Epigram Poems
"Faith" Is A Fine Invention
by Emily Dickinson
185
"Faith" is a fine invention
When Gentlemen can see—
But Microscopes are prudent
In an Emergency.
Fire And Ice
by Robert Frost
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
Dirce
by Walter Savage Landor
Stand close around, ye Stygian set,
With Dirce in one boat conveyed,
Or Charon, seeing, may forget
That he is old and she a shade.
A Lame Beggar
by John Donne
I am unable, yonder beggar cries,
To stand, or move; if he say true, he lies.
Epigram On Rough Roads
by Robert Burns
I'M now arrived—thanks to the gods!—
Thro' pathways rough and muddy,
A certain sign that makin roads
Is no this people's study:
Altho' Im not wi' Scripture cram'd,
I'm sure the Bible says
That heedless sinners shall be damn'd,
Unless they mend their ways.
Art Thou Pale For Weariness
by Percy Bysshe Shelley
Art thou pale for weariness
Of climbing heaven and gazing on the earth,
Wandering companionless
Among the stars that have a different birth,
And ever changing, like a joyless eye
That finds no object worth its constancy?
A Lame Beggar
by John Donne
I am unable, yonder beggar cries,
To stand, or move; if he say true, he lies.
Epigram On Politics
by Robert Burns
IN Politics if thou would'st mix,
And mean thy fortunes be;
Bear this in mind, be deaf and blind,
Let great folk hear and see.
Epigram On A Country Laird (Cardoness)
by Robert Burns
BLESS Jesus Christ, O Cardonessp,
With grateful, lifted eyes,
Who taught that not the soul alone,
But body too shall rise;
For had He said "the soul alone
From death I will deliver,"
Alas, alas! O Cardoness,
Then hadst thou lain for ever.
Epigram On Andrew Turner
by Robert Burns
IN se'enteen hunder'n forty-nine,
The deil gat stuff to mak a swine,
An' coost it in a corner;
But wilily he chang'd his plan,
An' shap'd it something like a man,
An' ca'd it Andrew Turner.
