Famous Strict Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Strict poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous strict poems. These examples illustrate what a famous strict poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Sylvia Plath
'Perspective betrays with its dichotomy:
train tracks always meet, not here, but only
in the impossible mind's eye;
horizons beat a retreat as we embark
on sophist seas to overtake that mark
where wave pretends to drench real sky.'
'Well then, if we agree, it is not odd
that one man's devil is another's god
or that the solar spectrum is
a multitude of...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
EARTH, round, rolling, compact—suns, moons, animals—all these are words to be
said;
Watery, vegetable, sauroid advances—beings, premonitions, lispings of the future,
Behold! these are vast words to be said.
Were you thinking that those were the words—those upright lines? those curves,
angles,
dots?
No, those are not the words—the substantial words are in the ground and sea,
They are in...Read more of this...
by
Jonathan Swift
Five hours, (and who can do it less in?)
By haughty Celia spent in dressing;
The goddess from her chamber issues,
Arrayed in lace, brocades, and tissues.
Strephon, who found the room was void
And Betty otherwise employed,
Stole in and took a strict survey
Of all the litter as it lay;
Whereof, to make the matter clear,
An inventory follows here.
And first a dirty smock appeared,
Beneath the...Read more of this...
by
Robert Pinsky
The back, the yoke, the yardage. Lapped seams,
The nearly invisible stitches along the collar
Turned in a sweatshop by Koreans or Malaysians
Gossiping over tea and noodles on their break
Or talking money or politics while one fitted
This armpiece with its overseam to the band
Of cuff I button at my wrist. The presser, the cutter,
The wringer, the mangle. The needle, the union,
The...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
1
TO think of time—of all that retrospection!
To think of to-day, and the ages continued henceforward!
Have you guess’d you yourself would not continue?
Have you dreaded these earth-beetles?
Have you fear’d the future would be nothing to you?
Is to-day nothing? Is the beginningless past nothing?
If the future is nothing, they are just as surely nothing.
To think...Read more of this...
by
Robert Frost
I didn't make you know how glad I was
To have you come and camp here on our land.
I promised myself to get down some day
And see the way you lived, but I don't know!
With a houseful of hungry men to feed
I guess you'd find.... It seems to me
I can't express my feelings any...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
'Tis wrong, according to the strict Koran,
To drink in Rajah, likewise in Sha'ban,
God and the Prophet claim those months as theirs;
Was Ramazan then made for thirsty man?...Read more of this...
by
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
I feel no small reluctance in venturing to give to the public a
work of the character of that indicated by the title-page to the
present volume; for, difficult as it must always be to render satisfactorily
into one's own tongue the writings of the bards of other lands,
the responsibility assumed by the translator is immeasurably increased
when...Read more of this...
by
William Topaz McGonagall
Thrice welcome home to Hawick, Mr J. Graham Henderson,
For by your Scotch tweeds a great honour you have won;
By exhibiting your beautiful tweeds at the World's Fair
You have been elected judge of Australian and American wools while there.
You had to pass a strict examination on the wool trade,
But you have been victorious, and not the least afraid,
And has...Read more of this...
by
Donald Justice
Papier-mache body; blue-and-black cotton jersey cover. Metal stand.
Instructions included.
-- Sears, Roebuck Catalogue
O my coy darling, still
You wear for me the scent
Of those long afternoons we spent,
The two of us together,
Safe in the attic from the jealous eyes
Of household spies
And the remote buffooneries of the weather;
So high,
Our sole remaining neighbor was the sky,
Which, often enough, at dusk,
Leaning its cloudy shoulders...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Unit, like Death, for Whom?
True, like the Tomb,
Who tells no secret
Told to Him --
The Grave is strict --
Tickets admit
Just two -- the Bearer --
And the Borne --
And seat -- just One --
The Living -- tell --
The Dying -- but a Syllable --
The Coy Dead -- None --
No Chatter -- here -- no tea --
So Babbler, and Bohea -- stay...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
I GAT your letter, winsome Willie;
Wi’ gratefu’ heart I thank you brawlie;
Tho’ I maun say’t, I wad be silly,
And unco vain,
Should I believe, my coaxin billie
Your flatterin strain.
But I’se believe ye kindly meant it:
I sud be laith to think ye hinted
Ironic satire, sidelins sklented
On my poor Musie;
Tho’ in sic phraisin terms ye’ve penn’d it,
I scarce...Read more of this...
by
Robert Penn Warren
So hangs the hour like fruit fullblown and sweet,
Our strict and desperate avatar,
Despite that antique westward gulls lament
Over enormous waters which retreat
Weary unto the white and sensual star.
Accept these images for what they are--
Out of the past a fragile element
Of substance into accident.
I would speak honestly and of a full heart;
I would speak surely for the tale...Read more of this...
by
Howard Nemerov
I tell you that I see her still
At the dark entrance of the hall.
One gas lamp burning near her shoulder
Shone also from her other side
Where hung the long inaccurate glass
Whose pictures were as troubled water.
An immense shadow had its hand
Between us on the floor, and seemed
To hump the knuckles nervously,
A giant crab readying to walk,
Or...Read more of this...
by
Barry Tebb
Memories bursting like tears or waves
On some lonely Adriatic shore
Beating again and again
Threshings of green sea foam
Flecked like the marble Leonardo
Chipped for his ‘Moses’.
And my tears came as suddenly
In that dream, criss-crossed
With memory and desire.
Grandad Nicky had worked
Down the pits for a pittance
To bring up his six children
But nothing left over for more
Than a few nuts and an orange
For...Read more of this...
by
Robert Herrick
Orpheus he went, as poets tell,
To fetch Eurydice from hell;
And had her, but it was upon
This short, but strict condition;
Backward he should not look, while he
Led her through hell's obscurity.
But ah! it happen'd, as he made
His passage through that dreadful shade,
Revolve he did his loving eye,
For gentle fear or jealousy;
And looking back, that look did sever
Him and Eurydice for...Read more of this...
by
Jack Gilbert
How astonishing it is that language can almost mean,
and frightening that it does not quite. Love, we say,
God, we say, Rome and Michiko, we write, and the words
get it all wrong. We say bread and it means according
to which nation. French has no word for home,
and we have no word for strict pleasure. A people
in northern India is dying...Read more of this...
by
Delmore Schwartz
Yeats died Saturday in France.
Freedom from his animal
Has come at last in alien Nice,
His heart beat separate from his will:
He knows at last the old abyss
Which always faced his staring face.
No ability, no dignity
Can fail him now who trained so long
For the outrage of eternity,
Teaching his heart to beat a song
In which man's strict humanity,
Erect as a soldier, became...Read more of this...
by
John Berryman
I met a junior-”not so junior-”and
a-many others, who knew 'him' or 'them'
long ago, slightly,
whom I know. It was the usual
cocktail party, only (my schedule being strict)
beforehand.
I worked. Well. Then they kept the kids away
with their own questions, over briefest coffee.
Then kids drove me to my city.
I think of the junior: once my advanced élève,
sweetnatured, slack a little, never perhaps...Read more of this...
by
Vachel Lindsay
Would I might wake St. Francis in you all,
Brother of birds and trees, God's Troubadour,
Blinded with weeping for the sad and poor;
Our wealth undone, all strict Franciscan men,
Come, let us chant the canticle again
Of mother earth and the enduring sun.
God make each soul the lonely leper's slave;
God make us saints, and brave....Read more of this...
by
George (Lord) Byron
I
'Tis done -- but yesterday a King!
And arm'd with Kings to strive --
And now thou art a nameless thing:
So abject -- yet alive!
Is this the man of thousand thrones,
Who strew'd our earth with hostile bones,
And can he thus survive?
Since he, miscall'd the Morning Star,
Nor man nor fiend hath fallen so...Read more of this...
by
Jane Austen
In measured verse I'll now rehearse
The charms of lovely Anna:
And, first, her mind is unconfined
Like any vast savannah.
Ontario's lake may fitly speak
Her fancy's ample bound:
Its circuit may, on strict survey
Five hundred miles be found.
Her wit descends on foes and friends
Like famed Niagara's fall;
And travellers gaze in wild amaze,
And listen, one...Read more of this...
by
Lewis Carroll
ONE winter night, at half-past nine,
Cold, tired, and cross, and muddy,
I had come home, too late to dine,
And supper, with cigars and wine,
Was waiting in the study.
There was a strangeness in the room,
And Something white and wavy
Was standing near me in the gloom -
I took it for the carpet-broom
Left by that careless slavey.
But presently the Thing began
To...Read more of this...
by
Isaac Watts
Complaint of quarrelsome neighbors; or, A devout wish for peace.
Thou God of love, thou ever-blest,
Pity my suff'ring state;
When wilt thou set my soul at rest
From lips that love deceit?
Hard lot of mine! my days are cast
Among the sons of strife,
Whose never-ceasing brawling waste
My golden hours of life.
O might I fly to change my place,
How would I choose to dwell
In...Read more of this...
by
Andrew Marvell
Oblig'd by frequent visits of this man,
Whom as Priest, Poet, and Musician,
I for some branch of Melchizedeck took,
(Though he derives himself from my Lord Brooke)
I sought his Lodging; which is at the Sign
Of the sad Pelican; Subject divine
For Poetry: There three Stair Cases high,
Which signifies his triple property,
I found at last a Chamber, as 'twas said,
But seem'd a Coffin...Read more of this...
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