Failure poems

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As I Step Over A Puddle At The End Of Winter, I Think Of An Ancient Chinese Governor

© James Wright

And how can I, born in evil days

And fresh from failure, ask a kindness of Fate?

Often in this life of ours we resemble, in our failure to meet, the Shen and
Shang constellations, one of which rises as the other one sets. What lucky
chance is it, then, that brings us together this evening under the light of
this same lamp? Youth and vigor last but a little time. -- Each of us now has

My Sad Captains

© Thom Gunn

One by one they appear in
the darkness: a few friends, and
a few with historical
names. How late they start to shine!
but before they fade they stand
perfectly embodied, all

How Could You Not

© Galway Kinnell

-- for Jane kenyon
It is a day after many days of storms.
Having been washed and washed, the air glitters;
small heaped cumuli blow across the sky; a shower

Love's Ordeal

© George MacDonald

In a lovely garden walking
Two lovers went hand in hand;
Two wan, worn figures, talking
They sat in the flowery land.

A Song Before Sailing

© Bliss William Carman

I call from room to room
Through the deserted gloom;
The echoes are all words I know,
Lost in some long ago.

Antonio Melidori

© Paul Hamilton Hayne

SCENE I.
[A place not far from the summit of Mount Psiloriti, in the Isle of Candia. Philota discovered with a basket of grapes upon her head; she looks eagerly upward. Time, a little before sunset.]
PHILOTA.

A Story For Rose On The Midnight Flight To Boston

© Anne Sexton

Until tonight they were separate specialties,
different stories, the best of their own worst.
Riding my warm cabin home, I remember Betsy's
laughter; she laughed as you did, Rose, at the first

Success

© Henry Lawson

Did you see that man riding past,

With shoulders bowed with care?

In the Black Forest

© Amy Levy

I lay beneath the pine trees,
And looked aloft, where, through
The dusky, clustered tree-tops,
Gleamed rent, gay rifts of blue.

Failure

© Madison Julius Cawein

There are some souls
Whose lot it is to set their hearts on goals
That adverse Fate controls.

Taken All Together

© Gamaliel Bradford

I've had a few diseases,
And trifled with despair,
Tried failure which displeases,
And coquetted with care.

A Book Of Strife In The Form Of The Diary Of An Old Soul - April

© George MacDonald

1.

LORD, I do choose the higher than my will.

The Abnormal Is Not Courage

© Jack Gilbert

The Poles rode out from Warsaw against the German
Tanks on horses. Rode knowing, in sunlight, with sabers,
A magnitude of beauty that allows me no peace.
And yet this poem would lessen that day. Question

Harold Arnett

I leaned against the mantel, sick, sick,
Thinking of my failure, looking into the abysm,
Weak from the noon-day heat.
A church bell sounded mournfully far away,

Searcy Foote

I wanted to go away to college
But rich Aunt Persis wouldn't help me.
So I made gardens and raked the lawns
And bought John Alden's books with my earnings

Flossie Cabanis

From Bindle's opera house in the village
To Broadway is a great step.
But I tried to take it, my ambition fired
When sixteen years of age,

Thursos Landing

In the night Reave dreamed that Helen
Lay with him in the deep grave, he awoke loathing her,
But when the weak moment between sleep and waking
Was past, his need of her and his judgment of her
Knew their suspended duel; and he heard her breathing,
Irregularly, gently in the dark.

Albert Schirding

Jonas Keene thought his lot a hard one
Because his children were all failures.
But I know of a fate more trying than that:
It is to be a failure while your children are successes.

The Crucible Of Life

Sunshine and shadow, blue sky and gray,
Laughter and tears as we tread on our way;
Hearts that are heavy, then hearts that are light,
Eyes that are misty and eyes that are bright;
Losses and gains in the heat of the strife,
Each in proportion to round out his life.