Title Poet Year Written Collection Body
To a June Breeze Henry Cuyler Bunner English

Wind of the City Streets,
    Impatient to be free,
In this dull time of heats
    My love takes wings to flee:
Leave thou this idle Town
And hunt Her down.

    Wherever She may stay,
        By Sea or Mountain-side,
    Make thou...

To a Lady Thomas William Parsons English

My christmas gifts were few: to one
  A fan, to keep love’s flame alive,
Since even to the constant sun
  Twilight and setting must arrive;

And to another—she who sent
  That splendid toy, an empty purse—
I gave, though not for satire meant,...

To a Lady John James Piatt English

You ask a verse, to sing (ah, laughing face!)
Your happy art of growing old with grace?
O Muse, begin, and let the truth—but hold!
First let me see that you are growing old.
To a Lady John James Piatt English

On Her Art of Growing Old Gracefully

YOU ask a verse, to sing (ah, laughing face!)
Your happy art of growing old with grace?
O Muse, begin, and let the truth—but hold!
First let me see that you are growing old.
To a Lady admiring Herself in a Looking-Glass Thomas Randolph 1625 English

Fair lady, when you see the grace
Of beauty in your looking-glass;
A stately forehead, smooth and high,
And full of princely majesty;
A sparkling eye no gem so fair,
Whose lustre dims the Cyprian star;
A glorious cheek, divinely sweet,
...

To a Lily James Matthew Legare English

Go bow thy head in gentle spite,
Thou lily white,
For she who spies thee waving here,
With thee in beauty can compare
As day with night.

Soft are thy leaves and white: her arms
Boast whiter charms.
Thy stem prone bent with loveliness...

To a Louse Robert Burns 1779 English

On Seeing One on a Lady’s Bonnet at Church

HA! whare ye gaun, ye crawlin’ ferlie?
Your impudence protects you sairly:
I canna say but ye strunt rarely
        Owre gauze an’ lace;
Though, faith! I fear ye dine but sparely
        On sic a place....

To a Magnolia Flower in the Garden of the Armenian Convent at Venice Silas Weir Mitchell English

I saw thy beauty in its high estate
  Of perfect empire, where at set of sun
In the cool twilight of thy lucent leaves
  The dewy freshness told that day was done.

Hast thou no gift beyond thine ivory cone’s
  Surpassing loveliness? Art thou not near—...

To a Moth Charles Edward Thomas English

Poor Creature! nay, I ’ll not say poor,
Why, surely, thou art wondrous blest;
Right royal is this sepulchre
Fate gave thee for thy last long rest.

See here—’t is but two lines above
The spot that marks thy early tomb—
Here Paris breathes his...

To a Mountain Daisy Robert Burns 1779 English

On Turning One Down with the Plough in April, 1786

WEE, modest, crimson-tippèd flower,
Thou ’s met me in an evil hour,
For I maun crush amang the stoure
        Thy slender stem;
To spare thee now is past my power,
        Thou bonny gem.

...
To a Mouse Robert Burns 1779 English

On Turning Her up in Her Nest with the Plough, November, 1785

WEE, sleekit, cowerin’, timorous beastie,
O, what a panic ’s in thy breastie!
Thou needna start awa sae hasty,
          Wi’ bickering brattle!
I wad be laith to rin an’ chase thee,...

To a poet's wife

        She, who in lonely pride may wear

            The laurel on her brow,

        And sit beneath its chilling shade,

            Is far less blest than thou.

 

        A higher happiness is thine,
...

To a poet, painter and musician

                Three Muses one day

                Had a serious fray,

        Concerning a youth who had wandered astray,

        And fast up Parnassus was taking his way.

                They each urged a claim
...

To a Portrait Arthur Symons 1885 English

A Pensive photograph
  Watches me from the shelf—
Ghost of old love, and half
  Ghost of myself!

How the dear waiting eyes
  Watch me and love me yet—
Sad home of memories,
  Her waiting eyes!

Ghost of old love, wronged ghost,...

To a Rose Frank Dempster Sherman English

Go, rose, and in her golden hair
  You shall forget the garden soon;
The sunshine is a captive there
  And crowns her with a constant noon.

And when your spicy odor goes,
  And fades the beauty of your bloom,
Think what a lovely hand, O Rose,...

To a Shred of Linen English

WOULD they swept cleaner!—

                                            Here's a littering shred

Of linen left behind—a vile reproach

To all good housewifery. Right glad am I,

That no neat lady, train'd in ancient times
...

To a silent poet English

        I see the sons of Genius rise

            The nobles of our land;

        And foremost in the gathering ranks

            I see the poet band.

 

        That Priesthood of the beautiful,
...

To a Skeleton Anonymous English

   [The Ms. of this poem, which appeared in 1820, was said to have been found in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, in London, near a perfect human skeleton. It was published in the Morning Chronicle. The author was never discovered, although a reward of fifty guineas was offered.]...

To a Town Poet Lizette Woodworth Reese English

Snatch the departing mood;
Make yours its emptying reed, and pipe us still
Faith in the time, faith in our common blood,
Faith in the least of good:
Song cannot fail if these its spirits fill!

What if your heritage be
The huddled trees along the...

To a Waterfowl William Cullen Bryant 1814 English

    whither, midst falling dew,
While glow the heavens with the last steps of day,
Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue
    Thy solitary way?

    Vainly the fowler’s eye
Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As, darkly...