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Famous Waver Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Swinburne, Algernon Charles
...Watchman, what of the night? - 
Storm and thunder and rain, 
Lights that waver and wane,
Leaving the watchfires unlit. 
Only the balefires are bright, 
And the flash of the lamps now and then 
From a palace where spoilers sit, 
Trampling the children of men.

Prophet, what of the night? - 
I stand by the verge of the sea, 
Banished, uncomforted, free, 
Hearing the noise of the waves 
And sudden flashes that smite 
Some ma...Read more of this...



by Clough, Arthur Hugh
...t to see,
Ye silly folk Galilee?
The reed that in the wind doth shake?
The weed that washes in the lake?
The reeds that waver, the weeds that float?
A young man preaching in a boat.
What was it ye went out to hear
By sea and land from far and near?
A teacher? Rather seek the feet
Of those who sit in Moses' seat.
Go humbly seek, and bow to them,
Far off in great Jerusalem.
From them that in her courts ye saw,
Her perfect doctors of the law,
What is it came ye here ...Read more of this...

by Ingelow, Jean
...
Flusheth the rise with her purple favor,
  Gloweth the cleft with her golden ring,
'Twixt the two brown butterflies waver,
  Lightly settle, and sleepily swing.
We two walk till the purple dieth
  And short dry grass under foot is brown.
But one little streak at a distance lieth
  Green like a ribbon to prank the down.
II.

Over the grass we stepped unto it,
  And God He knoweth how blithe we were!
Never a voice to bid us eschew it:
  Hey the green ribbon that ...Read more of this...

by Sandburg, Carl
...YOU will come one day in a waver of love,
Tender as dew, impetuous as rain,
The tan of the sun will be on your skin,
The purr of the breeze in your murmuring speech,
You will pose with a hill-flower grace.

You will come, with your slim, expressive arms,
A poise of the head no sculptor has caught
And nuances spoken with shoulder and neck,
Your face in a pass-and-repass of moods
As...Read more of this...

by Browning, Robert
...d.

II.

Just as perhaps he mused ``My plans
``That soar, to earth may fall,
``Let once my army-leader Lannes
``Waver at yonder wall,''---
Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew
A rider, bound on bound
Full-galloping; nor bridle drew
Until he reached the mound.

III.

Then off there flung in smiling joy,
And held himself erect
By just his horse's mane, a boy:
You hardly could suspect---
(So tight he kept his lips compressed,
Scarce any blood came through)
Yo...Read more of this...



by St Vincent Millay, Edna
...lanets whirl
Dizzily round and round and round and round,
Like tops across a table, gathering speed
With every spin, to waver on the edge
One instant—looking over—and the next
To shudder and lurch forward out of sight—

 * * * * * * *

Ah, I am worn out—I am wearied out—
It is too much—I am but flesh and blood,
And I must sleep. Though you were dead again,
I am but flesh and blood and I must sleep....Read more of this...

by Byron, George (Lord)
..., 
Inspiring hope himself had ceased to feel. 
None fled, for well they knew that flight were vain, 
But those that waver turn to smite again, 
While yet they find the firmest of the foe 
Recoil before their leader's look and blow; 
Now girt with numbers, now almost alone, 
He foils their ranks, or reunites his own; 
Himself he spared not — once they seem'd to fly — 
Now was the time, he waved his hand on high, 
And shook — Why sudden droops that plumed crest? 
The shaft ...Read more of this...

by Bishop, Elizabeth
...workmanship,
 detail upon detail,
 cornice upon facade,

reaching up so languidly up into
a weak white sky, it seems to waver there.
 (Where it has slowly grown
 in skies of water-glass

from fused beads of iron and copper crystals,
the little chemical "garden" in a jar
 trembles and stands again,
 pale blue, blue-green, and brick.)

The sparrows hurriedly begin their play.
Then, in the West, "Boom!" and a cloud of smoke.
 "Boom!" and the exploding ball
 of bl...Read more of this...

by Milton, John
..., and Atheists; have brought scandal
To Israel diffidence of God, and doubt
In feeble hearts, propense anough before
To waver, or fall off and joyn with Idols:
Which is my chief affliction, shame and sorrow,
The anguish of my Soul, that suffers not
Mine eie to harbour sleep, or thoughts to rest.
This only hope relieves me, that the strife 
With me hath end; all the contest is now
'Twixt God and Dagon; Dagon hath presum'd,
Me overthrown, to enter lists with God,
His Deity ...Read more of this...

by Plath, Sylvia
...sphere
With moon-eye, mouth-pipe, He pipes. Pipes green. Pipes water.

Pipes water green until green waters waver
With reedy lengths and necks and undulatings.
And as his notes twine green, the green river

Shapes its images around his sons.
He pipes a place to stand on, but no rocks,
No floor: a wave of flickering grass tongues

Supports his foot. He pipes a world of snakes,
Of sways and coilings, from the snake-rooted bottom
Of his mind. And now ...Read more of this...

by Arnold, Matthew
...ngely smiling Goddess,
And thou, proved, much enduring,
Wave-toss'd Wanderer!
Who can stand still?
Ye fade, ye swim, ye waver before me--
The cup again!
Faster, faster,
O Circe, Goddess.
Let the wild, thronging train,
The bright procession
Of eddying forms,
Sweep through my soul!...Read more of this...

by Plath, Sylvia
...sea denies them and will pluck
fantastic flesh down to the honest bone.

We take the plunge; under water our limbs
waver, faintly green, shuddering away
from the genuine color of skin; can our dreams
ever blur the intransigent lines which draw
the shape that shuts us in? absolute fact
intrudes even when the revolted eye
is closed; the tub exists behind our back;
its glittering surfaces are blank and true.

Yet always the ridiculous nude flanks urge
the fabrication of...Read more of this...

by Bishop, Elizabeth
.... 
At night, a grog a l'américaine. 
I'd blaze it with a kitchen match 
and lovely diaphanous blue flame 
would waver, doubled in the window. 
There must be a stove; there is a chimney, 
askew, but braced with wires, 
and electricity, possibly 
--at least, at the back another wire 
limply leashes the whole affair 
to something off behind the dunes. 
A light to read by--perfect! But--impossible. 
And that day the wind was much too cold 
even to get that far...Read more of this...

by Lowell, Amy
...t the little moving shadows of leaves.
Tap! Tap!
The knocking makes the candles quaver,
And the long black hangings waver
Tap! Tap! Tap!
Tap! Tap!
In the ears which do not heed.
Tap! Tap!
Above the eyelids which do not flicker.
Tap! Tap!
Over the hands which do not stir.
Chiselled like a cameo of white agate against the hangings,
Struck to brilliance by the falling moonlight,
A face!
Sharp as a frozen flame,
Beautiful as an altar lamp of silver,
And still....Read more of this...

by Scott, Sir Walter
...age on thy helmet brave,
     Till sun and wind shall bleach the stain,
     And thou wilt bring it me again.
     I waver still.—O God! more bright
     Let reason beam her parting light!—
     O. by thy knighthood's honored sign,
     And for thy life preserved by mine,
     When thou shalt see a darksome man,
     Who boasts him Chief of Alpine's Clan,
     With tartars broad and shadowy plume,
     And hand of blood, and brow of gloom
     Be thy heart bold, th...Read more of this...

by Russell, George William
...and great,
You frighten the ships at sea,
Now come floating your delicate freight
Out of the lilac tree,

Wind you must waver a gossamer sail
To ferry a scent so light,
Will you carry my love a message as frail
Through the hawk-haunted night?

For my heart is sometimes strange and wild,
Bitter and bold and free,
I scare the beautiful timid child,
As you frighten the ships at sea;

But now when the hawks are piercing the air,
With the golden stars above,
The only thing that my...Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...golden cup.

So that she thought, "And who shall gaze upon
My palace with unblinded eyes,
While this great bow will waver in the sun,
And that sweet incense rise?"

For that sweet incense rose and never fail'd,
And, while day sank or mounted higher,
The light aërial gallery, golden-rail'd,
Burnt like a fringe of fire.

Likewise the deep-set windows, stain'd and traced,
Would seem slow-flaming crimson fires
From shadow'd grots of arches interlaced,
And tipt with frost-...Read more of this...

by Heaney, Seamus
...Perch on their water perch hung in the clear Bann River
Near the clay bank in alder dapple and waver,

Perch they called ‘grunts’, little flood-slubs, runty and ready,
I saw and I see in the river’s glorified body

That is passable through, but they’re bluntly holding the 
pass,
Under the water-roof, over the bottom, adoze

On the current, against it, all muscle and slur
In the finland of perch, the fenland of alder, on air

That is water, on carpets ...Read more of this...

by Arnold, Matthew
...ddess,
287 And thou, proved, much enduring,
288 Wave-toss'd Wanderer!
289 Who can stand still?
290 Ye fade, ye swim, ye waver before me--
291 The cup again! 

292 Faster, faster,
293 O Circe, Goddess.
294 Let the wild, thronging train,
295 The bright procession
296 Of eddying forms,
297 Sweep through my soul!...Read more of this...

by Chesterton, G K
...pire, all
We leaned our backs on like a wall
And blessed as stron as strong and blamed as stolid--
Can it be these that waver and fall?
And what is this like a ghost returning,
A dream grown strong in the strong daylight?
The all-forsaken, the unforgotten,
The ever-behind and out of sight.
We turned our backs and our blind flesh felt it
Growing and growing, a tower in height.

Ah, not alone the evil splendour
And not the insolent arms alone
Break with the ramrod, stif...Read more of this...

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Book: Reflection on the Important Things