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Famous Surround Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Brackenridge, Hugh Henry
...wake 
Till he himself has run his long career; 
Till all those glorious orbs of light on high 
The rolling wonders that surround the ball, 
Drop from their spheres extinguish'd and consum'd; 
When final ruin with her fiery car 
Rides o'er creation, and all nature's works 
Are lost in chaos and the womb of night....Read more of this...



by Byron, George (Lord)
...hy to love her. 

There chiefly I sought thee there only I found thee; 
Her glance was the best of the rays that surround thee; 
When it sparkled o'er aught that was bright in my story 15 
I knew it was love and I felt it was glory....Read more of this...

by Murray, Les
...tes ago were busy main streets, pointing:
There's a fellow weeping down there. No one can stop him.

The man we surround, the man no one approaches
simply weeps, and does not cover it, weeps
not like a child, not like the wind, like a man
and does not declaim it, nor beat his breast, nor even
sob very loudly - yet the dignity of his weeping

holds us back from his space, the hollow he makes about him
in the midday light, in his pentagram of sorrow,
and uniforms back i...Read more of this...

by Wilcox, Ella Wheeler
...nd black befeathered head
Still more repulsive seems with death's grim pallor wed.



XXI.
New forces gather on surrounding knolls, 
And fierce and fiercer war's red river rolls.
With bright-hued pennants flying from each lance
The gayly costumed Kiowas advance. 
And bold Comanches (Bedouins of the land) 
Infuse fresh spirit in the Cheyenne band.
While from the ambush of some dark ravine
Flash arrows aimed by hands, unerring and unseen.



XXIII.
T...Read more of this...

by Marvell, Andrew
...the earth that does at anchor ride. 
What refuge to escape them can be found, 
Whose watery leaguers all the world surround? 
Needs must we all their tributaries be, 
Whose navies hold the sluices of the sea. 
The ocean is the fountain of command, 
But that once took, we captives are on land. 
And those that have the waters for their share, 
Can quickly leave us neither earth nor air. 
Yet if through these our fears could find a pass, 
Through double oak, and...Read more of this...



by Neruda, Pablo
...irty hours' pregnant,
And the hoarse tomcats that cross my garden at night,
Like a collar of palpitating sexual oysters
Surround my solitary home,
Enemies of my soul,
Conspirators in pajamas
Who exchange deep kisses for passwords.
Radiant summer brings out the lovers
In melancholy regiments,
Fat and thin and happy and sad couples;
Under the elegant coconut palms, near the ocean and moon,
There is a continual life of pants and panties,
A hum from the fondling of silk stock...Read more of this...

by Marvell, Andrew
...artling next with listening ear, 
As one that some unusual noise does hear. 
With cannon, trumpets, drums, his door surround-- 
But let some other painter draw the sound. 
Thrice did he rise, thrice the vain tumult fled, 
But again thunders, when he lies in bed. 
His mind secure does the known stroke repeat 
And finds the drums Louis's march did beat. 

Shake then the room, and all his curtains tear 
And with blue streaks infect the taper clear, 
While the pal...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...n embraces forcible and foul 
Engendering with me, of that rape begot 
These yelling monsters, that with ceaseless cry 
Surround me, as thou saw'st--hourly conceived 
And hourly born, with sorrow infinite 
To me; for, when they list, into the womb 
That bred them they return, and howl, and gnaw 
My bowels, their repast; then, bursting forth 
Afresh, with conscious terrors vex me round, 
That rest or intermission none I find. 
Before mine eyes in opposition sits 
Grim Deat...Read more of this...

by Ashbery, John
...ster and faster: desk, papers, books,
Photographs of friends, the window and the trees
Merging in one neutral band that surrounds
Me on all sides, everywhere I look.
And I cannot explain the action of leveling,
Why it should all boil down to one
Uniform substance, a magma of interiors.
My guide in these matters is your self,
Firm, oblique, accepting everything with the same
Wraith of a smile, and as time speeds up so that it is soon
Much later, I can know only the str...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...me can they hide nothing, and would not if they could, 
I reckon I am their boss, and they make me a pet besides, 
And surround me and lead me, and run ahead when I walk, 
To lift their cunning covers, to signify me with stretch’d arms, and resume the way;
Onward we move! a gay gang of blackguards! with mirth-shouting music, and wild-flapping
 pennants of
 joy! 

4
I am the actor, the actress, the voter, the politician; 
The emigrant and the exile, the criminal that stood in...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...cent, 
Exactly the contents of one, and exactly the contents of two, and which is
 ahead? 

4
Trippers and askers surround me; 
People I meet—the effect upon me of my early life, or the ward and city I
 live in, or the nation, 
The latest dates, discoveries, inventions, societies, authors old and new,
My dinner, dress, associates, looks, compliments, dues, 
The real or fancied indifference of some man or woman I love, 
The sickness of one of my folks, or of myself...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...ortal! clasp hands, 
And ever henceforth Sisters dear be both. 

Fear not, O Muse! truly new ways and days receive, surround you, 
(I candidly confess, a *****, ***** race, of novel fashion,) 
And yet the same old human race—the same within, without,
Faces and hearts the same—feelings the same—yearnings the same, 
The same old love—beauty and use the same. 

5
We do not blame thee, Elder World—nor separate ourselves from thee: 
(Would the Son separate himself from the...Read more of this...

by Ondaatje, Michael
...Speaking to you
this hour
these days when
I have lost the feather of poetry
and the rains
of separation 
surround us tock
tock like Go tablets

Everyone has learned 
to move carefully

'Dancing' 'laughing' 'bad taste'
is a memory
a tableau behind trees of law

In the midst of love for you
my wife's suffering
anger in every direction
and the children wise
as tough shrubs
but they are not tough
--so I fear
how anything can grow from this

all the wise blood
poure...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...s, America! take them, South, and take them, North! 
Make welcome for them everywhere, for they are your own offspring;
Surround them, East and West! for they would surround you; 
And you precedents! connect lovingly with them, for they connect lovingly with
 you. 

I conn’d old times; 
I sat studying at the feet of the great masters: 
Now, if eligible, O that the great masters might return and study me!

In the name of These States, shall I scorn the antique? 
Why These ...Read more of this...

by Jeffers, Robinson
...hile: what else? Men sold for toys.

Uneasy and fractional people, having no center
But in the eyes and mouths that surround them,
Having no function but to serve and support
Civilization, the enemy of man,
No wonder they live insanely, and desire
With their tongues, progress; with their eyes, pleasure; with their hearts, death.

Their ancestors were good hunters, good herdsmen and swordsman,
But now the world is turned upside down;
The good do evil, the hope's in cri...Read more of this...

by Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
...enter my castle wall! 

They climb up into my turret 
O'er the arms and back of my chair; 
If I try to escape, they surround me; 
They seem to be everywhere. 

They almost devour me with kisses, 
Their arms about me entwine, 
Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen 
In his Mouse-Tower on the Rhine! 

Do you think, O blue-eyed banditti, 
Because you have scaled the wall, 
Such an old mustache as I am 
Is not a match for you all! 

I have you fast in my fortre...Read more of this...

by Seeger, Alan
...forever flecked
With the warm sunshine of midsummer days;
Oft where the long straight allies intersect
And marble seats surround the open space,
Where a tiled pool and sculptured fountain stand,
Hath Evening found them seated, silent, hand in hand.

When twilight deepened, in the gathering shade
Beneath that old titanic cypress row,
Whose sombre vault and towering colonnade
Dwarfed the enfolded forms that moved below,
Oft with close steps these happy lovers strayed,
Till ...Read more of this...

by Stephens, James
...ons trod 
By Me and Mine shall never cease to be, 
For you are but the magnitude of Me, 
The width of My extension, the surround 
Of My dense splendour. Rolling, rolling round, 
To steeped infinity, and out beyond 
My own strong comprehension, you are bond 
And servile to My doings. Let you swing 
More wide and ever wide, you do but fling 
Around the instant Me, and measure still 
The breadth and proportion of My Will. 

Then stooping to the hut -- a beehive round...Read more of this...

by Pope, Alexander
...onders of her Face;
Sees by Degrees a purer Blush arise,
And keener Lightnings quicken in her Eyes.
The busy Sylphs surround their darling Care;
These set the Head, and those divide the Hair,
Some fold the Sleeve, while others plait the Gown;
And Betty's prais'd for Labours not her own.


Part 2

NOT with more Glories, in th' Etherial Plain,
The Sun first rises o'er the purpled Main,
Than issuing forth, the Rival of his Beams
Lanch'd on the Bosom of the Silver Thames....Read more of this...

by Eliot, T S (Thomas Stearns)
...wn circle, a circle closed on the outside; and, with all its
elements alike, every sphere is opaque to the others which surround
it. . . . In brief, regarded as an existence which appears in a soul,
the whole world for each is peculiar and private to that soul."
425. V. Weston, From Ritual to Romance; chapter on the Fisher
King.
428. V. Purgatorio, xxvi. 148.
 "'Ara vos prec
per aquella valor
 'que vos guida
al som de l'escalina...Read more of this...

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Book: Reflection on the Important Things