Question to the poets ?

[Alexander III]

I know this may be better suited to another section of the forums, but I wish to hear the answers from you !

The question is simple, tell me the three most beautiful poems you have ever read ?

Oh and please don't go into all that nonsense of, "but first one has to define beauty" and "our pool of knowledge is so small we cannot properly judge beauty or the poems we have read" or "is what we read even real" blah blah blah...

Simple question, simple answers

For me they would be

1) When I Have Fears That I May Cease To Be - Keats

2) Stanzas Written In Dejection 1818- Shelley

3) ( im not sure yet shall edit it in later after more thought)

[Hawkman]

Gosh, A3, this is a puzzle. Beautiful; that makes it hard because favourites don't always equate with beauty. I'll have to think about this one.

[hillwalker]

I tend to agree. It's a bit like asking somebody to list the three reddest paintings. One looks for much more than beauty in poetry..... or in any art form.
It reminds me of Elvis Costello who was quoted as saying that 'writing about music is like dancing about architecture' - one doesn't look to evaluate it on a scale of 1 to 10 or analyse it in isolation. One is meant to read it and take what one can from it - and each individual will find something different to savour

[Alexander III]

Is not beauty all that matters in a poem, for me it is

[krymsonkyng]

For me it's a unity of thought and form more than beauty. Simply because I enjoy one poem over another doesn't mean the one I like less is any less potent or powerful. Just less relate-able for me.

That said the three I relate to most right now
"High Flight" by John Gillespie McGee
"So we'll go no more a-roving" Byron
The poem I'm currently trying to write

[lalalauren]

Can I say all of John Donne's? haha just kidding. All of his poems are pretty much brilliant, but not all are beautiful..in my opinion.

Picking 3 is extremely difficult, but off the top of my head I'd probably say...

The Wasteland - T.S. Eliot
Bright Star - Keats
A valediction: forbidding mourning - Donne

...oh, and Prayer (I) - Herbert

[Alexander III]

Ok here let me rephrase the question

Which are the three poems you feel you enjoyed most of the ones you have read ?

[krymsonkyng]

Jabberwocky
B. Dolan's "Skycycle Blues"
Bukowski's "Question and Answer"

[PrinceMyshkin]

I agree: it's hard to select the most anything of things one loves or has loved but 3 that popped up spontaneously for me are:

Yeats: "The Second Coming"
Wm Carlos Williams: "Danse Russe"
W.D. Snodgrass: "April Inventory"