Introduction
There are moments when the easiest thing is to stop: after a failed exam, a rejected plan, a difficult job, a personal setback, or a long season where progress feels too slow to notice. These poems about keep trying are chosen for readers who need words that say, “try again,” “keep going,” and “do not give up,” without sounding empty or forced.
This collection brings together keep trying poems, short poems about keep trying, poems about trying again, never give up poems, poems about not giving up, and perseverance poems for students and general readers. The poems below speak about failure, patience, effort, courage, hope, hard work, and success after failure. For more carefully selected poetry collections, you can also explore Featured Poems after reading this set.
Poetry & Analysis
Selected Poems
Inspirational PoemsTry, Try Again
Tis a lesson you should heed,
If at first you don’t succeed,
Try, try again;
Then your courage should appear,
For if you will persevere,
You will conquer, never fear
Try, try again;
Once or twice, though you should fail,
If you would at last prevail,
Try, try again;
If we strive, ’tis no disgrace
Though we do not win the race;
What should you do in the case?
Try, try again
If you find your task is hard,
Time will bring you your reward,
Try, try again
All that other folks can do,
Why, with patience, should not you?
Only keep this rule in view:
Try, try again.
Overview Short Summary
This is the clearest classic poem about keep trying. It tells the reader that failure is not shameful and that patience, courage, and repeated effort can turn difficulty into progress.
Core Ideas Main Themes
- Trying again: The repeated phrase “Try, try again” gives the whole poem its central lesson.
- Perseverance: The speaker connects success with patience and steady effort.
- Failure and courage: The poem says losing a race or finding a task hard should not become a reason to quit.
Emotional Effect Tone and Mood
The tone is direct, encouraging, and simple. The mood is hopeful because every failure is answered with another attempt.
Literary Technique Imagery and Symbols
Race, task, reward, and courage create a practical world of effort rather than abstract motivation.
Poetic Form Rhyme Scheme and Structure
The short lines and repeated refrain make the poem easy to remember, especially for students and younger readers.
Keep A-Goin'!
If you strike a thorn or rose,
Keep a-goin’!
If it hails or if it snows,
Keep a-goin’!
‘Taint no use to sit an’ whine
When the fish ain’t on your line;
Bait your hook an’ keep on tryin’—
Keep a-goin’!
When the weather kills your crop,
Keep a-goin’!
When you tumble from the top,
Keep a-goin’!
S’pose you’re out o’ every dime,
Gettin’ broke ain’t any crime;
Tell the world you’re feelin’ prime—
Keep a-goin’!
When it looks like all is up,
Keep a-goin’!
Drain the sweetness from the cup,
Keep a-goin’!
See the wild birds on the wing,
Hear the bells that sweetly ring,
When you feel like sighin’ sing—
Keep a-goin’!
Overview Short Summary
This poem turns the idea of keep going into a cheerful refrain. It is useful for readers searching for keep going poems or short never give up poems because every hardship is answered with movement.
Core Ideas Main Themes
- Keep going: The refrain repeats the poem’s main advice again and again.
- Resilience: Bad weather, failed crops, and financial loss become reasons to keep trying, not stop.
- Optimism: The speaker encourages singing even when the heart feels like sighing.
Emotional Effect Tone and Mood
The tone is lively, practical, and upbeat. The mood is energetic rather than solemn.
Literary Technique Imagery and Symbols
Thorns, roses, hail, snow, crops, fishhooks, birds, and bells create everyday images of difficulty and encouragement.
Poetic Form Rhyme Scheme and Structure
The poem uses repeated refrain and informal dialect to make perseverance feel friendly and memorable.
If—
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
Overview Short Summary
Kipling’s poem is one of the most famous poems about perseverance and not giving up. Its strongest keep trying message appears when the speaker says to lose everything, start again, and still hold on.
Core Ideas Main Themes
- Self-control: The poem values patience, balance, and mental steadiness.
- Starting again: The speaker praises the courage to begin again after loss.
- Endurance: The line about Will saying “Hold on!” makes perseverance the poem’s emotional center.
Emotional Effect Tone and Mood
The tone is wise, firm, and instructional. The mood is strengthening because the poem gives a code for surviving pressure.
Literary Technique Imagery and Symbols
Triumph and Disaster are personified as impostors, while worn-out tools and an unforgiving minute make effort feel concrete.
Poetic Form Rhyme Scheme and Structure
The poem is built from conditional clauses, creating a disciplined structure that mirrors the discipline it praises.
Invictus
Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.
In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbow’d.
Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds and shall find me unafraid.
It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.
Overview Short Summary
This famous never give up poem is about refusing to be defeated by pain, chance, or fear. It fits readers who need strength to keep trying when life feels harsh.
Core Ideas Main Themes
- Inner strength: The speaker claims an “unconquerable soul” despite suffering.
- Courage: The poem values being unafraid in the face of hardship.
- Self-command: The final lines insist that the speaker still owns his fate and soul.
Emotional Effect Tone and Mood
The tone is defiant, controlled, and brave. The mood is powerful and empowering.
Literary Technique Imagery and Symbols
Night, bludgeonings, a strait gate, and a captain all symbolize danger, pressure, and command.
Poetic Form Rhyme Scheme and Structure
The four quatrains move from darkness to self-mastery, giving the poem a tight and memorable structure.
A Psalm of Life
Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream!—
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us farther than to-day.
Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.
In the world’s broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!
Trust no Future, howe’er pleasant!
Let the dead Past bury its dead!
Act,—act in the living Present!
Heart within, and God o’erhead!
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;
Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o’er life’s solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.
Overview Short Summary
This poem turns discouragement into action. It is a strong poem about trying your best because it urges the reader to act in the present, keep achieving, and learn to labor and wait.
Core Ideas Main Themes
- Action: The poem asks readers not to sleep through life but to act.
- Perseverance: The final stanza joins work, patience, and steady pursuit.
- Hope for others: The footprints image shows how one person’s effort can encourage another.
Emotional Effect Tone and Mood
The tone is inspirational and urgent. The mood is active, brave, and hopeful.
Literary Technique Imagery and Symbols
Battle, footprints, sailing, and drums make the struggle of life vivid and memorable.
Poetic Form Rhyme Scheme and Structure
Regular quatrains and rhyme give the poem a marching rhythm that supports its call to action.
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