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Famous Timorous Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Brooke, Rupert
...ine,
Has, on the world's most noblest chord of song,
Struck certain magic strains. Ears satiate
With the clamorous, timorous whisperings of to-day,
Thrilled to perceive once more the spacious voice
And serene unterrance of old. We heard
-- With rapturous breath half-held, as a dreamer dreams
Who dares not know it dreaming, lest he wake --
The odorous, amorous style of poetry,
The melancholy knocking of those lines,
The long, low soughing of pentameters,
-- Or the shar...Read more of this...



by Graves, Robert
...d Sir Galahad lies hid 
In a cave with Captain Kidd. 
None of all the magic hosts,
None remain but a few ghosts 
Of timorous heart, to linger on 
Weeping for lost Babylon....Read more of this...

by Wilde, Oscar
...ent
Some goat-eared Pan to be their seneschal
For fear of bold Poseidon's ravishment,
And loose their girdles, with shy timorous eyes,
Lest from the surf his azure arms and purple beard should rise.

On this side and on that a rocky cave,
Hung with the yellow-belled laburnum, stands
Smooth is the beach, save where some ebbing wave
Leaves its faint outline etched upon the sands,
As though it feared to be too soon forgot
By the green rush, its playfellow, - and yet, it is a...Read more of this...

by Moore, Thomas
...Some men are born to gather women's tears,
To give a harbour to their timorous fears,
To take them as the dry earth takes the rain,
As the dark wood the warm wind from the plain;
Yet their own tears remain unshed,
Their own tumultuous fears unsaid,
And, seeming steadfast as the forest and the earth
Shaken are they with pain.
They cry for voice as earth might cry for the sea
Or the wood for consuming fire;
Unanswered they r...Read more of this...

by Shakespeare, William
...g sorrow,
If thou encounter with the boar to-morrow.

"But if thou needs wilt hunt, be rul'd by me;
Uncouple at the timorous flying hare,
Or at the fox which lives by subtlety,
Or at the roe which no encounter dare:
Pursue these fearful creatures o'er the downs,
And on they well-breath'd horse keep with they hounds.

"And when thou hast on food the purblind hare,
Mark the poor wretch, to overshoot his troubles
How he outruns with winds, and with what care
He cranks an...Read more of this...



by Keats, John
...not call this too indulged tongue
Presumptuous, in thus venturing to be heard."

 So far her voice flow'd on, like timorous brook
That, lingering along a pebbled coast,
Doth fear to meet the sea: but sea it met,
And shudder'd; for the overwhelming voice
Of huge Enceladus swallow'd it in wrath:
The ponderous syllables, like sullen waves
In the half-glutted hollows of reef-rocks,
Came booming thus, while still upon his arm
He lean'd; not rising, from supreme contempt.
...Read more of this...

by Marvell, Andrew
...nstrates, by the post, 
This Isle of Candy was on Essex' coast. 

Fresh messengers still the sad news assure; 
More timorous now we are than first secure. 
False terrors our believing fears devise, 
And the French army one from Calais spies. 
Bennet and May and those of shorter reach 
Change all for guineas, and a crown for each, 
But wiser men and well foreseen in chance 
In Holland theirs had lodged before, and France. 
Whitehall's unsafe; the court all medi...Read more of this...

by Wordsworth, William
...Bosom heav'd—she stepp'd aside;  As conscious of my Look, she stepp'd—  Then suddenly with timorous eye    She fled to me and wept.   She half inclosed me with her arms,  She press'd me with a meek embrace;  And bending back her head look'd up,    And gaz'd upon my face.   'Twas partly Love, and partly Fear,  And part...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...reason, to perplex and dash 
Maturest counsels: for his thoughts were low-- 
 To vice industrious, but to nobler deeds 
Timorous and slothful. Yet he pleased the ear, 
And with persuasive accent thus began:-- 
 "I should be much for open war, O Peers, 
As not behind in hate, if what was urged 
Main reason to persuade immediate war 
Did not dissuade me most, and seem to cast 
Ominous conjecture on the whole success; 
When he who most excels in fact of arms, 
In what he cou...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...olley; for he meant 
Not to destroy, but root them out of Heaven: 
The overthrown he raised, and as a herd 
Of goats or timorous flock together thronged 
Drove them before him thunder-struck, pursued 
With terrours, and with furies, to the bounds 
And crystal wall of Heaven; which, opening wide, 
Rolled inward, and a spacious gap disclosed 
Into the wasteful deep: The monstrous sight 
Struck them with horrour backward, but far worse 
Urged them behind: Headlong themselves the...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
...experience, quickest in sight
In all things that to greatest actions lead.
The wisest, unexperienced, will be ever 
Timorous, and loth, with novice modesty
(As he who, seeking asses, found a kingdom)
Irresolute, unhardy, unadventrous.
But I will bring thee where thou soon shalt quit
Those rudiments, and see before thine eyes
The monarchies of the Earth, their pomp and state—
Sufficient introduction to inform
Thee, of thyself so apt, in regal arts,
And regal mysteries;...Read more of this...

by Scott, Sir Walter
...crouch'd to France's yoke,
And Austria bent, and Prussia broke,
And the firm Russian's purpose brave
Was barter'd by a timorous slave--
Even then dishonour's peace he spurn'd,
The sullied olive-branch return'd,
Stood for his country's glory fast,
And nail'd her colours to the mast!
Heaven, to reward his firmness, gave
A portion in this honour'd grave;
And ne'er held marble in its trust
Of two such wondrous men the dust.

With more than mortal powers endow'd,
How high the...Read more of this...

by Whitman, Walt
...nst other breasts, it shall be you! 
My brain, it shall be your occult convolutions.

Root of wash’d sweet flag! timorous pond-snipe! nest of guarded duplicate
 eggs! it shall be you! 
Mix’d tussled hay of head, beard, brawn, it shall be you! 
Trickling sap of maple! fibre of manly wheat! it shall be you! 

Sun so generous, it shall be you! 
Vapors lighting and shading my face, it shall be you!
You sweaty brooks and dews, it shall be you! 
Winds whose soft-tick...Read more of this...

by Marvell, Andrew
...alour lessening Arthur's deeds, 
For holiness the Confessor exceeds. 

He first put arms into Religion's hand, 
And timorous Conscience unto Courage manned: 
The soldier taught that inward mail to wear, 
And fearing God how they should nothing fear. 
`Those strokes,' he said, `will pierce through all below 
Where those that strike from heaven fetch their blow.' 
Astonished armies did their flight prepare, 
And cities strong were storm?d by his prayer; 
Of that, fo...Read more of this...

by Schiller, Friedrich von
...are in the gulf now to spring?"

Yet all as before in silence stand,
When a page, with a modest pride,
Steps out of the timorous squirely band,
And his girdle and mantle soon throws aside,
And all the knights, and the ladies too,
The noble stripling with wonderment view.

And when he draws nigh to the rocky brow,
And looks in the gulf so black,
The waters that she had swallowed but now,
The howling Charybdis is giving back;
And, with the distant thunder's dull sound.
...Read more of this...

by Browning, Robert
...
The wild fruit-trees bend,
E'en the myrtle-leaves curl, shrink and shut— 
All is silent and grave— 
'Tis a sensual and timorous beauty— 
How fair, but a slave!
So, I turned to the sea,—and there slumbered
As greenly as ever
Those isles of the siren, your Galli;
No ages can sever
The Three, nor enable their sister
To join them,—half-way
On the voyage, she looked at Ulysses— 
No farther today;
Though the small one, just launched in the wave,
Watches breast-high and steady
From...Read more of this...

by Scott, Sir Walter
...an iron band;
     Beneath the broad and ample bone,
     That bucklered heart to fear unknown,
     A feeble and a timorous guest,
     The fieldfare framed her lowly nest;
     There the slow blindworm left his slime
     On the fleet limbs that mocked at time;
     And there, too, lay the leader's skull
     Still wreathed with chaplet, flushed and full,
     For heath-bell with her purple bloom
     Supplied the bonnet and the plume.
     All night, in this sa...Read more of this...

by Arnold, Matthew
...hee from thy own fair life,
Like us distracted, and like us unblest.
Soon, soon thy cheer would die,
Thy hopes grow timorous, and unfixed thy powers,
Adn thy clear aims be cross and shifting made;
And then thy glad perennial youth would fade,
Fade, and grow old at last, and die like ours.

Then fly our greetings, fly our speech and smiles!
- As some grave Tyrian trader, from the sea,
Descried at sunrise and emerging prow
Lifting the cool-haired creepers stealthily,
Th...Read more of this...

by Thomson, James
...laim the little Boon,
That Providence allows. The foodless Wilds
Pour forth their brown Inhabitants; the Hare,
Tho' timorous of Heart, and hard beset 
By Death, in various Forms, dark Snares, and Dogs,
And more unpitying Men, the Garden seeks,
Urg'd on by fearless Want. The bleating Kind
Eye the bleak Heavens, and next, the glistening Earth,
With Looks of dumb Despair; then sad, dispers'd,
Dig, for the wither'd Herb, thro' Heaps of Snow.

NOW, Shepherds, to your h...Read more of this...

by Shakespeare, William
...pies an adder
Wreath'd up in fatal folds just in his way,
The fear whereof doth make him shake and shudder;
Even so the timorous yelping of the hounds
Appals her senses and her spirit confounds.

For now she knows it is no gentle chase,
But the blunt boar, rough bear, or lion proud,
Because the cry remaineth in one place,
Where fearfully the dogs exclaim aloud:
Finding their enemy to be so curst,
They all strain court'sy who shall cope him first.

This dismal cry ring...Read more of this...

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