False hearts, and broken vows;
If...Read more of this...
by
Howard Nemerov
Innocence?
In a sense.
In no sense!
Was that it?
Was that it?
Was that it?
That was it....Read more of this...
by
Sir Walter Raleigh
What is our life? A play of passion,
Our mirth the music of division,
Our mother's wombs the tiring-houses be,
Where we are dressed for this short comedy.
Heaven the judicious sharp spectator is,
That sits and marks still who doth act amiss.
Our graves that hide us from the setting sun
Are like drawn curtains when the play...Read more of this...
by
Jorie Graham
All this was written on the next day's list.
On which the busyness unfurled its cursive roots,
pale but effective,
and the long stem of the necessary, the sum of events,
built-up its tiniest cathedral...
(Or is it the sum of what takes place? )
If I lean down, to whisper, to them,
down into their gravitational field, there where they head busily on
into the woods,...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
It's easy to invent a Life --
God does it -- every Day --
Creation -- but the Gambol
Of His Authority --
It's easy to efface it --
The thrifty Deity
Could scarce afford Eternity
To Spontaneity --
The Perished Patterns murmur --
But His Perturbless Plan
Proceed -- inserting Here -- a Sun --
There -- leaving out a Man --...Read more of this...
by
Robert Herrick
If after rude and boisterous seas
My wearied pinnace here finds ease;
If so it be I've gain'd the shore,
With safety of a faithful oar;
If having run my barque on ground,
Ye see the aged vessel crown'd;
What's to be done? but on the sands
Ye dance and sing, and now clap hands.
--The first act's doubtful, but (we say)
It is the last commends the...Read more of this...
by
Fernando Pessoa
My weary life, that lives unsatisfied
On the foiled off-brink of being e'er but this,
To whom the power to will hath been denied
And the will to renounce doth also miss;
My sated life, with having nothing sated,
In the motion of moving poisèd aye,
Within its dreams from its own dreams abated--
This life let the Gods change or take away.
For this endless succession of...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Count upon life not longer than the sixtieth year.
Place thy foot in no direction without being overcome
with wine. As long as thy skull hath not been made a
pitcher, go always on thy way, nor take the wine-gourd
from thy shoulder or the wine-cup from thy hand....Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Life, and Death, and Giants --
Such as These -- are still --
Minor -- Apparatus -- Hopper of the Mill --
Beetle at the Candle --
Or a Fife's Fame --
Maintain -- by Accident that they proclaim --...Read more of this...
by
Ella Wheeler Wilcox
In the rapture of life and of living,
I lift up my head and rejoice,
And I thank the great Giver for giving
The soul of my gladness a voice.
In the glow of the glorious weather,
In the sweet-scented, sensuous air,
My burdens seem light as a feather –
They are nothing to bear.
In the strength and the glory of power,
In the pride and...Read more of this...
by
Stephen Crane
There was a man who lived a life of fire.
Even upon the fabric of time,
Where purple becomes orange
And orange purple,
This life glowed,
A dire red stain, indelible;
Yet when he was dead,
He saw that he had not lived....Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
When life is spent, what's Balkh or Nishapore?
What sweet or bitter, when the cup runs o'er?
Come drink! full many a moon will wax and wane
In times to come, when we are here no more....Read more of this...
by
Robert William Service
'Tis true my garments threadbare are,
And sorry poor I seem;
But inly I am richer far
Than any poet's dream.
For I've a hidden life no one
Can ever hope to see;
A sacred sanctuary none
May share with me.
Aloof I stand from out the strife,
Within my heart a song;
By virtue of my inner life
I to myself belong.
Against man-ruling...Read more of this...
by
Robert Herrick
Life is the body's light; which, once declining,
Those crimson clouds i' th' cheeks and lips leave shining:-
Those counter-changed tabbies in the air,
The sun once set, all of one colour are:
So, when death comes, fresh tinctures lose their place,
And dismal darkness then doth smutch the face....Read more of this...
by
Nazim Hikmet
The hair falling on your forehead
suddenly lifted.
Suddenly something stirred on the ground.
The trees are whispering
in the dark.
Your bare arms will be cold.
Far off
where we can't see,
the moon must be rising.
It hasn't reached us yet,
slipping through the leaves
to light up your shoulder.
But I know
a wind comes up with the moon.
The trees are whispering.
Your...Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
Oh, I am hurt to death, my Love;
The shafts of Fate have pierced my striving heart,
And I am sick and weary of
The endless pain and smart.
My soul is weary of the strife,
And chafes at life, and chafes at life.
Time mocks me with fair promises;
A blooming future grows a barren past,
Like rain my fair full-blossomed trees
Unburden in the blast.
The harvest fails...Read more of this...
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