Famous Tears Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Tears poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous tears poems. These examples illustrate what a famous tears poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
I see thine image through my tears to-night,
And yet to-day I saw thee smiling. How
Refer the cause?—Beloved, is it thou
Or I, who makes me sad? The acolyte
Amid the chanted joy and thankful rite
May so fall flat, with pale insensate brow,
On the altar-stair. I hear thy voice and vow,
Perplexed, uncertain, since thou art out of sight,
As he, in his swooning...Read more of this...
by
Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
Just as the dawn of Love was breaking
Across the weary world of grey,
Just as my life once more was waking
As roses waken late in May,
Fate, blindly cruel and havoc-making,
...Read more of this...
by
Omar Khayyam
Down fall the tears from skies enwrapt in gloom,
Without this drink, the flowers could never bloom!
As now these flowerets yield delight to me,
So shall my dust yield flowers,—God knows for whom....Read more of this...
by
Emily Dickinson
Endow the Living -- with the Tears --
You squander on the Dead,
And They were Men and Women -- now,
Around Your Fireside --
Instead of Passive Creatures,
Denied the Cherishing
Till They -- the Cherishing deny --
With Death's Ethereal Scron --...Read more of this...
by
Robert Herrick
Knew'st thou one month would take thy life away,
Thou'dst weep; but laugh, should it not last a day....Read more of this...
by
Andrew Marvell
How wisely Nature did decree,
With the same Eyes to weep and see!
That, having view'd the object vain,
They might be ready to complain.
And since the Self-deluding Sight,
In a false Angle takes each hight;
These Tears which better measure all,
Like wat'ry Lines and Plummets fall.
Two Tears, which Sorrow long did weigh
Within the Scales of either Eye,
And then paid out in equal Poise,
Are...Read more of this...
by
Brooks Haxton
Gripping the lectern, rocking it, searching
the faces for the souls, for signs of heartfelt
mindfulness at work, I thought, as I recited
words I wrote in tears: instead of tears,
if I had understood my father's business,
I could be selling men's clothes. I could be
kneeling, complimenting someone at the bay
of mirrors, mumblingly, with pinpoints pressed
between my lips. That was the life I...Read more of this...
by
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
How happens it that thou art sad,
While happy all appear?
Thine eye proclaims too well that thou
Hast wept full many a tear.
"If I have wept in solitude,
None other shares my grief,
And tears to me sweet balsam are,
And give my heart relief."
Thy happy friends invite thee now,--
Oh come, then, to our breast!
And let the loss thou hast sustain'd
Be there to us...Read more of this...
by
Robert Herrick
Come pity us, all ye who see
Our harps hung on the willow-tree;
Come pity us, ye passers-by,
Who see or hear poor widows' cry;
Come pity us, and bring your ears
And eyes to pity widows' tears.
CHOR. And when you are come hither,
Then we will keep
A fast, and weep
Our eyes out all together,
For Tabitha; who dead lies here,
Clean wash'd, and laid out for...Read more of this...
by
John Donne
O might those sighs and tears return again
Into my breast and eyes, which I have spent,
That I might in this holy discontent
Mourn with some fruit, as I have mourned in vain;
In mine Idolatry what showers of rain
Mine eyes did waste! what griefs my heart did rent!
That sufferance was my sin; now I repent;
'Cause I did suffer I must suffer...Read more of this...
by
Walt Whitman
TEARS! tears! tears!
In the night, in solitude, tears;
On the white shore dripping, dripping, suck’d in by the sand;
Tears—not a star shining—all dark and desolate;
Moist tears from the eyes of a muffled head:
—O who is that ghost?—that form in the dark, with tears?
What shapeless lump is that, bent, crouch’d there on the sand?
Streaming tears—sobbing...Read more of this...
by
Louise Bogan
All night the cocks crew, under a moon like day,
And I, in the cage of sleep, on a stranger's breast,
Shed tears, like a task not to be put away---
In the false light, false grief in my happy bed,
A labor of tears, set against joy's undoing.
I would not wake at your word, I had tears to say.
I clung to the...Read more of this...
by
Alfred Lord Tennyson
‘Te somnia nostra reducunt.’
OVID.
And ask ye why these sad tears stream?
Why these wan eyes are dim with weeping?
I had a dream–a lovely dream,
Of her that in the grave is sleeping.
I saw her as ’twas yesterday,
The bloom upon her cheek still glowing;
And round her play’d a golden ray,
And on her brows were gay flowers blowing.
With angel-hand she swept a lyre,
A...Read more of this...
by
Robert Herrick
Tears, though they're here below the sinner's brine,
Above, they are the Angels' spiced wine....Read more of this...
by
Lucy Maud Montgomery
With tears they buried you to-day,
But well I knew no turf could hold
Your gladness long beneath the mould,
Or cramp your laughter in the clay;
I smiled while others wept for you
Because I knew.
And now you sit with me to-night
Here in our old, accustomed place;
Tender and mirthful is your face,
Your eyes with starry joy are bright
Oh, you are merry as...Read more of this...
by
Emily Brontë
She dried her tears and they did smile
To see her cheeks' returning glow
How little dreaming all the while
That full heart throbbed to overflow
With that sweet look and lively tone
And bright eye shining all the day
They could not guess at midnight lone
How she would weep the time away...Read more of this...
by
Alfred Lord Tennyson
Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean,
Tears from the depth of some divine despair
Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes,
In looking on the happy Autumn-fields,
And thinking of the days that are no more.
Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail,
That brings our friends up from the underworld,
Sad as the last which reddens over one
That...Read more of this...
by
Lewis Carroll
When on the sandy shore I sit,
Beside the salt sea-wave,
And fall into a weeping fit
Because I dare not shave -
A little whisper at my ear
Enquires the reason of my fear.
I answer "If that ruffian Jones
Should recognise me here,
He'd bellow out my name in tones
Offensive to the ear:
He chaffs me so on being stout
(A thing that always puts me out)."
Ah...Read more of this...
by
Emile Verhaeren
I dedicate to your tears, to your smile, my gentlest thoughts, those I tell you, those also that remain undefined and too deep to tell.
I dedicate to your tears, to your smile, to your whole soul, my soul, with its tears and its smiles and its kiss.
See, the dawn whitens the ground that is the colour of lees of wine;...Read more of this...
by
Paul Laurence Dunbar
All hot and grimy from the road,
Dust gray from arduous years,
I sat me down and eased my load
Beside the Fount of Tears.
The waters sparkled to my eye,
Calm, crystal-like, and cool,
And breathing there a restful sigh,
I bent me to the pool.
When, lo! a voice cried: "Pilgrim, rise,
Harsh tho' the sentence be,
And on to other lands and skies—
This fount is not for...Read more of this...
by
Kahlil Gibran
As the Sun withdrew his rays from the garden, and the moon threw cushioned beams upon the flowers, I sat under the trees pondering upon the phenomena of the atmosphere, looking through the branches at the strewn stars which glittered like chips of silver upon a blue carpet; and I could hear from a distance the agitated murmur of...Read more of this...
by
Lizette Woodworth Reese
When I consider Life and its few years --
A wisp of fog betwixt us and the sun;
A call to battle, and the battle done
Ere the last echo dies within our ears;
A rose choked in the grass; an hour of fears;
The gusts that past a darkening shore do beat;
The burst of music down an unlistening street, --
I wonder at the...Read more of this...
by
William Shakespeare
What potions have I drunk of Siren tears,
Distilled from limbecks foul as hell within,
Applying fears to hopes, and hopes to fears,
Still losing when I saw my self to win!
What wretched errors hath my heart committed,
Whilst it hath thought it self so blessèd never!
How have mine eyes out of their spheres been fitted
In the distraction of this madding fever!
O, benefit...Read more of this...
by
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
THANK God, bless God, all ye who suffer not
More grief than ye can weep for. That is well--
That is light grieving ! lighter, none befell
Since Adam forfeited the primal lot.
Tears ! what are tears ? The babe weeps in its cot,
The mother singing, at her marriage-bell
The bride weeps, and before the oracle
Of high-faned hills the poet has forgot
Such moisture...Read more of this...
by
Alfred Lord Tennyson
Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean,
Tears from the depth of some divine despair
Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes,
In looking on the happy Autumn-fields,
And thinking of the days that are no more.
Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail,
That brings our friends up from the underworld,
Sad as the last which...Read more of this...
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