Famous Subject Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Subject poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous subject poems. These examples illustrate what a famous subject poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Phillis Wheatley
Through airy roads he wings his instant flight
To purer regions of celestial light;
Enlarg'd he sees unnumber'd systems roll,
Beneath him sees the universal whole,
Planets on planets run their destin'd round,
And circling wonders fill the vast profound.
Th' ethereal now, and now th' empyreal skies
With growing splendors strike his wond'ring eyes:
The angels view him with delight unknown,
Press his soft hand, and seat...Read more of this...
by
Robert Burns
FY, let us a’ to Kirkcudbright,
For there will be bickerin’ there;
For Murray’s light horse are to muster,
And O how the heroes will swear!
And there will be Murray, Commander,
And Gordon, the battle to win;
Like brothers they’ll stand by each other,
Sae knit in alliance and kin.
And there will be black-nebbit Johnie,
The tongue o’ the trump to...Read more of this...
by
Anne Kingsmill Finch
No sooner, FLAVIO, was you gone,
But, your Injunction thought upon,
ARDELIA took the Pen;
Designing to perform the Task,
Her FLAVIO did so kindly ask,
Ere he returned agen.
Unto Parnassus strait she sent,
And bid the Messenger, that went
Unto the Muses Court,
Assure them, she their Aid did need,
And begg'd they'd use their utmost Speed,
Because the Time was short.
The hasty...Read more of this...
by
Anne Kingsmill Finch
Tis true of courage I'm no mistress
No Boadicia nor Thalestriss
Nor shall I e'er be famed hereafter
For such a Soul as Cato's Daughter
Nor active valour nor enduring
Nor leading troops nor forts securing
Like Teckley's wife or Pucell valiant
Will e'er be reckonded for my talent
Who all things fear whilst day is shining
And my own shadow light declining
And from the Spleen's...Read more of this...
by
Sir Philip Sidney
You that with allegory's curious frame,
Of others' children changelings use to make,
With me those pains for God's sake do not take:
I list not dig so deep for brazen fame.
When I say "Stella," I do mean the same
Princess of Beauty, for whose only sake
The reins of Love I love, though never slake,
And joy...Read more of this...
by
Anne Kingsmill Finch
WITH such a Pulse, with such disorder'd Veins,
Such lab'ring Breath, as thy Disease constrains;
With failing Eyes, that scarce the Light endure,
(So long unclos'd, they've watch'd thy doubtful Cure)
To his Hephaestion Alexander writes,
To soothe thy Days, and wing thy sleepless Nights,
I send thee Love: Oh! that I could impart,
As well my vital Spirits...Read more of this...
by
Mary Darby Robinson
'Twas on a Mountain, near the Western Main
An ALIEN dwelt. A solitary Hut
Built on a jutting crag, o'erhung with weeds,
Mark'd the poor Exile's home. Full ten long years
The melancholy wretch had liv'd unseen
By all, save HENRY, a lov'd, little Son
The partner of his sorrows. On the day
When Persecution, in the sainted guise
Of Liberty, spread wide its venom'd pow'r,
The brave,...Read more of this...
by
Edgar Lee Masters
My mother was for woman's rights
And my father was the rich miller at London Mills.
I dreamed of the wrongs of the world and wanted to right them.
When my father died, I set out to see peoples and countries
In order to learn how to reform the world.
I traveled through many lands.
I saw the ruins of Rome,
And the ruins of Athens,
And...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
Lo, here the gentle lark, weary of rest,
From his moist cabinet mounts up on high,
And wakes the morning, from whose silver breast
The sun ariseth in his majesty;
Who doth the world so gloriously behold
That cedar-tops and hills seem burnish'd gold.
Venus salutes him with this fair good-morrow;
"O thou clear god, and patron of all light,
From whom each lamp and shining star...Read more of this...
by
A R Ammons
When the crow
lands, the
tip of the sprung spruce
bough weighs
so low, the
system so friction-free,
the bobbing lasts
way past any
interest in the subject....Read more of this...
by
John Donne
I long to talk with some old lover's ghost,
Who died before the God of Love was born:
I cannot think that he, who then loved most,
Sunk so low as to love one which did scorn.
But since this god produced a destiny,
And that vice-nature, Custom, lets it be,
I must love her that loves not me.
Sure, they which made him god meant...Read more of this...
by
Richard Flecknoe
All human things are subject to decay.
And, when fate summons, monarchs must obey.
This Flecknoe found, who, like Augustus, young
Was called to empire, and had governed long;
In prose and verse was owned, without dispute,
Throughout the realms of nonsense, absolute....Read more of this...
by
John Ashbery
Orpheus liked the glad personal quality
Of the things beneath the sky. Of course, Eurydice was a part
Of this. Then one day, everything changed. He rends
Rocks into fissures with lament. Gullies, hummocks
Can't withstand it. The sky shudders from one horizon
To the other, almost ready to give up wholeness.
Then Apollo quietly told him: "Leave it all on earth.
Your lute, what point?...Read more of this...
by
David Lehman
As I sit at my desk wishing
I did not have to edit a book
on poetry and painting a
subject that fascinates me
usually, but today is not as
usual, being today, white sky,
decent amount of sunlight,
forty one degrees in Central Park,
and it makes sense to dream of
Chicago, another big city
with two major league ballclubs,
and the pleasure of seeing Paul
and you, too, Elaine,...Read more of this...
by
Ben Jonson
XII. — EPISTLE TO ELIZABETH COUNTESS OF RUTLAND. That which, to boot with hell, is thought worth heaven, And for it, life, conscience, yea souls are given, Toils, by grave custom, up and down the court, To every squire, or groom, that will report Well or ill, only all the following year, Just to the weight their this day's presents...Read more of this...
by
John Donne
For every hour that thou wilt spare me now
I will allow,
Usurious God of Love, twenty to thee,
When with my brown my gray hairs equal be;
Till then, Love, let my body reign, and let
Me travel, sojourn, snatch, plot, have, forget,
Resume my last year's relic: think that yet
We'had never met.
Let me think any rival's letter mine,
And at next nine
Keep midnight's promise;...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
How can my muse want subject to invent,
While thou dost breathe, that pour'st into my verse
Thine own sweet argument, too excellent
For every vulgar paper to rehearse?
O! give thy self the thanks, if aught in me
Worthy perusal stand against thy sight;
For who's so dumb that cannot write to thee,
When thou thy self dost give invention light?
Be thou the tenth...Read more of this...
by
Barry Tebb
Why is it that in dreams I have visited -
As teacher or pupil - almost every college and school
In our once so green and pleasant land?
Hardly a subject from art to anthropology I have not
In dream seminar or floating spinning classroom
Studied or tried my prentice hand at, or learned
At the sandalled feet of some guru; as this minute
I returned...Read more of this...
by
James Thomson
When Britain first, at Heaven's command,
Arose from out the azure main;
This was the charter of the land,
And guardian angels sung this strain:
"Rule, Britannia, rule the waves;
Britons never will be slaves."
The nations, not so blest as thee,
Must, in their turns, to tyrants fall:
While thou shalt flourish great and free,
The dread and envy of them all.
"Rule, Britannia, rule the waves;
Britons...Read more of this...
by
Andrew Barton Paterson
When Ironbark the turtle came to Anthony's lagoon
The hills were hid behind a mist of equinoctal rain,
The ripple of the rivulets was like a cheerful tune
And wild companions waltzed among the grass as tall as grain.
But Ironbark the turtle cared no whit for all of these;
The ripple of the rivulets, the rustle of the...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
Who is it that says most, which can say more,
Than this rich praise -- that you alone are you,
In whose confine immurèd is the store
Which should example where your equal grew?
Lean penury within that pen doth dwell
That to his subject lends not some small glory;
But he that writes of you, if he can tell
That you are you, so dignifies...Read more of this...
by
Marilyn L Taylor
A reflection on my students
They are so beautiful, and so very young
they seem almost to glitter with perfection,
these creatures that I briefly move among.
I never get to stay with them for long,
but even so, I view them with affection:
they are so beautiful, and so very young.
Poised or clumsy, placid or high-strung,
they’re expert in the art of introspection,
these creatures...Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
I got so I could take his name --
Without -- Tremendous gain --
That Stop-sensation -- on my Soul --
And Thunder -- in the Room --
I got so I could walk across
That Angle in the floor,
Where he turned so, and I turned -- how --
And all our Sinew tore --
I got so I could stir the Box --
In which his...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
How can my Muse want subject to invent
While thou dost breathe, that pour'st into my verse
Thine own sweet argument, too excellent
For every vulgar paper to rehearse?
O, give thyself the thanks, if aught in me
Worthy perusal stand against thy sight,
For who's so dumb that cannot write to thee,
When thou thyself dost give invention light?
Be thou the tenth Muse, ten times...Read more of this...
by
Friedrich von Schiller
Upon his battlements he stood,
And downward gazed in joyous mood,
On Samos' Isle, that owned his sway,
"All this is subject to my yoke;"
To Egypt's monarch thus he spoke,--
"That I am truly blest, then, say!"
"The immortals' favor thou hast known!
Thy sceptre's might has overthrown
All those who once were like to thee.
Yet to avenge them one lives still;
I cannot call thee blest,...Read more of this...
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