Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I'm telling lies.
...
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may tread me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.
...
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
...
Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
...
Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
...
It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of ANNABEL LEE;
...
The most important thing we've learned,
So far as children are concerned,
Is never, NEVER, NEVER let
Them near your television set -
...
The free bird leaps
on the back of the wind
and floats downstream
till the current ends
...
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
...
Writing a poem is not about bringing some words together to create some charming sentences. It's so much deeper than that. Writing poetry is a bridge that allows people to express their feelings and make others live every single word they read. Poetry is to educate people, to lead them away from hate to love, from violence to mercy and pity. Writing poetry is to help this community better understand life and live it more passionately. PoemHunter.com contains an enormous number of famous poems from all over the world, by both classical and modern poets. You can read as many as you want, and also submit your own poems to share your writings with all our poets, members, and visitors.
GALLUS
This now, the very latest of my toils,
Vouchsafe me, Arethusa! needs must I
Sing a brief song to Gallus- brief, but yet
Such as Lycoris' self may fitly read.
Who would not sing for Gallus? So, when thou
Beneath Sicanian billows glidest on,
May Doris blend no bitter wave with thine,
Begin! The love of Gallus be our theme,
And the shrewd pangs he suffered, while, hard by,
The flat-nosed she-goats browse the tender brush.
We sing not to deaf ears; no word of ours
But the woods echo it. What groves or lawns
Held you, ye Dryad-maidens, when for love-
Love all unworthy of a loss so dear-
Gallus lay dying? for neither did the slopes
Of Pindus or Parnassus stay you then,
No, nor Aonian Aganippe. Him
Even the laurels and the tamarisks wept;
For him, outstretched beneath a lonely rock,
Wept pine-clad Maenalus, and the flinty crags
Of cold Lycaeus. The sheep too stood around-
Of us they feel no shame, poet divine;
Nor of the flock be thou ashamed: even fair
Adonis by the rivers fed his sheep-
Came shepherd too, and swine-herd footing slow,
And, from the winter-acorns dripping-wet
Menalcas. All with one accord exclaim:
'From whence this love of thine?' Apollo came;
...
It was not dying: everybody died.
It was not dying: we had died before
In the routine crashes-- and our fields
Called up the papers, wrote home to our folks,
And the rates rose, all because of us.
We died on the wrong page of the almanac,
Scattered on mountains fifty miles away;
Diving on haystacks, fighting with a friend,
We blazed up on the lines we never saw.
We died like aunts or pets or foreigners.
...
The city hums like a restless heart,
steel veins carrying the pulse of strangers
who dream in fragments—
coffee cups, subway echoes,
screens glowing with promises
too fragile to hold.
I pause at the corner,
watching a mural peel into memory,
colors fading but still defiant,
...
Why is the time so full of hate
Every day they say soon will be our fate
Maybe if we all just stopped the aggression
...
I used to be my parents' child,
and when I cried,
I cried as a parent's child,
That is, until our time ran out,
...
I've learned that plans may fall apart,
That dreams can crack a tender heart.
That not all wounds will mend with time,
And not all wrongs will turn to rhyme.
...
Be the better soul, the steady flame,
Not for applause, not for acclaim.
Let your heart be pure, your path be true—
What you are will echo through.
...
I began to notice the patterns,
and with them came a quiet knowing
that I already understood how the story ends.
...
We grumble when the work is long,
While others pray to just belong.
We sigh at waking with the sun,
While some feel life has just begun.
...
Don't trust the glass—it only sees
The surface of your mysteries.
It shows the skin, the shape, the face,
But not your soul, your quiet grace.
...
Shout out to the hearts still brave,
Who rise each day, who ride each wave.
To those who stumble, yet still stand,
Who reach for grace with trembling hand.
...
I've learned that plans can come undone,
Like threads unspooled beneath the sun.
That dreams may fall, and hearts may crack,
And some lost things don't wander back.
...
To the you beneath the heavy skies,
Who hides the ache behind your eyes.
To the you who walks through rain alone,
And wonders when the light has flown.
...
Enough is enough—I've found my voice,
No longer bound by someone's choice.
I won't be quiet, won't pretend,
I'll stand my ground, I won't bend.
...
Thank you to the ones who bruised
Your silence, sharp, your words, confused.
You carved the steel beneath my skin,
And taught me how to rise again.
...
I dwell
In the absence
You left behind
...
If you die before me
I would jump down into your grave
and hug you so innocently
that angels will become jealous.
...
Beautiful is the 'thank you'
Wrapped with gratitude,
Offered to peace prone people
Who offer what is real-themselves
...
Indoors by technology, outdoors by speedy transport
I travel the world
Today in Japan, tomorrow in Rome,
Next day by an ancient civilization or in Hawaii or Coast Ivory,
...
The low lands call
I am tempted to answer
They are offering me a free dwelling
Without having to conquer
...
The Peace Warrior Of Mzansi, among heroes - a colossus!
Sun Of The Nation; a rare gift of Providence.
Once, entangled in the web of racist succubus;
Unruffled he declares before High Justice:
...
(This is a composition in Pilipino Language the first one I did, the only one, and hope some of the Filipinos will get this funny poem in this site. The poem is updated with English translation)
Noong taong otsenta dekada
...
Love and lust are poles apart.
Lust is chaos, love is art.
...
Rappelle-toi Barbara
Il pleuvait sans cesse sur Brest ce jour-là
Et tu marchais souriante
Épanouie ravie ruisselante
...
you put this pen
in my hand and you
take the pen from you put this pen
...
On this dry prepared path walk heavy feet.
This is not "dinner music." This is a power structure.
...
"Come, pretty birds, present your lays,
And learn to chaunt a goddess praise;
Ye wood-nymphs, let your voices be
Employ'd to serve her deity:
...
If you had the choice of two women to wed,
(Though of course the idea is quite absurd)
And the first from her heels to her dainty head
Was charming in every sense of the word:
...
A little while, a little while,
The weary task is put away,
And I can sing and I can smile,
Alike, while I have holiday.
...
Between us now and here -
Two thrown together
Who are not wont to wear
Life's flushest feather -
...
185
"Faith" is a fine invention
When Gentlemen can see—
...