Striking Similes

Langford Home • Miscellany & Lists

Once upon a time, in my 69th column for PCW Plus magazine, I commended Fifteen Thousand Useful Phrases (New York and London: Funk & Wagnalls, 1917) by Grenville Kleiser (1868-1953) as a never-failing source of inspiration for writers. Some people thought I must be making it all up. To give the flavour of the book and silence unbelievers, I have scanned Mr Kleiser's rigorously alphabetized "Section VIII: Striking Similes" (pp225-278). Some of them are curiously familiar. Others, culled from contemporary novels or our mentor's own fevered imagination, are not. The conger-eel simile remains my favourite. Please use this literary resource with caution, and for good purposes only.

I'm not sure whether the world is ready for a similar transcription of "Section VII: Literary Expressions". If I uploaded this too, would it be regarded as "A book to beguile the tedious hours" or "A dire monotony of bookish idiom", bringing "A daily avalanche of vituperation" to the hapless Langford ("A callow and conscienceless brute")?

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A
A blind rage like a fire swept over him

A book that rends and tears like a broken saw

A breath of melancholy made itself felt like a chill and sudden gust from some unknown sea

A cloud in the west like a pall creeps upward

A cloud like a flag from the sky

A cluster of stars hangs like fruit in the tree

A confused mass of impressions, like an old rubbish-heap

A cry as of a sea-bird in the wind

A dead leaf might as reasonably demand to return to the tree

A drowsy murmur floats into the air like thistledown

A face as imperturbable as fate

A face as pale as wax

A face tempered like steel

A fatigued, faded, lusterless air, as of a caged creature

A few pens parched by long disuse

A figure like a carving on a spire

A fluttering as of blind bewildered moths

A giant galleon overhead, looked like some misty monster of the deep

A glacial pang of pain like the stab of a dagger of ice frozen from a poisoned well

A glance that flitted like a bird

A great moon like a red lamp in the sycamore

A grim face like a carved mask

A hand icily cold and clammy as death

A heart from which noble sentiments sprang like sparks from an anvil

A jeweler that glittered like his shop

A lady that lean'd on his arm like a queen in a fable of old fairy days

A life, a Presence, like the air

A life as common and brown and bare as the box of earth in the window there

A light wind outside the lattice swayed a branch of roses to and fro, shaking out their perfume as from a swung censer

A lightning-phrase, as if shot from the quiver of infallible wisdom

A list of our unread books torments some of us like a list of murders

A little breeze ran through the corn like a swift serpent

A little weed-clogged ship, gray as a ghost

A long slit of daylight like a pointing finger

A memory like a well-ordered cupboard

A mighty wind, like a leviathan, plowed the brine

A mind very like a bookcase

A mystery, soft, soothing and gentle, like the whisper of a child murmuring its happiness in its sleep

A name which sounds even now like the call of a trumpet

A note of despairing appeal which fell like a cold hand upon one's living soul

A purpose as the steady flame

A question deep almost as the mystery of life

A quibbling mouth that snapped at verbal errors like a lizard catching flies

A radiant look came over her face, like a sudden burst of sunshine on a cloudy day

A reputation that swelled like a sponge

A ruby like a drop of blood

A shadow of melancholy touched her lithe fancies, as a cloud dims the waving of golden grain

A silver moon, like a new-stamped coin, rode triumphant in the sky

A slow thought that crept like a cold worm through all his brain

A smile flashed over her face, like sunshine over a flower

A soft and purple mist like a vaporous amethyst

A soft haze, like a fairy dream, is floating over wood and stream

A soul as white as heaven

A sound like the throb of a bell

A stooping girl as pale as a pearl

A sudden sense of fear ran through her nerves like the chill of an icy wind

A sweet voice caroling like a gold-caged nightingale

A thin shrill voice like the cry of an expiring mouse

A thing of as frail enchantment as the gleam of stars upon snow

A vague thought, as elusive as the smell of a primrose

A vanishing loveliness as tender as the flush of the rose leaf and as ethereal as the light of a solitary star

A voice as low as the sea

A voice soft and sweet as a tune that one knows

A white bird floats there, like a drifting leaf

Against a sky as clear as sapphire

Age, like winter weather

Agile as a leopard

Agitated like a storm-tossed ship

Air like wine

All around them like a forest swept the deep and empurpled masses of her tangled hair

All like an icicle it seemed, so tapering and cold

All my life broke up, like some great river's ice at touch of spring

All silent as the sheeted dead

All sounds were lost in the whistle of air humming by like the flight of a million arrows

All that's beautiful drifts away like the waters

All the world lay stretched before him like the open palm of his hand

All unconscious as a flower

Alone, like a storm-tossed wreck, on this night of the glad New Year

An anxiety hung like a dark impenetrable cloud

An ardent face out-looking like a star

An ecstasy which suddenly overwhelms your mind like an unexpected and exquisite thought

An envious wind crept by like an unwelcome thought

An ideal as sublime and comprehensive as the horizon

An immortal spirit dwelt in that frail body, like a bird in an outworn cage

An impudent trick as hackneyed as conjuring rabbits out of a hat

An indefinable resemblance to a goat

An isle of Paradise, fair as a gem

An old nodding negress whose sable head shined in the sun like a polished cocoanut

An omnibus across the bridge crawls like a yellow butterfly

An undefined sadness seemed to have fallen about her like a cloud

An unknown world, wild as primeval chaos

An unpleasing strain, like the vibration of a rope drawn out too fast

And a pinnace like a flutter'd bird came flying from afar

And a tear like silver, glistened in the corner of her eye

And all our thoughts ran into tears like sunshine into rain

And at first the road comes moving toward me, like a bride waving palms

And Dusk, with breast as of a dove, brooded

And eyes as bright as the day

And fell as cold as a lump of clay

And her cheek was like a rose

And here were forests ancient as the hills

And many a fountain, rivulet, and pond, as clear as elemental diamond, or serene morning air

And melting like the stars in June

And night, as welcome as a friend

And silence like a poultice comes to heal the blows of sound

And spangled o'er with twinkling points, like stars

And the smile she softly uses fills the silence like a speech

As a child in play scatters the heaps of sand that he has piled on the seashore

As a cloud that gathers her robe like drifted snow

As a flower after a drought drinks in the steady plunging rain

As a leaf that beats on a mountain

As a lion grieves at the loss of her whelps

As a man plowing all day longs for supper and welcomes sunset

As a sea disturbed by opposing winds

As amusing as a litter of likely young pigs

As arbitrary as a cyclone and as killing as a pestilence

As austere as a Roman matron

As beautiful as the purple flush of dawn

As blind as a mole

As brief as sunset clouds in heaven

As bright as sunlight on a stream

As busy as a bee

As cattle driven by a gadfly

As chimney sweepers come to dust

As clear as a whistle

As clear as the parts of a tree in the morning sun

As close as oak and ivy stand

As delicate and as fair as a lily

As delightful to the mind as cool well-water to thirsty lips

As diamond cuts diamond

As direct and unvarying as the course of a homing bird

As distinct as night and morning

As dry as desert dust

As dumb as a fish

As easily as the sun shines

As easy as a turn of the hand

As elastic as a steel spring

As extinct as the dodo

As faint as the memory of a sound

As familiar to him as his alphabet

As fatal as the fang of the most venomous snake

As fleeting and elusive as our dreams

As foam from a ship's swiftness

As fresh and invigorating as a sea-breeze

As full of eager vigor as a mountain stream

As full of spirit as a gray squirrel

As gay and busy as a brook

As gently as the flower gives forth its perfume

As gently as withered leaves float from a tree

As graceful as a bough

As grave as a judge

As great as the first day of creation

As high as heaven

As I dropped like a bolt from the blue

As I dwelt like a sparrow among the spires

As if a door were suddenly left ajar into some world unseen before

As impossible as to count the stars in illimitable space

As in the footsteps of a god

As inaccessible to his feet as the clefts and gorges of the clouds

As inexorable as the flight of time

As innocent as a new laid egg

As iridescent as a soap bubble

As locusts gather to a stream before a fire

As mellow and deep as a psalm

As men strip for a race, so must an author strip for the race with time

As merry as bees in clover

As nimble as water

As one who has climbed above the earth's eternal snowline and sees only white peaks and pinnacles

As pale as any ghost

As patient as the trees

As quick as the movement of some wild animal

As quiet as a nun breathless with adoration

As radiant as the rose

As readily and naturally as ducklings take to water

As reticent as a well-bred stockbroker

As ruthlessly as the hoof of a horse tramples on a rose

As shallow streams run dimpling all the way

As simple as the intercourse of a child with its mother

As sleep falls upon the eyes of a child tired with a long summer day of eager pleasure and delight

As some vast river of unfailing source

As stars that shoot along the sky

As still as a stone

As stupid as a sheep

As sudden as a dislocated joint slipping back into place

As summer winds that creep from flower to flower

As supple as a step-ladder

As swaggering and sentimental as a penny novelette

As swift as thought

As the accumulation of snowflakes makes the avalanche

As the bubble is extinguished in the ocean

As the dew upon the roses warms and melts the morning light

As the fair cedar, fallen before the breeze, lies self-embalmed amidst the moldering trees

As the light straw flies in dark'ning whirlwinds

As the lightning cleaves the night

As the loud blast that tears the skies

As the slow shadows of the pointed grass mark the eternal periods

As those move easiest who have learn'd to dance

As though a rose should shut, and be a bud again

As though Pharaoh should set the Israelites to make a pin instead of a pyramid

As unapproachable as a star

As weird as the elfin lights

As well try to photograph the other side of the moon

At extreme tension, like a drawn bow

Away he rushed like a cyclone

Awkward as a cart-horse

B
Babbling like a child

Balmy in manner as a bland southern morning

Be like the granite of thy rock-ribbed land

Beauteous she looks as a water-lily

Beautiful as the dawn, dominant as the sun

Beauty maddens the soul like wine

Beheld great Babel, wrathful, beautiful, burn like a blood-red cloud upon the plain

Beneath a sky as fair as summer flowers

Bent like a wand of willow

Black as a foam-swept rock

Black his hair as the wintry night

Blithe as a bird

Bounded by the narrow fences of life

Bowed like a mountain

Breaking his oath and resolution like a twist of rotten silk

Breathed like a sea at rest

Bright as a diamond in the sun

Bright as a fallen fragment of the sky

Bright as the coming forth of the morning, in the cloud of an early shower

Bright as the sunbeams

Bright as the tear of an angel, glittered a lonely star

Brilliant and gay as a Greek

Brisk as a wasp in the sunshine

Brittle and bent like a bow

Bronze-green beetles tumbled over stones, and lay helpless on their backs with the air of an elderly clergyman knocked down by an omnibus

Brown as the sweet smelling loam

Brute terrors like the scurrying of rats in a deserted attic

Buried in his library like a mouse in a cheese

Burns like a living coal in the soul

But across it, like a mob's menace, fell the thunder

But thou art fled, like some frail exhalation

Butterflies like gems

C
Calm as the night

Calm like a flowing river

Calm like a mountain brooding o'er the sea

Calmly dropping care like a mantle from her shoulders

Cast thy voice abroad like thunder

Charm upon charm in her was packed, like rose-leaves in a costly vase

Chaste as the icicle

Cheeks as soft as July peaches

Chill breath of winter

Choked by the thorns and brambles of early adversity

Cities scattered over the world like ant-hills

Cities that rise and sink like bubbles

Clear and definite like the glance of a child or the voice of a girl

Clear as a forest pool

Clear as crystal

Clenched little hands like rumpled roses, dimpled and dear

Cloud-like that island hung afar

Clouds like the petals of a rose

Cloudy mirror of opinion

Cold and hard as steel

Cold as the white rose waking at daybreak

Cold, glittering monotony like frosting around a cake

Collapsed like a concertina

Colored like a fairy tale

Companionless as the last cloud of an expiring storm whose thunder is its knell

Consecration that like a golden thread runs through the warp and woof of one's life

Constant as gliding waters

Contending like ants for little molehill realms

Continuous as the stars that shine

Cowslips, like chance-found gold

Creeds like robes are laid aside

Creeping like a snail, unwillingly to school

Cruel as death

Curious as a lynx

Cuts into the matter as with a pen of fire

D
Dainty as flowers

Dance like a wave of the sea

Dark and deep as night

Dark as pitch

Dark trees bending together as though whispering secrets

Dazzling white as snow in sunshine

Deafening and implacable as some elemental force

Dear as remembered kisses after death

Dear as the light that visits these sad eyes

Dearer than night to the thief

Debasing fancies gather like foul birds

Deep as the fathomless sea

Deep dark well of sorrow

Delicate as nymphs

Delicate as the flush on a rose or the sculptured line on a Grecian urn

Denominational lines like stone walls

Dependency had dropped from her like a cast-off cloak

Despondency clung to him like a garment that is wet

Destructive as the lightning flash

Die like flies

Dip and surge lightly to and fro, like the red harbor-buoy

Disappearing into distance like a hazy sea

Dissatisfaction had settled on his mind like a shadow

Dissolve like some unsubstantial vision faded

Do make a music like to rustling satin

Dogging them like their own shadow

Dost thou not hear the murmuring nightingale like water bubbling from a silver jar?

Drop like a feather, softly to the ground

Drowned like rats

Dull as champagne

E
Each like a corpse within its grave

Each moment was an iridescent bubble fresh-blown from the lips of fancy

Eager-hearted as a boy

Eager with the headlong zest of a hunter for the game

Ears that seemed as deaf as dead man s ears

Easy as a poet's dream

Emotions flashed across her face like the sweep of sun-rent clouds over a quiet landscape

Eternal as the skies

Evanescent as bubbles

Every flake that fell from heaven was like an angel's kiss

Every lineament was clear as in the sculptor's thought

Every one on the watch, like a falcon on its nest

Every phrase is like the flash of a scimitar

Exploded like a penny squib

Eyes as deeply dark as are the desert skies

Eyes as luminous and bright and brown as waters of a woodland river

Eyes half veiled by slumberous tears, like bluest water seen through mists of rain

Eyes like a very dark topaz

Eyes like deep wells of compassionate gloom

Eyes like limpid pools in shadow

Eyes like mountain water that o'erflowing on a rock

F
Faces pale with bliss, like evening stars

Fade away like a cloud in the horizon

Faint and distant as the light of a sun that has long set

Faintly, like a falling dew

Fair and fleet as a fawn

Fair as a star when only one is shining in the sky

Fallen like dead leaves on the highway

Falling away like a speck in space

Fanciful and extravagant as a caliph's dream

Fawning like dumb neglected lap-dogs

Felt her breath upon his cheek like a perfumed air

Fields of young grain and verdured pastures like crushed velvet

Fierce as a bear in defeat

Fierce as the flames

Fills life up like a cup with bubbling and sparkling liquor

Fit closely together as the close-set stones of a building

Fix'd like a beacon-tower above the waves of a tempest

Flame like a flag unfurled

Flap loose and slack like a drooping sail

Flashed with the brilliancy of a well-cut jewel

Fled like sweet dreams

Fleet as an arrow

Flitted like a sylph on wings

Flowers as soft as thoughts of budding love

Fluent as a rill, that wanders silver-footed down a hill

Fluid as thought

Fluttered like gilded butterflies in giddy mazes

Fragile as a spider's web

Free as the air, from zone to zone I flew

Free as the winds that caress

Fresh and unworn as the sea that breaks languidly beside them

Fresh as a jewel found but yesterday

Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail

Frightened like a child in the dark

Full-throated as the sea

Furious as eagles

G
Gazed like a star into the morning light

Glaring like noontide

Gleam like a diamond on a dancing girl

Glistening like threads of gold

Glitter like a swarm of fire-flies tangled in a silver braid

Glittering like an aigrette of stars

Gone astray as a sheep that is lost

Gone like a glow on the cloud at the close of day

Gone like tenants that quit without warning

Gorgeous as the hues of heaven

Grazing through a circulating library as contentedly as cattle in a fresh meadow

Great scarlet poppies lay in drifts and heaps, like bodies fallen there in vain assault

H
Hair as harsh as tropical grass and gray as ashes

Hangs like a blue thread loosen'd from the sky

Hard, sharp, and glittering as a sword

Harnessed men, like beasts of burden, drew it to the riverside

Haunts you like the memory of some former happiness

He began to laugh with that sibilant laugh which resembles the hiss of a serpent

He bent upon the lightning page like some rapt poet o'er his rhyme

He bolted down the stairs like a hare

He clatters like a windmill

He danced like a man in a swarm of hornets

He fell as falls some forest lion, fighting well

He fell down on my threshold like a wounded stag

He had acted exactly like an automaton

He lay as straight as a mummy

He lay like a warrior taking his rest

He lived as modestly as a hermit

He looked fagged and sallow, like the day

He looked with the bland, expressionless stare of an overgrown baby

He played with grave questions as a cat plays with a mouse

He radiated vigor and abundance like a happy child

He sat down quaking like a jelly

He saw disaster like a ghostly figure following her

He snatched furiously at breath like a tiger snatching at meat

He spoke with a uniformity of emphasis that made his words stand out like the raised type for the blind

He swayed in the sudden grip of anger

He sweeps the field of battle like a monsoon

He that wavereth is like a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed

He turned on me like a thunder-cloud

He turned white as chalk

He wandered restlessly through the house, like a prowling animal

He was as splendidly serious as a reformer

He was as steady as a clock

He was as wax in those clever hands

He was bold as the hawk

He was so weak now, like a shrunk cedar white with the hoar-frost

Hearts unfold like flowers before thee

Heavy was my heart as stone

Heeled like an avalanche to leeward

Her arms like slumber o'er my shoulders crept

Her banners like a thousand sunsets glow

Her beauty broke on him like some rare flower

Her beauty fervent as a fiery moon

Her breath is like a cloud

Her cheeks are like the blushing cloud

Her cheeks were wan and her eyes like coals

Her dusky cheek would burn like a poppy

Her expression changed with the rapidity of a kaleidoscope

Her eyes as bright as a blazing star

Her eyes as stars of twilight fair

Her eyes, glimmering star-like in her pale face

Her eyes were as a dove that sickeneth

Her face changed with each turn of their talk, like a wheat-field under a summer breeze

Her face collapsed as if it were a pricked balloon

Her face was as solemn as a mask

Her face was dull as lead

Her face was like a light

Her face was passionless, like those by sculptor graved for niches in a temple

Her hair dropped on her pallid cheeks, like sea-weed on a clam

Her hair hung down like summer twilight

Her hair shone like a nimbus

Her hair was like a coronet

Her hands are white as the virgin rose that she wore on her wedding day

Her hands like moonlight brush the keys

Her head dropped into her hands like a storm-broken flower

Her heart has grown icy as a fountain in the fall

Her holy love that like a vestal flame had burned

Her impulse came and went like fireflies in the dusk

Her lashes like fans upon her cheek

Her laugh is like a rainbow-tinted spray

Her lips are like two budded roses

Her lips like a lovely song that ripples as it flows

Her lips like twilight water

Her little lips are tremulous as brook-water is

Her long black hair danced round her like a snake

Her mouth as sweet as a ripe fig

Her neck is like a stately tower

Her pale robe clinging to the grass seemed like a snake

Her pulses flutter'd like a dove

Her skin was as the bark of birches

Her sweetness halting like a tardy May

Her two white hands like swans on a frozen lake

Her voice cut like a knife

Her voice like mournful bells crying on the wind

Her voice was like the voice the stars had when they sang together

Her voice was rich and vibrant, like the middle notes of a 'cello

Her words sounding like wavelets on a summer shore

Herding his thoughts as a collie dog herds sheep

Here and there a solitary volume greeted him like a friend in a crowd of strange faces

Here in statue-like repose, an old wrinkled mountain rose

Hers was the loveliness of some tall white lily cut in marble, splendid but chill

His bashfulness melted like a spring frost

His brow bent like a cliff o'er his thoughts

His cheeks were furrowed and writhen like rain-washed crags

His eyes blazed like deep forests

His eyes glowed like blue coals

His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like moldy hay

His face burnt like a brand

His face was glad as dawn to me

His face was often lit up by a smile like pale wintry sunshine

His fingers were knotted like a cord

His formal kiss fell chill as a flake of snow on the cheek

His fortune melted away like snow in a thaw

His glorious moments were strung like pearls upon a string

His indifference fell from him like a garment

His invectives and vituperations bite and flay like steel whips

His mind murmurs like a harp among the trees

His mind was like a lonely wild

His mind was like a summer sky

His nerves thrilled like throbbing violins

His retort was like a knife-cut across the sinews

His revenge descends perfect, sudden, like a curse from heaven

His spirits sank like a stone

His talk is like an incessant play of fireworks

His voice is as the thin faint song when the wind wearily sighs in the grass

His voice rose like a stream of rich distilled perfumes

His voice was like the clap of thunder which interrupts the warbling birds among the leaves

His whole soul wavered and shook like a wind-swept leaf

His words gave a curious satisfaction, as when a coin, tested, rings true gold

Hopeful as the break of day

How like a saint she sleeps

How like a winter hath my absence been

How like the sky she bends over her child

Howling in the wilderness like beasts

Huge as a hippopotamus

Humming-birds like lake of purple fire

Hushed as the grave

Hushed like a breathless lyre

I
I had grown pure as the dawn and the dew I have heard the Hidden People like the hum of swarming bees

I have seen the ravens flying, like banners of old wars

I saw a face bloom like a flower

I saw a river of men marching like a tide

I saw his senses swim dizzy as clouds

I wander'd lonely as a cloud

I was as sensitive as a barometer

I was no more than a straw on the torrent of his will

I will face thy wrath though it bite as a sword

Ideas which spread with the speed of light

Idle hopes, like empty shadows

Impassive as a statue

Impatient as the wind

Impregnable as Gibraltar

Impressive as a warrant of arrest for high treason

Incredible little white teeth, like snow shut in a rose

Infrequent carriages sped like mechanical toys guided by manikins

In honor spotless as unfallen snow

In that head of his a flame burnt that was like an altar-fire

In yonder cottage shines a light, far-gleaming like a gem

Instantly she revived like flowers in water

Intangible as a dream

It came and faded like a wreath of mist at eve

It cuts like knives, this air so chill

It drops away like water from a smooth statue

It pealed through her brain like a muffled bell

It poured upon her like a trembling flood

It racked his ears like an explosion of steam-whistles

It ran as clear as a trout-brook

It seems as motionless and still as the zenith in the skies

It set his memories humming like a hive of bees

It staggered the eye, like the sight of water running up hill

It stung like a frozen lash

It was as futile as to oppose an earthquake with argument

It was as if a door had been opened into a furnace, so the eyes blazed

It would collapse as if by enchantment

Its temples and its palaces did seem like fabrics of enchantment piled to Heaven

J
Jealousy, fierce as the fires

K
Kindle like an angel's wings the western skies in flame

Kindly mornings when autumn and winter seemed to go hand in hand like a happy aged couple

Kingdoms melt away like snow

L
Laboring like a giant

Languid streams that cross softly, slowly, with a sound like smothered weeping

Laughter like a beautiful bubble from the rosebud of babyhood

Laughter like the sudden outburst of the glad bird in the tree-top

Lazy merchantmen that crawled like flies over the blue enamel of the sea

Leapt like a hunted stag

Let his frolic fancy play, like a happy child

Let in confusion like a whirling flood

Let thy mouth murmur like the doves

Life had been arrested, as the horologist, with interjected finger, arrests the beating of the clock

Life stretched before him alluring and various as the open road

Life sweet as perfume and pure as prayer

Light as a snowflake

Lights gleamed there like stars in a still sky

Like a ball of ice it glittered in a frozen sea of sky

Like a blade sent home to its scabbard

Like a blast from a horn

Like a blast from the suddenly opened door of a furnace

Like a blossom blown before a breeze, a white moon drifts before a shimmering sky

Like a bright window in a distant view

Like a caged lion shaking the bars of his prison

Like a calm flock of silver-fleeced sheep

Like a cloud of fire

Like a cold wind his words went through their flesh

Like a crowd of frightened porpoises a shoal of sharks pursue

Like a damp-handed auctioneer

Like a deaf and dumb man wondering what it was all about

Like a dew-drop, ill-fitted to sustain unkindly shocks

Like a dipping swallow the stout ship dashed through the storm

Like a distant star glimmering steadily in the darkness

Like a dream she vanished

Like a festooned girdle encircling the waist of a bride

Like a flower her red lips parted

Like a game in which the important pait is to keep from laughing

Like a glow-worm golden

Like a golden-shielded army

Like a great express train, roaring, flashing, dashing headlong

Like a great fragment of the dawu it lay

Like a great ring of pure and endless light

Like a great tune to which the planets roll

Like a high and radiant ocean

Like a high-born maiden

Like a jewel every cottage casement showed

Like a joyless eye that finds no object worth its constancy

Like a knight worn out by conflict

Like a knot of daisies lay the hamlets on the hill

Like a lily in bloom

Like a living meteor

Like a locomotive-engine with unsound lungs

Like a long arrow through the dark the train is darting

Like a mirage, vague, dimly seen at first

Like a miser who spoils his coat with scanting a little cloth

Like a mist the music drifted from the silvery strings

Like a moral lighthouse in the midst of a dark and troubled sea

Like a murmur of the wind came a gentle sound of stillness

Like a noisy argument in a drawing-room

Like a pageant of the Golden Year, in rich memorial pomp the hours go by

Like a pale flower by some sad maiden cherished

Like a poet hidden

Like a river of molten amethyst

Like a rocket discharging a shower of golden stars

Like a rose embower'd in its own green leaves

Like a sea of upturned faces

Like a shadow never to be overtaken

Like a shadow on a fair sunlit landscape

Like a sheeted ghost

Like a ship tossed to and fro on the waves of life's sea

Like a slim bronze statue of Despair

Like a snow-flake lost in the ocean

Like a soul that wavers in the Valley of the Shadow

Like a stalled horse that breaks loose and goes at a gallop through the plain

Like a star, his love's pure face lo6ked down

Like a star that dwelt apart

Like a star, unhasting, unresting

Like a stone thrown at random

Like a summer cloud, youth indeed has crept away

Like a summer-dried fountain

Like a swift eagle in the morning glare breasting the whirlwind with impetuous flight

Like a thing at rest

Like a thing read in a book or remembered out of the faraway past

Like a tide of triumph through their veins, the red, rejoicing blood began to race

Like a triumphing fire the news was borne

Like a troop of boys let loose from school, the adventurers went by

Like a vaporous amethyst

Like a vision of the morning air

Like a voice from the unknown regiens

Like a wandering star I fell through the deeps of desire

Like a watch-worn and weary sentinel

Like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed

Like a whirlwind they went past

Like a withered leaf the moon is blown across the bay

Like a world of sunshine

Like a yellow silken scarf the thick fog hangs

Like an alien ghost I stole away

Like an eagle clutching his prey, his arm swooped down

Like an eagle dallying with the wind

Like an engine of dread war, he set his shoulder to the mountain-side

Like an enraged tiger

Like an enthusiast leading about with him an indifferent tourist

Like an icy wave, a swift and tragic impression swept through him

Like an unbidden guest

Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun

Like an unseen star of birth

Like an unwelcome thought

Like apparitions seen and gone

Like attempting to number the waves on the shore of a limitless sea

Like bells that waste the moments with their loudness

Like blasts of trumpets blown in wars

Like bright Apollo

Like bright lamps, the fabled apples glow

Like building castles in the air

Like bursting waves from the ocean

Like cliffs which have been rent asunder

Like clouds of gnats with perfect lineaments

Like cobwebs woven round the limbs of an infant giant

Like crystals of snow

Like dead lovers who died true

Like Death, who rides upon a thought, and makes his way through temple, tower, and palace

Like dew upon a sleeping flower

Like dining with a ghost

Like drawing nectar in a sieve

Like earth's decaying leaves

Like echoes from a hidden lyre

Like echoes from an antenatal dream

Like fixed eyes, whence the dear light of sense and thought has fled

Like footsteps upon wool

Like fragrance from dead flowers

Like ghosts, from an enchanter fleeing

Like ghosts the sentries come and go

Like golden boats on a sunny sea

Like great black birds, the demons haunt the woods

Like green waves on the sea

Like having to taste a hundred exquisite dishes in a single meal

Like Heaven's free breath, which he who grasps can hold not

Like helpless birds in the warm nest

Like iridescent bubbles floating on a foul stream

Like kindred drops mingled into one

Like laying a burden on the back of a moth

Like lead his feet were

like leaves in wintry weather

Like leviathans afloat

Like lighting a candle to the sun

Like making a mountain out of a mole-hill

Like mariners pulling the life-boat

Like mice that steal in and out as if they feared the light

Like mountain over mountain huddled

Like mountain streams we meet and part

Like music on the water

Like notes which die when born, but still haunt the echoes of the hill

Like oceans of liquid silver

Like one pale star against the dusk, a single diamond on her brow gleamed with imprisoned fire

Like one who halts with tired wings

Like one who talks of what he loves in dream

Like organ music came the deep reply

Like pageantry of mist on an autumnal stream

Like phantoms gathered by the sick imagination

Like planets in the sky

Like pouring oil on troubled waters

Like roses that in deserts bloom and die

Like rowing upstream against a strong downward current

Like scents from a twilight garden

Like separated souls

Like serpents struggling in a vulture's grasp

Like sheep from out the fold of the sky, stars leapt

like ships that have gone down at sea

Like shy elves hiding from the traveler's eye

Like skeletons, the sycamores uplift their wasted hands

Like some grave night thought threading a dream

Like some new-gathered snowy hyacinth, so white and cold and delicate it was

Like some poor nigh-related guest, that may not rudely be dismist

Like some suppressed and hideous thought which flits athwart our musings, but can find no rest within a pure and gentle mind

Like some unshriven churchyard thing, the riar crawled

Like something fashioned in a dream

Like sounds of wind and flood

Like splendor-winged moths about a taper

Like stepping out on summer evenings from the glaring ball-room upon the cool and still piazza

Like straws in a gust of wind

Like summer's beam and summer's stream

Like sunlight, in and out the leaves, the robins went

Like sweet thoughts in a dream

Like the awful shadow of some unseen power

Like the bellowing of bulls

Like the boar encircled by hunters and hounds

Like the bubbles on a river sparkling, bursting, borne away

Like the cold breath of the grave

Like the creaking of doors held stealthily ajar

Like the cry of an itinerant vendor in a quiet and picturesque town

Like the dance of some gay sunbeam

Like the dawn of the morn

Like the detestable and spidery araucaria

Like the dew on the mountain

Like the dim scent in violets

Like the drifting foam of a restless sea when the waves show their teeth in the flying breeze

Like the embodiment of a perfect rose, complete in form and fragrance

Like the faint cry of unassisted woe

Like the faint exquisite music of a dream

Like the fair flower dishevel'd in the wind

Like the fair sun, when in his fresh array he cheers the morn, and all the earth revealeth

Like the falling thud of the blade of a murderous ax

Like the fierce fiend of a distempered dream

Like the fitting of an old glove to a hand

Like the foam on the river

Like the great thunder sounding

Like the jangling of all the strings of some musical instrument

Like the jewels that gleam in baby eyes

Like the kiss of maiden love the breeze is sweet and bland

Like the long wandering love, the weary heart may faint for rest

Like the moon in water seen by night

Like the music in the patter of small feet

Like the prodigal whom wealth softens into imbecility

Like the quivering image of a landscape in a flowing stream

Like the rainbow, thou didst fade

Like the rustling of grain moved by the west-wind

Like the sap that turns to nectar, in the velvet of the peach

Like the sea whose waves are set in motion by the winds

Like the sea-worm, that perforates the shell of the mussel, which straightway closes the wound with a pearl

Like the setting of a tropical sun

Like the shadow of a great hill that reaches far out over the plain

Like the shadows of the stars in the upheaved sea

Like the shudder of a doomed soul

Like the silver gleam when the poplar trees rustle their pale leaves listlessly

Like the soft light of an autumnal day

Like the Spring-time, fresh and green

Like the stern-lights of a ship at sea, illuminating only the path which has been passed over

Like the sudden impulse of a madman

Like the swell of Summer's ocean

Like the tattered effigy in a cornfield

Like the vase in which roses have once been distill'd

Like the visits of angels, short and far between

Like the whole sky when to the east the morning doth return

Like thistles of the wilderness, fit neither for food nor fuel

Like those great rivers, whose course every one beholds, but their springs have been seen by but few

Like thoughts whose very sweetness yielded proof that they were born for immortality

Like to diamonds her white teeth shone between the parted lips

Like torrents from a mountain source, we rushed into each other's arms

Like troops of ghosts on the dry wind past

Like two doves with silvery wings, let our souls fly

Like two flaming stars were his eyes

Like vaporous shapes half seen

Like village curs that bark when their fellows do

Like wasted hours of youth

Like winds that bear sweet music, when they breathe through some dim latticed chamber

Like wine-stain to a flask the old distrust still clings

Like winged stars the fire-flies flash and glance

Like young lovers whom youth and love make dear

Lingering like an unloved guest

Lithe as a panther

Little white hands like pearls

Lofty as a queen

Loneliness struck him like a blow

Looked back with faithful eyes like a great mastiff to his master's face

Looking as sulky as the weather itself

Looking like a snarling beast baulked of its prey

Loose clouds like earth's decaying leaves are shed

Lost like the lightning in the sullen clod

Love as clean as starlight

Love brilliant as the morning

Love had like the canker-worm consumed her early prime

Love is a changing lord as the light on a turning sword

Love like a child around the world doth run

Love like a miser in the dark his joys would hide

Love shakes like a windy reed your heart

Love smiled like an unclouded sun

Love that sings and has wings as a bird

Lovely as starry water

Lovely the land unknown and like a river flowing

M
March on my soul nor like the laggard stay

Me on whose heart as a worm she trod

Meaningless as the syllables of an unknown tongue

Men moved hither and thither like insects in their crevices

Mentality as hard as bronze

Mentally round-shouldered and decrepit

Merge imperceptibly into one another like the hues of the prism

Meteors that dart like screaming birds

Milk-white pavements, clear and richly pale, like alabaster

More variegated than the skin of a serpent

Motion like the spirit of that wind whose soft sten deepens slumber

Motionless as a plumb line

Mountains like frozen wrinkles on a sea

Moving in the same dull round, like blind horses in a mill

Mute as an iceberg

My age is as a lusty Winter

My body broken as a turning wheel

My breath to Heaven like vapor goes

My head was like a great bronze bell with one thought for the clapper

My heart is as some famine-murdered land

My heart is like a full sponge and must weep a little

My heart like a bird doth hover

My heart will be as wind fainting in hot grass

My life floweth away like a river

My life was white as driven snow

My love for thee is like the sovereign moon that rules the sea

My love's like the steadfast sun

My lungs began to crow like chanticleer

My mind swayed idly like a water-lily in a lake

My muscles are as steel

My skin is as sallow as gold

My soul was as a lampless sea

My spirit seemed to beat the void, like the bird from out the ark

My thoughts came yapping and growling round me like a pack of curs

My thoughts ran leaping through the green ways of my mind like fawns at play

N
Night falls like fire

No longer shall slander's venomed spite crawl like a snake across his perfect name

Now every nerve in my body seemed like a strained harp-string ready to snap at a touch

Now like a wild nymph she veils her shadowy form

Now like a wild rose in the fields of heaven slipt forth the slender figure of the Dawn

Now memory and emotion surged in my soul like a tempest

Now thou seemest like a bankrupt beau, stripped of his gaudy hues

O
Obscured with wrath as is the sun with cloud

Odorous as all Arabia

Often enough life tosses like a fretful stream among rocky boulders

Oh, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud

Old as the evening star

Old happy hours that have long folded their wings

Once again, like madness, the black shapes of doubt swing through his brain

One bleared star, faint glimmering like a bee

One bright drop is like the gem that decks a monarch's crown

One by one flitting like a mournful bird

One deep roar as of a cloven world

One winged cloud above like a spread dragon overhangs the west

Oppressed by the indefiniteness which hung in her mind, like a thick summer haze

Or shedding radiance like the smiles of God

Our enemies were broken like a dam of river reeds

Our hearts bowed down like violets after rain

Our sail like a dew-lit blossom shone

Overhead the intense blue of the noonday sky burst like a jewel in the sun

P
Pale and grave as a sculptured nun

Pale as a drifting blossom

Passed like a phantom into the shadows

Passive and tractable as a child

Peaceful as a village cricket-green on Sunday

Peevish and impatient, like some ill-trained man who is sick

Perished utterly, like a blown-out flame

Philosophy evolved itself, like a vast spider's loom

Pillowed upon its alabaster arms like to a child o'erwearied with sweet toil

Polished as the bosom of a star

Poured his heart out like the rending sea in passionate wave on wave

Pouting like the snowy buds o' roses in July

Presently she hovered like a fluttering leaf or flake of snow

Pride and self-disgust served her like first-aid surgeons on the battlefield

Proud as the proudest of church dignitaries

Pure as a wild-flower

Pure as the azure above them

Pure as the naked heavens

Pure as the snowy leaves that fold over the flower's heart

Purple, crimson, and scarlet, like the curtains of God's tabernacle

Put on gravity like a robe

Q
Quaking and quivering like a short-haired puppy after a ducking

Questions and answers sounding like a continuous popping of corks

Quiet as a nun's face

Quietly as a cloud he stole

Quietude which seemed to him beautiful as clear depths of water

Quivering like an eager race-horse to start

R
Rage, rage ye tears, that never more should creep like hounds about God's footstool

Ran like a young fawn

Rattle in the ear like a flourish of trumpets

Rays springing from the east like golden arrows

Red as the print of a kiss might be

Redolent with the homely scent of old-fashioned herbs and flowers

Reflected each in the other like stars in a lake

Refreshed like dusty grass after a shower

Refreshing as descending rains to sunburnt climes

Remote as the hidden star

Restless as a blue-bottle fly on a warm summer's day

Revealed his doings like those of bees in a glass hive

Rich as the dawn

Ride like the wind through the night

Rivers that like silver threads ran through the green and gold of pasture lands

Roared like mountain torrents

Rolling it under the tongue as a sweet morsel

Round my chair the children run like little things of dancing gold

Ruddy as sunrise

Ruddy his face as the morning light

Ruffling out his cravat with a crackle of starch, like a turkey when it spreads its feathers

Running to and fro like frightened sheep

Rushing and hurrying about like a June-bug

S
Sanctuaries where the passions may, like wild falcons, cover their faces with their wings

Sayings that stir the blood like the sound of a trumpet

Scattered love as stars do light

Sea-gulls flying like flakes of the sea

Sentences level and straight like a hurled lance

Shadowy faces, known in dream, pass as petals upon a stream

Shake like an aspen leaf

Shaken off like a nightmare

Shapeless as a sack of wool

Shattered like so much glass

She brightened like a child whose broken toy is glued together

She could summon tears as one summons servants

She danced like a flower in the wind

She disclaimed the weariness that dragged upon her spirits like leaden weights

She exuded a faint and intoxicating perfume of womanliness, like a crushed herb

She felt like an unrepentant criminal

She fled like a spirit from the room

She flounders like a huge conger-eel in an ocean of dingy morality

She gave him a surprised look, like a child catching an older person in a foolish statement

She gave off antipathies as a liquid gives off vapor

She has great eyes like the doe

She heard him like one in a dream

She let the soft waves of her deep hair fall like flowers from Paradise

She looked like a tall golden candle

She looked like the picture of a young rapt saint, lost in heavenly musing

She moved like mirth incarnate

She nestles like a dove

She played with a hundred possibilities fitfully and discursively as a musician runs his fingers over a key-board

She played with grave cabinets as a cat plays with a mouse

She saw this planet like a star hung in the glistening depths of even

She seemed as happy as a wave that dances on the sea

She shall be sportive as the fawn

She stood silent a moment, dropping before him like a broken branch

She that passed had lips like pinks

She walked like a galley-slave

She walks in beauty like the night

She was as brilliant, and as hard too, as electric light

She was silent, standing before him like a little statuesque figure

Shining like the dewy star of dawn

Shivering pine-trees, like phantoms

Showy as damask-rose and shy as musk

Shrill as the loon's call

Shrivel like paper thrust into a flame

Shy as the squirrel

Sights seen as a traveling swallow might see them on the wing

Silence deep as death

Silence now is brooding like a gentle spirit o'er the still and pulseless world

Silence that seemed heavy and dark, like a passing cloud

Sinks clamorous like mill-waters at wild play

Sits like the maniac on his fancied throne

Skies as clear as babies' eyes

Sleek and thick and yellow as gold

Slender and thin as a slender wire

Slowly as a tortoise

Slowly as the finger of a clock, her shadow came

Slowly moved off and disappeared like shapes breathed on a mirror and melting away

Slowly, unnoted, like the creeping rust that spreads insidious, had estrangement come

Small as a grain of mustard seed

Smooth as a pond

Smooth as the pillar flashing in the sun

Snug as a bug in a rug

Soaring as swift as smoke from a volcano springs

So elusive that the memory of it afterwards was wont to come and go like a flash of light

So my spirit beat itself like a caged bird against its prison bars in vain

Soft as a zephyr

Soft as sleep the snow fell

Soft as Spring

Soft as the down of the turtle dove

Soft as the landscape of a dream

Soft as the south-wind

Soft in their color as gray pearls

Soft vibrations of verbal melody, like the sound of a golden bell rung far down under the humming waters

Some gleams of feeling pure and warm as sunshine on a sky of storm

Some like veiled ghosts hurrying past as though driven to their land of shadows by shuddering fear

Some minds are like an open fire -- how direct and instant our communication with them

Something divine seemed to cling around her like some subtle vapor

Something resistant and inert, like the obstinate rolling over of a heavy sleeper after he has been called to get up

Something sharp and brilliant, like the glitter of a sword or a forked flash of lightning

Sorrowful eyes like those of wearied kine spent from the plowing

Spread like wildfire

Squirrel-in-the-cage kind of movement

Stamping like a plowman to shuffle off the snow

Stared about like calves in a pen

Steadfast as the soul of truth

Steals lingering like a river smooth

Still as death

Stood like a wave-beaten rock

Straight as a ray of light

Straight as an arrow

Streamed like a meteor through the troubled air

Streamed o'er his memory like a forest flame

Streaming tears, like pearl drops from a flint

Striking with the force of an engine of destruction

Strong as a bison

Style comes, if at all, like the bloom upon fruit, or the glow of health upon the cheek

Subtle as jealousy

Sudden a thought came like a full-blown rose, flushing his brow

Sudden sprays of rain, like volleys of sharp arrows, rattled gustily against the windows

Suddenly, like death, the truth flashed on them

Sunbeams flashing on the face of things like sudden smilings of divine delight

Sunday mornings which seem to put on, like a Sabbath garment, an atmosphere of divine quietude

Supple and sweet as a rose in bloom

Sway like blown moths against the rosewhite flame

Sweet as a summer night without a breath

Sweet as music she spoke

Sweet as the rain at noon

Sweet as the smile of a fairy

Swift as a swallow heading south

Swift as lightning

Swift as the panther in triumph

Swifter than the twinkling of an eye

T
Talking and thinking became to him like the open page of a monthly magazine

Tall lance-like reeds wave sadly o'er his head

That like a wounded snake drags its slow length along

The anemone that weeps at day-break, like a silly girl before her lover

The army blazed and glowed in the golden sunlight like a mosaic of a hundred thousand jewels

The army like a witch's caldron seethed

The beating of her heart was like a drum

The beauty of her quiet life was like a rose in blowing

The billows burst like cannon down the coast

The birds swam the flood of air like tiny ships

The boat cuts its swift way through little waves like molten gold and opal

The boom of the surf grew ever less sonorous, like the thunder of a retreating storm

The breast-plate of righteousness

The breathless hours like phantoms stole away

The breeze is as a pleasant tune

The calm white brow as calm as earliest morn

The camp fire reddens like angry skies

The chambers of the house were haunted by an incessant echoing, like some dripping cavern

The church swarmed like a hive

The city is all in a turmoil; it boils like a pot of lentils

The clouds that move like spirits o'er the welkin clear

The clustered apples burnt like flame

The colored bulbs swung noon-like from tree and shrub

The crimson close of day

The curl'd moon was like a little feather

The curling wreaths like turbans seem

The dark hours are swept away like crumbling ashes

The dark mass of her hair shook round her like a sea

The dawn is rising from the sea, like a white lady from her

The dawn had whitened in the mist like a dead face bed

The dawn with silver-sandaled feet crept like a frightened girl.

The day stunned me like light upon some wizard way

The day was sweeter than honey and the honey-comb

The days have trampled me like armed men

The dead past flew away over the fens like a flight of wild swans

The deep like one black maelstrom round her whirls

The deepening east like a scarlet poppy burnt

The desolate rocky hills rolled like a solid wave along the horizon

The dome of heaven is like one drop of dew

The dreams of poets come like music heard at evening from the depth of some enchanted forest

The eagerness faded from his eyes, leaving them cold as a winter sky after sunset

The earth was like a frying-pan, or some such hissing matter

The eternal sea, which like a childless mother, still must croon her ancient sorrows to the cold white moon

The evening sky was as green as jade

The excitement had spread through the whole house, like a piquant and agreeable odor

The excitement of the thought buoyed his high-strung temperament like a tonic

The feathery meadows like a lilac sea

The firm body like a slope of snow

The first whiff of reality dissipated them like smoke

The floor, newly waxed, gleamed in the candle-light like beaten moonbeams

The fragrant clouds of hair, they flowed round him like a snare

The gathering glory of life shone like the dawn

The gesture was all strength and will, like the stretching of a sea-bird's wings

The girl's voice rang like a bird-call through his rustling fancies

The glimmer of tall flowers standing like pensive moon-worshipers in an ecstasy of prayerless bloom

The guides sniffed, like chamois, the air

The heavens are like a scroll unfurled

The hills across the valley were purple as thunder-clouds

The hoofs of the horses rang like the dumb cadence of an old saga

The hours crawled by like years

The hum of the camp sounds like the sea

The hurrying crowds of men gather like clouds

The ideas succeeded each other like a dynasty of kings

The impalpable presence of the new century rose like a vast empty house through which no human feet had walked

The inexorable facts closed in on him like prison-warders hand-cuffing a convict

The lake glimmered as still as a mirror

The land of gold seemed to hold him like a spell

The land was like a dream

The level boughs, like bars of iron across the setting sun

The light of London flaring like a dreary dawn

The lights blazed up like day

The lilies were drooping, white, and wan, like the head and skin of a dying man

The mellowing hand of time

The melody rose tenderly and lingeringly like a haunting perfume of pressed flowers

The Milky Way lay like diamond-dust upon the robe of some great king

The monk's face whitened like sea-foam

The moon drowsed between the trees like a great yellow moth

The moon on the tower slept soft as snow

The moonbeams rest like a pale spotless shroud

The moonlight lay like snow

The moonlight, like a fairy mist, upon the mesa spreads

The mortal coldness of the soul, like death itself comes down

The mountain shadows mingling, lay like pools above the earth

The mountains loomed up dimly, like phantoms through the mist

The music almost died away, then it burst like a pent-up flood

The name that cuts into my soul like a knife

The nervous little train winding its way like a jointed reptile

The new ferns were spread upon the earth like some lacy coverlet

The night like a battle-broken host is driven before

The night yawned like a foul wind

The ocean swelled like an undulating mirror of the bowl of heaven

The old books look somewhat pathetically from the shelves, like aged dogs wondering why no one takes them for a walk

The old infamy will pop into daylight like a toad out of a fissure in the rock

The penalty falls like a thunderbolt from heaven

The phrase was like a spear-thrust

The pine trees waved as waves a woman's hair

The place was like some enchanted town of palaces

The plains to northward change their color like the shimmering necks of doves

The poppy burned like a crimson ember

The prime of man has waxed like cedars

The public press would chatter and make odd ambiguous sounds like a shipload of monkeys in a storm

The purple heather rolls like dumb thunder

The rainbows flashed like fire

The river shouted as ever its cry of joy over the vitality of life, like a spirited boy before the face of inscrutable nature

The roofs with their gables like hoods

The roses lie upon the grass like little shreds of crimson silk

The satire of the word cut like a knife

The scullion with face shining like his pans

The sea reeled round like a wine-vat splashing

The sea-song of the trampling waves is as muffled bells

The sea spread out like a wrinkled marble floor

The sea, that gleamed still, like a myriad-petaled rose

The sea was as untroubled as the turquoise vault which it reflected

The setting of the sun is like a word of peace

The sharp hail rattles against the panes and melts on my cheeks like tears

The ships, like sheeted phantoms coming and going

The silence seemed to crush to earth like a great looking-glass and shiver into a million pieces

The silvery morning like a tranquil vision fills the world

The sky burned like a heated opal

The sky gleamed with the hardness and brilliancy of blue enamel

The sky was as a shield that caught the stain of blood and battle from the dying sun

The sky was clear and blue, and the air as soft as milk

The sky was like a peach

The sky where stars like lilies white and fair shine through the mists

The solid air around me there heaved like a roaring ocean

The solid mountains gleamed like the unsteady sea

The soul is like a well of water springing up into everlasting life

The sound is like a noon-day gale

The sound is like a silver-fountain that springeth in a golden basin

The sound of a thousand tears, like softly pattering wings

The sound of your running feet that like the sea-hoofs beat

The spear-tongued lightning slipped like a snake

The Spring breaks like a bird

The stacks of corn in brown array, like tattered wigwams on the plain

The stars come down and trembling glow like blossoms on the waves below

The stars lay on the lapis-lazuli sky like white flower-petals on still deep water

The stars pale and silent as a seer

The strange cold sense of aloofness that had numbed her senses suddenly gave way like snow melting in the spring

The sudden thought of your face is like a wound when it comes unsought

The sun, like a great dragon, writhes in gold

The sun on the sea-wave lies white as the moon

The surf was like the advancing lines of an unknown enemy flinging itself upon the shore

The terrible past lay afar, like a dream left behind in the night

The tide was in the salt-weed, and like a knife it tore

The time, gliding like a dream

The torrent from the hills leaped down their rocky stairways like wild steeds

The tree whose pluméd boughs are soft as wings of birds

The uproar and contention pierced him like arrows

The veiled future bowed before me like a vision of promise

The velvet grass that is like padding to earth's meager ribs

The villa dips its foot in the lake, smiling at its reflection like a bather lingering on the brink

The voice of Fate, crying like some old Bellman through the world

The voice that rang in the night like a bugle call

The warm kindling blood burned her cheeks like the breath of a hot wind

The waves were rolling in, long and lazy, like sea-worn travelers

The whole truth, naked, cold, and fatal as a patriot's blade

The wind all round their ears hissed like a flight of white-winged geese

The wind comes and it draws its length along like the genii from the earthen pot

The wine flows like blood

The woman seemed like a thing of stone

The words kept ringing in my ears like the tolling of a bell

The words of the wise fall like the tolling of sweet, grave bells upon the soul

The world had vanished like a phantasmagoria

The world is bitter as a tear

The world is in a simmer, like a sea

The world wavers within its circle like a dream

The years stretched before her like some vast blank page out to receive the record of her toil

The years vanished like a May snowdrift

The yellow apples glowed like fire

Their glances met like crossed swords

Their joy like sunshine deep and broad falls on my heart

Their minds rested upon the thought, as chasing butterflies might rest together on a flower

Their music frightful as the serpent's hiss

Their touch affrights me as a serpent's sting

Then fall unheeded like the faded flower

Then felt I like some watcher of the skies

Then it swelled out to rich and glorious harmonies like a full orchestra playing under the sea

Then the lover sighing like furnace

Theories sprouted in his mind like mushrooms

There is an air about you like the air that folds a star

There, like a bird, it sits and sings

There seemed to brood in the air a quiet benevolence of a Father watching His myriad children at play

There she soars like a seraph

There she stood straight as a lily on its stem

There slowly rose to sight, a country like a dragon fast asleep

There streamed into the air the sweet smell of crushed grass, as though many fields had been pressed between giant's fingers and so had been left

These eyes like stars have led me

These final words snapped like a whip-lash

These thoughts pierced me like thorns

They are as cruel as creeping tigers

They are as white foam on the swept sands

They are as white swans in the dusk, thy white hands

They are painted sharp as death

They broke into pieces and fell on the ground, like a silvery, shimmering shower of hail

They dropped like panthers

They fly like spray

They had hands like claws

They had slipped away like visions

They have as many principles as a fish has bones

They have faces like flowers

They hurried down like plovers that have heard the call

They look like rose-buds filled with snow

They seem like swarming flies, the crowd of little men

They seemed like floating flowers

They shine as sweet as simple doves

They stand like solitary mountain forms on some hard, perfectly transparent day

They vanished like the shapes that float upon a summer s dream

Thick as wind-blown leaves innumerable

Thickly the flakes drive past, each like a childish ghost

Thine eyes like two twin stars shining

This life is like a bubble blown up in the air

This love that dwells like moonlight in your face

This thought is as death

This tower rose in the sunset like a prayer

Those ancestral themes past which so many generations have slept like sea-going winds over pastures

Those death-like eyes, unconscious of the sun

Those eyelids folded like a white rose-leaf

Those eyes like bridal beacons shine

Thou art to me but as a wave of the wild sea

Thou as heaven art fair and young

Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea

Thou must wither like a rose

Thou shalt be as free as mountain winds

Thou wouldst weep tears bitter as blood

Though bright as silver the meridian beams shine

Though thou be black as night

Thoughts vague as the fitful breeze

Three-cornered notes fly about like butterflies

Through the forest, like a fairy dream through some dark mind, the ferns in branching beauty stream

Through the moonlit trees, like ghosts of sounds haunting the moonlight, stole the faint tinkle of a guitar

Through the riot of his senses, like a silver blaze, ran the legend

Thy beauty like a beast it bites

Thy brown benignant eyes have sudden gleams of gladness and surprise, like woodland brooks that cross a sunlit spot

Thy carven columns must have grown by magic, like a dream in stone

Thy favors are but like the wind that kisses everything it meets

Thy heart is light as a leaf of a tree

Thy name burns like a gray and flickering candle flame

Thy name will be as honey on men's lips

Till death like sleep might steal on me

Till he melted like a cloud in the silent summer heaven

Time drops in decay, like a candle burnt out

Time like a pulse shakes fierce

To drag life on, which like a heavy chain lengthens behind with many a link of pain

To forsake as the trees drop their leaves in autumn

Toys with smooth trifles like a child at play

Transitory as clouds without substance

Transparent like a shining sun

Tree and shrub altered their values and became transmuted to silver sentinels

Trees that spread their forked boughs like a stag's antlers

Trembling like an aspen-leaf

Truths which forever shine as fixed stars

Turning easily and securely as on a perfect axle

U
Unbends like a loosened bow

Unbreakable as iron

Unconscious as an oak-tree of its growth

Under the willow-tree glimmered her face like a foam-flake drifting over the sea

Unheralded, like some tornado loosed out of the brooding hills, it came to pass

Unknown, like a seed in fallow ground, was the germ of a plan

Unmoving as a tombstone

Untameable as flies

Unutterable things pressing on my soul like a pent-up storm craving for outlet

Upcast like foam of the effacing tide

Uplifting the soul as on dovelike wings

Uplifting their stony peaks around us like the walls and turrets of a gigantic fortress

Urgent as the seas

Uttering wild cries like a creature in pain

V
Vague as a dream

Vague thoughts that stream shapelessly through her mind like long sad vapors through the twilight sky

Vanish into thin air, like ghosts at the cockcrow

Vanished like snow when comes a thaw

Vanished like vapor before the sun

Vibrations set quivering like harp strings struck by the hand of a master

Vociferous praise following like a noisy wave

W
Walking somewhat unsteadily like a blind man feeling his way

Waves glittered and danced on all sides like millions of diamonds

We left her and retraced our steps like faithless hounds

Weak and frail like the vapor of a vale

Wearing their wounds like stars

Weary wind, who wanderest like the world's rejected guest

When a draft might puff them out like a guttering candle

When arm in arm they both came swiftly running, like a pair of turtle-doves that could not live asunder day or night

When cards, invitations, and three-corn'd notes fly about like white butterflies

When she died, her breath whistled like the wind in a keyhole

When the fever pierced me like a knife

Where a lamp of deathless beauty shines like a beacon

Where heroes die as leaves fall

Where the intricate wheels of trade are grinding on, like a mill

Where the source of the waters is fine as a thread

Whilst the lagging hours of the day went by like windless clouds o'er a tender sky

Whistled sharply in the air like a handful of vipers

White as a ghost from darkness

White as chalk

White as dove or lily, or spirit of the light

White as the driven snow

White as the moon's white flame

White as the sea-bird's wing

White clouds like daisies

White hands she moves like swimming swans

White hands through her hair, like white doves going into the shadow of a wood

White like flame

White sails of sloops like specters

Whose bodies are as strong as alabaster

Whose hair was as gold raiment on a king

Whose laugh moves like a bat through silent haunted woods

Whose little eyes glow like the sparks of fire

Whose music like a robe of living light reclothed each newborn age

Windy speech which hits all around the mark like a drunken carpenter

Winged like an arrow to its mark

With a sting like a scorpion

With all the complacency of a homeless cat

With an angry broken roar, like billows on an unseen shore, their fury burst

With hate darkling as the swift winter hail

With music sweet as love

With sounds like breakers

With strength like steel

With the whisper of leaves in one's ear

With words like honey melting from the comb

Wits as sharp as gimlets

Women with tongues like polar needles

Words as fresh as spring verdure

Words as soft as rain

Words like the gossamer film of the summer

Words sweet as honey from his lips distill'd

Words were flashing like brilliant birds through the boughs overhead

Wordsworth, thy music like a river rolls

Worthless like the conjurer's gold

Wrangle over details like a grasping pawnbroker

Wrinkled and scored like a dried apple

Writhing with an intensity that burnt like a steady flame

Y
Yielding to the charm of the moment

Yonder flimsy crescent, bent like an archer's bow above the snowy summit

You are as gloomy to-night as an undertaker out of employment

You are as hard as stone

You gave me such chill embraces as the snow-covered heights receive from clouds

Your blood is red like wine

Your charms lay like metals in a mine

Your eyes are like fantastic moons that shiver in some stagnant lake

Your eyes as blue as violets

Your eyes they were green and gray like an April day

Your frail fancies are swallowed up, like chance flowers flung upon the river's current

Your hair was golden as tints of sunrise

Your heart is as dry as a reed

Your locks are like the raven

Your love shall fall about me like sweet rain

Your step's like the rain to summer vexed farmer

Your thoughts are buzzing like a swarm of bees

Your tongue is like a scarlet snake

Your voice had a quaver in it just like the linnet

Youth like a summer morn

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