Life poems

/ page 485 of 844 /

Order by :

1
. . .
480
481
482
483
484
485
486
487
488
489
490
. . .
844

In vain thy lawless Fires contend with mine,
Tho' Crouds unnumber'd fall before thy Shrine;
Let Youths, who ne'er aspir'd to noble Fame,
And the soft Virgin, kindle at thy Flame,
Thee, Son of Indolence and Vice, I scorn,
By Reason nourish'd, and of Virtue born.

Three Teenage Girls: 1956 by Steve Orlen: American Life in Poetry #160 Ted Kooser, U.S. Poet Laureat

© Ted Kooser

I've mentioned how important close observation is in composing a vivid poem. In this scene by Arizona poet, Steve Orlen, the details not only help us to see the girls clearly, but the last detail is loaded with suggestion. The poem closes with the car door shutting, and we readers are shut out of what will happen, though we can guess. Three Teenage Girls: 1956

Three teenage girls in tight red sleeveless blouses and black Capri pants
And colorful headscarves secured in a knot to their chins
Are walking down the hill, chatting, laughing,
Cupping their cigarettes against the light rain,
The closest to the road with her left thumb stuck out
Not looking at the cars going past.

Two Sonnets On Fame

© John Keats

I.
Fame, like a wayward girl, will still be coy
To those who woo her with too slavish knees,
But makes surrender to some thoughtless boy,

America

© Tony Hoagland

Then one of the students with blue hair and a tongue stud

Says that America is for him a maximum-security prison

Rosalie's Good Eats Cafe

© Sheldon Allan Silverstein

It's two in the mornin' on Saturday night

At Rosalie's Good Eats Café.

The Monument and the Shrine

© John Logan

At focus in the national
Park’s ellipse a marker
Draws tight the guys of

Convict Once - Part First.

© James Brunton Stephens

I.
FREE again! Free again! eastward and westward, before me, behind me,
Wide lies Australia! and free are my feet, as my soul is, to roam!
Oh joy unwonted of space undetermined! No limit assigned me!
Freedom conditioned by nought save the need and desire of a home!

Experience

© Ralph Waldo Emerson

The lords of life, the lords of life,

I saw them pass,

Hymn to the Comb-Over

© Wesley McNair

How the thickest of them erupt just

above the ear, cresting in waves so stiff

The bright blessed day with joy we see

© Nicolaj Frederik Severin Grundtvig

The bright blessed day with joy we see
Rise out of the sea at dawning;
It lightens the sky unceasingly,
Our gain and delight adorning!
As children of light we sense that soon
Dark night will give way to morning!

Modern Love: L

© George Meredith

Thus piteously Love closed what he begat:

The union of this ever-diverse pair!

Song of Myself

© Walt Whitman

Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.

Sonnets from the Portuguese 43: How do I love thee? Let me count the ways

© Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

I love thee to the depth and breadth and height

Five Psalms

© Mark Jarman

1.

Let us think of God as a lover

Hope, Like The Short-lived Ray That Gleams Awhile

Hope, like the short-lived ray that gleams awhile
Through wintry skies, upon the frozen waste,
Cheers e'en the face of misery to a smile;
But soon the momentary pleasure's past.

Sabbath lie

© John Wesley

On Friday, at twilight of a summer day
While the smells of food and prayer rose from every house
And the sound of the Sabbath angels’ wings was in the air,
While still a child I started to lie to my father:
“I went to another synagogue.”

"How dark, how quiet sleeps the vale below!"

How dark, how quiet sleeps the vale below!
In the dim farms, look, not a window shines:
Distantly heard among the lonely pines,
How soft the languid autumn breezes flow