Time is one of life's great mysteries. Many writers and poems have tried to explain it over the centuries. Time remains a mystery despite their best efforts. Here is a collection of great time-related poems from renowned poets.
- "Forever" by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Dunbar's poem begins: "I had not known before Forever was so long a word. The slow stroke of the clock of time I had not heard."
- "Time Is" by Henry Jackson van Dyke Jr
van Dyke Jr.'s poem begins: "Time is Too slow for those who Wait, Too swift for those who Fear,"
- "On Time" by John Milton
John Milton's poem start with these two lines: "Fly envious Time, till thou run out thy race, Call on the lazy leaden-stepping hours, "
- "As The Time Draws Nigh" by Walt Whitman
Whitman's poem contains the lines:"As the time draws nigh, glooming, a cloud,
A dread beyond, of I know not what, darkens me."
- "Time does not bring relief (Sonnet II)" by Edna St. Vincent Millay
Millay's poem about time and pain begins: "Time does not bring relief; you all have lied Who told me time would ease me of my pain!"
- "Time Long Past" by Percy Bysshe Shelley
Shelley's poem includes the lines:"Each day a shadow onward cast
Which made us wish it yet might last—
That Time long past."
- "Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back" by William Shakespeare
Shakespeare's poem begins:"Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,
A great-sized monster of ingratitudes:
Those scraps are good deeds past; which are devour'd"
- "When I do count the clock that tells the time" by William Shakespeare
Shakespeare's poem contains the lines:"Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake
And die as fast as they see others grow; "
- "They say that time assuages" by Emily Dickinson
Dickinson's poem contains the line:"They say that “time assuages”,—
Time never did assuage;
An actual suffering strengthens,"
- "The Lapse of Time" by William Cullen Bryant
Bryant's poem contains the lines: "Then haste thee, Time--'tis kindness all That speeds thy winged feet so fast:"
- "The World's a Bubble" by Francis Bacon
Bacon's poem begins with the lines: "The World's a bubble, and the life of man less than a span In his conception wretched, from the womb so to the tomb."
