Famous Unerring Poems by Famous Poets

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

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The Infanticide

by Friedrich von Schiller
 Hark where the bells toll, chiming, dull and steady,
The clock's slow hand hath reached the appointed time.
Well, be it so--prepare, my soul is ready,
Companions of the grave--the rest for crime!
Now take, O world! my last farewell--receiving
My parting kisses--in these tears they dwell!
Sweet are thy poisons while we taste believing,
Now we are quits--heart-poisoner, fare-thee-well!

Farewell, ye suns that once to joy...Read more of this...

Elegy on the Death of Lady Middleton

by Mary Darby Robinson
 THE knell of death, that on the twilight gale, 
Swells its deep murmur to the pensive ear; 
In awful sounds repeats a mournful tale, 
And claims the tribute of a tender tear. 

The dreadful hour is past ! the mandate giv'n! 
The gentle MIDDLETON shall breathe no more, 
Yet who shall blame the wise decrees of Heaven, 
Or the...Read more of this...

Ode to the Moon

by Mary Darby Robinson
 PALE GODDESS of the witching hour;
Blest Contemplation's placid friend; 
Oft in my solitary bow'r,
I mark thy lucid beam
From thy crystal car descend,
Whitening the spangled heath, and limpid sapphire stream. 

And oft, amidst the shades of night
I court thy undulating light;
When Fairies dance around the verdant ring,
Or frisk beside the bubbling spring,
When the thoughtless SHEPHERD'S song
Echoes thro' the silent air,
As...Read more of this...

Ode to Eloquence

by Mary Darby Robinson
 HAIL! GODDESS of persuasive art! 
The magic of whose tuneful tongue 
Lulls to soft harmony the wand'ring heart 
With fascinating song; 
O, let me hear thy heav'n-taught strain, 
As thro' my quiv'ring pulses steal 
The mingling throbs of joy and pain, 
Which only sensate minds can feel; 
Ah ! let me taste the bliss supreme, 
Which thy warm touch...Read more of this...

On the Death of a young Lady of Five Years of Age

by Phillis Wheatley
From dark abodes to fair etherial light
Th' enraptur'd innocent has wing'd her flight;
On the kind bosom of eternal love
She finds unknown beatitude above.
This known, ye parents, nor her loss deplore,
She feels the iron hand of pain no more;
The dispensations of unerring grace,
Should turn your sorrows into grateful praise;
Let then no tears for her henceforward flow,
No more distress'd in our dark...Read more of this...

Child of Europe

by Czeslaw Milosz
 1
We, whose lungs fill with the sweetness of day.
Who in May admire trees flowering
Are better than those who perished.

We, who taste of exotic dishes,
And enjoy fully the delights of love,
Are better than those who were buried.

We, from the fiery furnaces, from behind barbed wires
On which the winds of endless autumns howled,
We, who remember battles where the wounded air roared...Read more of this...

Psalm 139 part 2

by Isaac Watts
 The wonderful formation of man.

'Twas from thy hand, my God, I came,
A work of such a curious frame
In me thy fearful wonders shine,
And each proclaims thy skill divine.

Thine eyes did all my limbs survey,
Which yet in dark confusion lay;
Thou saw'st the daily growth they took,
Formed by the model of thy book.

By thee my growing parts were named,
And what thy...Read more of this...

Genius

by Friedrich von Schiller
 "Do I believe," sayest thou, "what the masters of wisdom would teach me,
And what their followers' band boldly and readily swear?
Cannot I ever attain to true peace, excepting through knowledge,
Or is the system upheld only by fortune and law?
Must I distrust the gently-warning impulse, the precept
That thou, Nature, thyself hast in my bosom impressed,
Till the schools have affixed to...Read more of this...

What man, what hero (QUEMN VIRUM AUT HEROA)

by Horace
     What man, what hero, Clio sweet,
       On harp or flute wilt thou proclaim?
     What god shall echo's voice repeat
       In mocking game
     To Helicon's sequester'd shade,
       Or Pindus, or...Read more of this...

Parabola

by Alec Derwent (A D) Hope
 Year after year the princess lies asleep 
Until the hundred years foretold are done, 
Easily drawing her enchanted breath. 
Caught on the monstrous thorns around the keep, 
Bones of the youths who sought her, one by one 
Rot loose and rattle to the ground beneath.

But when the Destined Lover at last shall come, 
For whom alone Fortune reserves the...Read more of this...

115. The Farewell to the Brethren of St. James's Lodge Tarbolton

by Robert Burns
 ADIEU! a heart-warm fond adieu;
 Dear brothers of the mystic tie!
Ye favourèd, enlighten’d few,
 Companions of my social joy;
Tho’ I to foreign lands must hie,
 Pursuing Fortune’s slidd’ry ba’;
With melting heart, and brimful eye,
 I’ll mind you still, tho’ far awa.


Oft have I met your social band,
 And spent the cheerful, festive night;
Oft, honour’d with supreme command,
 Presided o’er...Read more of this...

112. A Dream

by Robert Burns
 GUID-MORNIN’ to our Majesty!
 May Heaven augment your blisses
On ev’ry new birth-day ye see,
 A humble poet wishes.
My bardship here, at your Levee
 On sic a day as this is,
Is sure an uncouth sight to see,
 Amang thae birth-day dresses
 Sae fine this day.


I see ye’re complimented thrang,
 By mony a lord an’ lady;
“God save the King” ’s a...Read more of this...

Salts And Oils

by Philip Levine
 In Havana in 1948 I ate fried dog
believing it was Peking duck. Later,
in Tampa I bunked with an insane sailor
who kept a .38 Smith and Wesson in his shorts.
In the same room were twins, oilers
from Toledo, who argued for hours
each night whose turn it was
to get breakfast and should he turn
the eggs or not. On the way north
I lived...Read more of this...

A Poem Sacred to the Memory of Sir Isaac Newton

by James Thomson
 Shall the great soul of Newton quit this earth, 
To mingle with his stars; and every muse,
Astonish'd into silence, shun the weight
Of honours due to his illustrious name?
But what can man?--Even now the sons of light,
In strains high-warbled to seraphic lyre,
Hail his arrival on the coast of bliss.
Yet am not I deterr'd, though high the theme,
And sung to harps...Read more of this...

To the Rev. Dr. Thomas Amory

by Phillis Wheatley
 To cultivate in ev'ry noble mind
Habitual grace, and sentiments refin'd,
Thus while you strive to mend the human heart,
Thus while the heav'nly precepts you impart,
O may each bosom catch the sacred fire,
And youthful minds to Virtue's throne aspire!
When God's eternal ways you set in sight,
And Virtue shines in all her native light,
In vain would Vice her works in night conceal,
For...Read more of this...

America

by Claude McKay
 Although she feeds me bread of bitterness,
And sinks into my throat her tiger's tooth,
Stealing my breath of life, I will confess
I love this cultured hell that tests my youth!
Her vigor flows like tides into my blood,
Giving me strength erect against her hate.
Her bigness sweeps my being like a flood.
Yet as a rebel fronts a king in state,
I stand within...Read more of this...

Psalm 66 part 1

by Isaac Watts
 Governing power and goodness; or, Our graces tried by afflictions.

Sing, all ye nations, to the Lord,
Sing with a joyful noise;
With melody of sound record
His honors and your joys.

Say to the Power that shakes the sky,
"How terrible art thou!
Sinners before thy presence fly,
Or at thy feet they bow."

[Come, see the wonders of our God,
How glorious are his ways!
In Moses' hand...Read more of this...

The Touchstone

by William Allingham
 A man there came, whence none could tell, 
Bearing a Touchstone in his hand; 
And tested all things in the land 
By its unerring spell. 

Quick birth of transmutation smote 
The fair to foul, the foul to fair; 
Purple nor ermine did he spare, 
Nor scorn the dusty coat. 

Of heirloom jewels, prized so much, 
Were many changed to...Read more of this...

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