Famous Substitution Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Substitution

by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
 WHEN some beloved voice that was to you
Both sound and sweetness, faileth suddenly,
And silence, against which you dare not cry,
Aches round you like a strong disease and new--
What hope ? what help ? what music will undo
That silence to your sense ? Not friendship's sigh,
Not reason's subtle count; not melody
Of viols, nor of pipes that Faunus blew;
Not songs of...Read more of this...

Nostos

by Louise Gluck
 There was an apple tree in the yard --
this would have been
forty years ago -- behind,
only meadows. Drifts
of crocus in the damp grass.
I stood at that window:
late April. Spring
flowers in the neighbor's yard.
How many times, really, did the tree
flower on my birthday,
the exact day, not
before, not after? Substitution
of the immutable
for the shifting, the evolving.
Substitution of the image
for relentless earth....Read more of this...

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