Famous Well Hung Poems by Famous Poets

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

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Asleep

by Wilfred Owen
 Under his helmet, up against his pack,
After the many days of work and waking,
Sleep took him by the brow and laid him back.
And in the happy no-time of his sleeping,
Death took him by the heart. There was a quaking
Of the aborted life within him leaping ...
Then chest and sleepy arms once more fell slack.
And soon the slow, stray blood...Read more of this...

A Bucolic Betwixt Two;lacon And Thyrsis

by Robert Herrick
 LACON. For a kiss or two, confess,
What doth cause this pensiveness,
Thou most lovely neat-herdess?
Why so lonely on the hill?
Why thy pipe by thee so still,
That erewhile was heard so shrill?
Tell me, do thy kine now fail
To fulfil the milking-pail?
Say, what is't that thou dost ail?

THYR. None of these; but out, alas!
A mischance is come to pass,
And I'll tell thee...Read more of this...

Q was a Quince that hung

by Edward Lear
Q  was a Quince that hungUpon a garden tree; Papa he brought it with him home,And ate it with his tea. ...Read more of this...

The Chimney-Sweepers Song

by William Strode
 Hath Christmas furr'd your Chimneys,
Or have the maides neglected,
Doe Fire-balls droppe from your Chimney's toppe,
The Pidgin is respected,
Looke up with feare and horror,
O how my mistresse wonders!
The streete doth crie, the newes doth flie,
The boyes they thinke it thunders.


Then up I rush with my pole and brush,
I scowre the chimney's Jacket,
I make it shine as bright as mine,
When I...Read more of this...

The straw parlor

by Eugene Field
 Way up at the top of a big stack of straw
Was the cunningest parlor that ever you saw!
And there could you lie when aweary of play
And gossip or laze in the coziest way;
No matter how careworn or sorry one's mood
No worldly distraction presumed to intrude.
As a refuge from onerous mundane ado
I think I approve of straw parlors, don't you?

A...Read more of this...

Witchcraft was hung in History

by Emily Dickinson
 'Twas such a little -- little boat
That toddled down the bay!
'Twas such a gallant -- gallant sea
That beckoned it away!

'Twas such a greedy, greedy wave
That licked it from the Coast --
Nor ever guessed the stately sails
My little craft was lost!...Read more of this...

Whitsunday

by George Herbert
 Listen sweet Dove unto my song, 
And spread thy golden wings in me; 
Hatching my tender heart so long, 
Till it get wing, and fly away with thee.

Where is that fire which once descended
On thy Apostles? thou didst then
Keep open house, richly attended, 
Feasting all comers by twelve chosen men.

Such glorious gifts thou didst bestow, 
That th'earth did like...Read more of this...

Christmas treasures

by Eugene Field
 I count my treasures o'er with care.--
The little toy my darling knew,
A little sock of faded hue,
A little lock of golden hair.

Long years ago this holy time,
My little one--my all to me--
Sat robed in white upon my knee
And heard the merry Christmas chime.

"Tell me, my little golden-head,
If Santa Claus should come to-night,
What shall he bring my baby bright,--
What treasure...Read more of this...

My Queen

by Fannie Isabelle Sherrick
A fair sweet blossom is born for you,
   A beautiful rose, my queen!
 And never was flower so fair as this,
   Oh, never so fair, I ween!
A banner is hung in the western sky
Of colors that flash ere they fade and die;
And the rippling waves where the waters run
Are stained with the gold of the summer...Read more of this...

Orpheus with his Lute Made Trees

by William Shakespeare
 Orpheus with his lute made trees,
And the mountain tops that freeze,
Bow themselves, when he did sing:
To his music plants and flowers
Ever sprung; as sun and showers
There had made a lasting spring.

Everything that heard him play,
Even the billows of the sea,
Hung their heads, and then lay by.
In sweet music is such art,
Killing care and grief of heart
Fall asleep, or hearing,...Read more of this...

The Lion For Real

by Allen Ginsberg
 "Soyez muette pour moi, Idole contemplative..."


I came home and found a lion in my living room
Rushed out on the fire escape screaming Lion! Lion!
Two stenographers pulled their brunnette hair and banged the window shut
I hurried home to Patterson and stayed two days

Called up old Reichian analyst
who'd kicked me out of therapy for smoking marijuana
'It's happened' I panted 'There's a...Read more of this...

On the Threshold

by Amy Levy
 O God, my dream! I dreamed that you were dead;
Your mother hung above the couch and wept
Whereon you lay all white, and garlanded
With blooms of waxen whiteness. I had crept
Up to your chamber-door, which stood ajar,
And in the doorway watched you from afar,
Nor dared advance to kiss your lips and brow.
I had no part nor lot in you, as...Read more of this...

Super Flumina Babylonis

by Algernon Charles Swinburne
 By the waters of Babylon we sat down and wept,
Remembering thee,
That for ages of agony hast endured, and slept,
And wouldst not see.

By the waters of Babylon we stood up and sang,
Considering thee,
That a blast of deliverance in the darkness rang,
To set thee free.

And with trumpets and thunderings and with morning song
Came up the light;
And thy spirit uplifted thee to...Read more of this...

Athanasia

by Oscar Wilde
 To that gaunt House of Art which lacks for naught
Of all the great things men have saved from Time,
The withered body of a girl was brought
Dead ere the world's glad youth had touched its prime,
And seen by lonely Arabs lying hid
In the dim womb of some black pyramid.

But when they had unloosed the linen band
Which swathed the Egyptian's body,...Read more of this...

A Fairy Tale

by Amy Lowell
 On winter nights beside the nursery fire
We read the fairy tale, while glowing coals
Builded its pictures. There before our eyes
We saw the vaulted hall of traceried stone
Uprear itself, the distant ceiling hung
With pendent stalactites like frozen vines;
And all along the walls at intervals,
Curled upwards into pillars, roses climbed,
And ramped and were confined, and clustered leaves
Divided where there peered a...Read more of this...

Solace

by Dorothy Parker
 There was a rose that faded young;
I saw its shattered beauty hung
Upon a broken stem.
I heard them say, "What need to care
With roses budding everywhere?"
I did not answer them.

There was a bird, brought down to die;
They said, "A hundred fill the sky-
What reason to be sad?"
There was a girl, whose lover fled;
I did not wait, the while they said,
"There's...Read more of this...

The Burghers of Calais

by Marriott Edgar
 It were after the Battle of Crecy- 
The foe all lay dead on the ground- 
And King Edward went out with his soldiers
To clean up the places around.

The first place they came to were Calais, 
Where t' burghers all stood in a row,
And when Edward told them to surrender 
They told Edward where he could go.

Said he, " I'll...Read more of this...

Kicks

by Howard Nemerov
 The fishermen on Lake Michigan, sometimes,
For kicks, they spit two hunks of bait on hooks
At either end of a single length of line
And toss that up among the scavenging gulls,

Who go for it so fast that often two of them
Make the connection before it hits the water.
Hooked and hung up like that, they do a dance
That lasts only so...Read more of this...

King Trisanku

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
 Viswamitra the Magician,
By his spells and incantations,
Up to Indra's realms elysian
Raised Trisanku, king of nations. 

Indra and the gods offended
Hurled him downward, and descending
In the air he hung suspended,
With these equal powers contending. 

Thus by aspirations lifted,
By misgivings downward driven,
Human hearts are tossed and drifted
Midway between earth and heaven....Read more of this...

Upon the gallows hung a wretch

by Emily Dickinson
 Upon the gallows hung a wretch,
Too sullied for the hell
To which the law entitled him.
As nature's curtain fell
The one who bore him tottered in , --
For this was woman's son.
"'Twere all I had," she stricken gasped --
Oh, what a livid boon!...Read more of this...

Memoir

by Carl Sandburg
 We look on the shoulders filling the stage of the Chicago Auditorium.

A fat mayor has spoken much English and the mud of his speech is crossed with quicksilver hisses elusive and rapid from floor and gallery.

A neat governor speaks English and the listeners ring chimes to his clear thoughts.

Joffre speaks a few words in French; this is a voice...Read more of this...

Dedication To M..

by Rainer Maria Rilke
 Swing of the heart. O firmly hung, fastened on what
invisible branch. Who, who gave you the push,
that you swung with me into the leaves?
How near I was to the exquisite fruits. But not-staying
is the essence of this motion. Only the nearness, only
toward the forever-too-high, all at once the possible
nearness. Vicinities, then
from an irresistibly swung-up-to place
--already, once again, lost--the new...Read more of this...

As I Walked Out One Evening

by Wystan Hugh (W H) Auden
As I walked out one evening,Walking down Bristol Street,The crowds upon the pavementWere fields of harvest wheat. And down by the brimming riverI heard a lover singUnder an arch of the railway:'Love has no ending. 'I'll love you, dear, I'll love youTill China and Africa meet,And the river jumps over the mountainAnd the salmon sing in the street, 'I'll love...Read more of this...

What think You I take my Pen in Hand?

by Walt Whitman
 WHAT think you I take my pen in hand to record? 
The battle-ship, perfect-model’d, majestic, that I saw pass the offing to-day under full
 sail?

The splendors of the past day? Or the splendor of the night that envelopes me? 
Or the vaunted glory and growth of the great city spread around me?—No; 
But I record of two simple men...Read more of this...

A Ballad of Ducks

by Andrew Barton Paterson
 The railway rattled and roared and swung 
With jolting and bumping trucks. 
The sun, like a billiard red ball, hung 
In the Western sky: and the tireless tongue 
Of the wild-eyed man in the corner told 
This terrible tale of the days of old, 
And the party that ought to have kept the ducks. 
"Well, it ain't all joy...Read more of this...

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