Famous Visual Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Howl

...eamt and made incarnate gaps in Time & Space through images juxtaposed, and trapped the archangel of the soul between 2 visual images and joined the elemental verbs and set the noun and dash of consciousness together jumping with sensation of Pater Omnipotens Aeterna Deus
to recreate the syntax and measure of poor human prose and stand before you speechless and intelligent and shaking with shame, rejected yet confessing out the soul to conform to the rhythm of thought in his...Read more of this...
by Ginsberg, Allen


MFingal - Canto III

...d state,
Seen through perspective of the grate:
So now M'Fingal's Second-sight
Beheld all things in gloomier light;
His visual nerve, well purged with tar,
Saw all the coming scenes of war.
As his prophetic soul grew stronger,
He found he could hold in no longer.
First from the pole, as fierce he shook,
His wig from pitchy durance broke,
His mouth unglued, his feathers flutter'd,
His tarr'd skirts crack'd, and thus he utter'd.


"Ah, Mr. Constable, in vain
We strive 'gainst w...Read more of this...
by Trumbull, John

Paradise Lost: Book 03

...ard still direct, whence no way round 
Shadow from body opaque can fall; and the air, 
No where so clear, sharpened his visual ray 
To objects distant far, whereby he soon 
Saw within ken a glorious Angel stand, 
The same whom John saw also in the sun: 
His back was turned, but not his brightness hid; 
Of beaming sunny rays a golden tiar 
Circled his head, nor less his locks behind 
Illustrious on his shoulders fledge with wings 
Lay waving round; on some great charge employe...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

Paradise Lost: Book 11

...the film removed, 
Which that false fruit that promised clearer sight 
Had bred; then purged with euphrasy and rue 
The visual nerve, for he had much to see; 
And from the well of life three drops instilled. 
So deep the power of these ingredients pierced, 
Even to the inmost seat of mental sight, 
That Adam, now enforced to close his eyes, 
Sunk down, and all his spirits became entranced; 
But him the gentle Angel by the hand 
Soon raised, and his attention thus recalled. 
A...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

Prayer

...aking of their unison (turning, re-
 infolding,
entering and exiting their own unison in unison) making of themselves a
visual current, one that cannot freight or sway by
minutest fractions the water's downdrafts and upswirls, the
dockside cycles of finally-arriving boat-wakes, there where
they hit deeper resistance, water that seems to burst into
itself (it has those layers) a real current though mostly
invisible sending into the visible (minnows) arrowing
 motion that force...Read more of this...
by Graham, Jorie


Samson Agonistes

...s of the body dwells,
Shut up from outward light 
To incorporate with gloomy night;
For inward light alas
Puts forth no visual beam.
O mirror of our fickle state,
Since man on earth unparallel'd!
The rarer thy example stands,
By how much from the top of wondrous glory,
Strongest of mortal men,
To lowest pitch of abject fortune thou art fall'n.
For him I reckon not in high estate 
Whom long descent of birth
Or the sphear of fortune raises;
But thee whose strength, while vertue...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

The Milkmaid

...pe a tear; 
 Is it that passing train, 
Whose alien whirr offends her country ear? - 

 Nay! Phyllis does not dwell 
On visual and familiar things like these; 
 What moves her is the spell 
Of inner themes and inner poetries: 

 Could but by Sunday morn 
Her gay new gown come, meads might dry to dun, 
 Trains shriek till ears were torn, 
If Fred would not prefer that Other One....Read more of this...
by Hardy, Thomas

The stoddards

...arks at me as I enter through the door;
The Cerberus would fain begrudge what sights it cannot see,
The rapture of that visual feast it cannot share with me;
A miniature edition this--this most absurd of hounds--
A genuine unique, I'm sure, and one unknown to Lowndes.

Books--always books--are piled around; some musty, and all old;
Tall, solemn folios such as Lamb declared he loved to hold;
Large paper copies with their virgin margins white and wide,
And presentation volumes ...Read more of this...
by Field, Eugene

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