Famous Very Softly Poems by Famous Poets

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

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How MGinnis went missing

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 Let us cease our idle chatter, 
Let the tears bedew our cheek, 
For a man from Tallangatta 
Has been missing for a week. 
Where the roaring flooded Murray 
Covered all the lower land, 
There he started in a hurry, 
With a bottle in his hand. 

And his fate is hid for ever, 
But the public seem to think 
That...Read more of this...

The Old Men Used to Sing

by Alice Walker
The old men used to sing
And lifted a brother
Carefully
Out the door
I used to think they
Were born
Knowing how to
Gently swing
A casket
They shuffled softly
Eyes dry
More awkward
With the flowers
Than with the widow
After they'd put the
Body in
And stood around waiting
In their
Brown suits. ...Read more of this...

The Rose Of Peace

by William Butler Yeats
 If Michael, leader of God's host
When Heaven and Hell are met,
Looked down on you from Heaven's door-post
He would his deeds forget.

Brooding no more upon God's wars
In his divine homestead,
He would go weave out of the stars
A chaplet for your head.

And all folk seeing him bow down,
And white stars tell your praise,
Would come at last to God's great town,
Led on...Read more of this...

Black Moran

by Robert William Service
 The mule-skinner was Bill Jerome, the passengers were three;
Two tinhorns from the dives of Nome, and Father Tim McGee.
And as for sunny Southland bound, through weary woods they sped,
The solitude that ringed them round was silent as the dead.

Then when the trail crooked crazily, the frost-rimed horses reared,
And from behind a fallen tree a grim galoot appeared;
He wore a...Read more of this...

Alice

by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Know you, winds that blow your course
Down the verdant valleys,
That somewhere you must, perforce,
Kiss the brow of Alice?
When her gentle face you find,
Kiss it softly, naughty wind.
Roses waving fair and sweet
Thro' the garden alleys,
Grow into a glory meet
For the eye of Alice;
Let the wind your offering bear
Of sweet perfume, faint and rare.
Lily holding crystal dew
In your pure white chalice,
Nature kind...Read more of this...

The Invisible Bride

by Edwin Markham
 THE low-voiced girls that go 
In gardens of the Lord, 
Like flowers of the field they grow 
In sisterly accord. 

Their whispering feet are white 
Along the leafy ways; 
They go in whirls of light 
Too beautiful for praise. 

And in their band forsooth 
Is one to set me free-- 
The one that touched my youth-- 
The one God...Read more of this...

In The Naked Bed In Platos Cave

by Delmore Schwartz
 In the naked bed, in Plato's cave, 
Reflected headlights slowly slid the wall,
Carpenters hammered under the shaded window,
Wind troubled the window curtains all night long,
A fleet of trucks strained uphill, grinding,
Their freights covered, as usual.
The ceiling lightened again, the slanting diagram
Slid slowly forth.
 Hearing the milkman's clop,
his striving up the stair, the bottle's chink,
I rose from bed, lit a...Read more of this...

Canzone XII

by Francesco Petrarch
CANZONE XII. Una donna più bella assai che 'l sole. GLORY AND VIRTUE.  A lady, lovelier, brighter than the sun,Like him superior o'er all time and space,Of rare resistless grace,Me to her train in early life had won:She, from that hour, in act, and word and thought,—For still the world...Read more of this...

North and South

by Claude McKay
 O sweet are tropic lands for waking dreams! 
There time and life move lazily along. 
There by the banks of blue-and-silver streams 
Grass-sheltered crickets chirp incessant song, 
Gay-colored lizards loll all through the day, 
Their tongues outstretched for careless little flies, 
And swarthy children in the fields at play, 
Look upward laughing at the smiling skies. 
A breath of...Read more of this...

Loneliness

by Katherine Mansfield
 Now it is Loneliness who comes at night
Instead of Sleep, to sit beside my bed.
Like a tired child I lie and wait her tread,
I watch her softly blowing out the light.
Motionless sitting, neither left or right
She turns, and weary, weary droops her head.
She, too, is old; she, too, has fought the fight.
So, with the laurel she is garlanded.

Through the...Read more of this...

The Garden of Kama:

by Adela Florence Cory Nicolson
   When I am dying, lean over me tenderly, softly,
     Stoop, as the yellow roses droop in the wind from the South.
   So I may, when I wake, if there be an Awakening,
     Keep, what lulled me to sleep, the touch of your lips on my mouth....Read more of this...

Woman In Love

by Rainer Maria Rilke
 That is my window. Just now
I have so softly wakened.
I thought that I would float.
How far does my life reach,
and where does the night begin

I could think that everything
was still me all around;
transparent like a crystal's
depths, darkened, mute.

I could keep even the stars
within me; so immense
my heart seems to me; so willingly
it let him go again.

whom I began perhaps...Read more of this...

Alexanders Feast; Or The Power Of Music

by John Dryden
 'Twas at the royal feast for Persia won
By Philip's warlike son— 
Aloft in awful state
The godlike hero sate
On his imperial throne;
His valiant peers were placed around,
Their brows with roses and with myrtles bound
(So should desert in arms be crowned);
The lovely Thais by his side
Sate like a blooming eastern bride
In flower of youth and beauty's pride:— 
Happy, happy, happy pair!
None...Read more of this...

Half-waking

by William Allingham
 I thought it was the little bed 
I slept in long ago; 
A straight white curtain at the head, 
And two smooth knobs below. 
I thought I saw the nursery fire, 
And in a chair well-known 
My mother sat, and did not tire 
With reading all alone. 
If I should make the slightest sound 
To show that I'm awake,...Read more of this...

A Sincere Man Am I

by José Martí
A sincere man am I
From the land where palm trees grow,
And I want before I die
My soul's verses to bestow.

I'm a traveler to all parts,
And a newcomer to none:
I am art among the arts,
With the mountains I am one.

I know how to name and class
All the strange flowers that grow;
I know every blade of grass,
Fatal lie and sublime woe.

I have...Read more of this...

A Late Walk

by Robert Frost
 When I go up through the mowing field,
The headless aftermath,
Smooth-laid like thatch with the heavy dew,
Half closes the garden path.

And when I come to the garden ground,
The whir of sober birds
Up from the tangle of withered weeds
Is sadder than any words

A tree beside the wall stands bare,
But a leaf that lingered brown,
Disturbed, I doubt not, by my thought,
Comes softly...Read more of this...

The Shanty On The Rise

by Henry Lawson
 When the caravans of wool-teams climbed the ranges from the West, 
On a spur among the mountains stood `The Bullock-drivers' Rest'; 
It was built of bark and saplings, and was rather rough inside, 
But 'twas good enough for bushmen in the careless days that died -- 
Just a quiet little shanty kept by `Something-in-Disguise', 
As the bushmen called the...Read more of this...

A Sunbeam

by Fannie Isabelle Sherrick
The sun was hid all day by clouds,
  The rain fell softly down;
A cold gray mist hung o'er the earth,
  And veiled the silent town.
Behind the clouds a sunbeam crept
  With restless wings of gold;
The skies above were bright and warm,
  The earth below was cold.
It glanced along the heavy clouds,
  Then sought to glide...Read more of this...

Lilys Menagerie

by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
 [Goethe describes this much-admired Poem, which 
he wrote in honour of his love Lily, as being "designed to change 
his surrender of her into despair, by drolly-fretful images."]

THERE'S no menagerie, I vow,

Excels my Lily's at this minute;

She keeps the strangest creatures in it,
And catches them, she knows not how.

Oh, how they hop, and run, and rave,
And their clipp'd pinions...Read more of this...

First Party At Ken Keseys With Hells Angels

by Allen Ginsberg
 Cool black night thru redwoods
cars parked outside in shade
behind the gate, stars dim above
the ravine, a fire burning by the side
porch and a few tired souls hunched over
in black leather jackets. In the huge
wooden house, a yellow chandelier 
at 3 A.M. the blast of loudspeakers
hi-fi Rolling Stones Ray Charles Beatles
Jumping Joe Jackson and twenty youths
dancing to the vibration thru...Read more of this...

A Death - Scene

by Emily Brontë
 "O day! he cannot die
When thou so fair art shining!
O Sun, in such a glorious sky,
So tranquilly declining; 

He cannot leave thee now,
While fresh west winds are blowing,
And all around his youthful brow
Thy cheerful light is glowing! 

Edward, awake, awake -
The golden evening gleams
Warm and bright on Arden's lake -
Arouse thee from thy dreams! 

Beside thee, on my knee,
My...Read more of this...

Sonnet LXXIX

by Francesco Petrarch
SONNET LXXIX. L' aura mia sacra al mio stanco riposo. HE TELLS HER IN SLEEP OF HIS SUFFERINGS, AND, OVERCOME BY HER SYMPATHY, AWAKES.  On my oft-troubled sleep my sacred airSo softly breathes, at last I courage take,To tell her of my past and present ache,Which never in her life my heart...Read more of this...

Insomnia

by Robert William Service
 Heigh ho! to sleep I vainly try;
Since twelve I haven't closed an eye,
And now it's three, and as I lie,
From Notre Dame to St. Denis
The bells of Paris chime to me;
"You're young," they say, "and strong and free."

I do not turn with sighs and groans
To ease my limbs, to rest my bones,
As if my bed were stuffed with stones,
No...Read more of this...

They Flee from Me

by Sir Thomas Wyatt
They flee from me that sometime did me seek
   With naked foot stalking in my chamber.
I have seen them gentle tame and meek
   That now are wild and do not remember
   That sometime they put themselves in danger
To take bread at my hand; and now they range
Busily seeking with a continual change.

Thanked be fortune,...Read more of this...

Without You

by Hermann Hesse
 My Pillow gazes upon me at night
Empty as a gravestone;
I never thought it would be so bitter
To be alone,
Not to lie down asleep in your hair.

I lie alone in a silent house,
The hanging lamp darkened,
And gently stretch out my hands
To gather in yours,
And softly press my warm mouth
Toward you, and kiss myself, exhausted and weak-
Then suddenly I'm awake
And all...Read more of this...

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