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Famous Winnow Poems by Famous Poets

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

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by Ingelow, Jean
...her bosom gliding
  Bear down the lily and drown the reed.
Stately prows are rising and bowing
  (Shouts of mariners winnow the air),
And level sands for banks endowing
  The tiny green ribbon that showed so fair.
While, O my heart! as white sails shiver,
  And crowds are passing, and banks stretch wide
How hard to follow, with lips that quiver,
  That moving speck on the far-off side!
Farther, farther—I see it—know it—
  My eyes brim over, it melts away:
Only my ...Read more of this...



by Dickinson, Emily
...ift her, from Brow to Barefoot!
Strain till your last Surmise --
Drop, like a Tapestry, away,
Before the Fire's Eyes --
Winnow her finest fondness --
But hallow just the snow
Intact, in Everlasting flake --
Oh, Caviler, for you!...Read more of this...

by Keats, John
...so delicious is the unsating food,
That men, who might have tower'd in the van
Of all the congregated world, to fan
And winnow from the coming step of time
All chaff of custom, wipe away all slime
Left by men-slugs and human serpentry,
Have been content to let occasion die,
Whilst they did sleep in love's elysium.
And, truly, I would rather be struck dumb,
Than speak against this ardent listlessness:
For I have ever thought that it might bless
The world with benefits unkn...Read more of this...

by Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
...hall we all be cast,
In the sure faith, that we shall rise again
At the great harvest, when the archangel's blast
Shall winnow, like a fan, the chaff and grain.

Then shall the good stand in immortal bloom,
In the fair gardens of that second birth;
And each bright blossom mingle its perfume
With that of flowers, which never bloomed on earth.

With thy rude ploughahare, Death, turn up the sod,
And spread the furrow for the seed we sow;
This is the field and Acre of our...Read more of this...

by Lanier, Sidney
...assion that grieves,
Friendly, sisterly, sweetheart leaves,
Oh, rain me down from your darks that contain me
Wisdoms ye winnow from winds that pain me, --
Sift down tremors of sweet-within-sweet
That advise me of more than they bring, -- repeat
Me the woods-smell that swiftly but now brought breath
From the heaven-side bank of the river of death, --
Teach me the terms of silence, -- preach me
The passion of patience, -- sift me, -- impeach me, --
And there, oh there
As ye han...Read more of this...



by Emerson, Ralph Waldo
...To drug their crops or weapon their arts withal. 
They turn the frost upon their chemic heap, 
They set the wind to winnow pulse and grain, 
They thank the spring-flood for its fertile slime, 
And, on cheap summit-levels of the snow, 
Slide with the sledge to inaccessible woods 
O'er meadows bottomless. So, year by year, 
They fight the elements with elements 
(That one would say, meadow and forest walked. 
Transmuted in these men to rule their like), 
And by the ...Read more of this...

by Emerson, Ralph Waldo
...To drug their crops, or weapon their arts withal. 
They turn the frost upon their chemic heap;
They set the wind to winnow vetch and grain;
They thank the spring-flood for its fertile slime;
And, on cheap summit-levels of the snow,
Slide with the sledge to inaccessible woods,
O'er meadows bottomless. So, year by year,
They fight the elements with elements,
(That one would say, meadow and forest walked
Upright in human shape to rule their like.)
And by the order in...Read more of this...

by Service, Robert William
...hat tore the sullen sky;
A million shuddered at my sooth
 And anarchist was I.
Red righteousness was in my word
 To winnow evil chaff;
Yet while I swung crusading sword
 I heard the devil laugh.

I framed a lie, a rainbow lie
 To glorify a thought;
And none was so surprised as I
 When fast as fire it caught.
Like honey people lapped my lie
 And peddled it abroad,
Till in a lift of sunny sky
 I saw the smile of God.

If falsehood may be best, I thought,
 To hel...Read more of this...

by Montgomery, Lucy Maud
...ound 
Close to the ground, 
That grasses make when they grow, 
Comes the wind in a gay, 
Rollicking, turbulent way, 
To winnow each bough and toss each spray, 
Piping and whistling in glee 
With the vibrant notes of a merry minstrelsy. 

The friendly rain 
Sings many a haunting strain, 
Now of gladness and now of dole, 
Anon of the glamor and the dream 
That ever seem 
To wait on a pilgrim soul; 
Yea, we can hear 
The grief of an elder year, 
And laughter half-forgotten a...Read more of this...

by Tennyson, Alfred Lord
...eight;
And far away into the sickly light,
From many a wondrous grot and secret cell
Unnumber'd and enormous polypi
Winnow with giant arms the slumbering green.
There hath he lain for ages and will lie
Battening upon huge seaworms in his sleep,
Until the latter fire shall heat the deep;
Then once by man and angels to be seen,
In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die....Read more of this...

by Kipling, Rudyard
...to year
 Till all be purified;
For though no fluttering fan be heard .
 Nor chaff be seen to flee--
The Lord shall winnow the Lord's Preferred--
 And, Hey then up go we!

Our altars which the heathen brake
 Shall rankly smoke anew,
And anise, mint and cummin take
 Their dread and sovereign due,
Whereby the buttons of our trade
 Shall soon restored be
With curious work in gilt and braid,
 And, Hey then up go we!

Then come, my brethren, and prepare
 The candlesticks and b...Read more of this...

by Kipling, Rudyard
...pon his nails, and the little devils ran,
And he said: "Go husk this whimpering thief that comes in the guise of a man:
Winnow him out 'twixt star and star, and sieve his proper worth:
There's sore decline in Adam's line if this be spawn of earth."
Empusa's crew, so naked-new they may not face the fire,
But weep that they bin too small to sin to the height of their desire,
Over the coal they chased the Soul, and racked it all abroad,
As children rifle a caddis-case or the...Read more of this...

by Tessimond, A S J
...lossoms its load,
 a black, untidy rose.

The fountain of the escalator
 curls at the crest,
 breaks and scatters
A winnow of men,
 a sickle of dark spray....Read more of this...

by Marvell, Andrew
...s.
Thanks for my Rest ye Mossy Banks,
And unto you cool Zephyr's Thanks,
Who, as my Hair, my Thoughts too shed,
And winnow from the Chaff my Head.

How safe, methinks, and strong, behind
These Trees have I incamp'd my Mind;
Where Beauty, aiming at the Heart,
Bends in some Tree its useless Dart;
And where the World no certain Shot
Can make, or me it toucheth not.
But I on it securely play,
And gaul its Horsemen all the Day.

Bind me ye Woodbines in your 'twines...Read more of this...

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Book: Shattered Sighs