Best Poems About
A man in a bustling city yearns to escape to a small Irish island named Innisfree. There, he envisions constructing a modest cabin, cultivating beans, and ultimately discovering tranquility. The entire poem unfolds like a vivid daydream; ho
Two people wander into a small, sunlit meadow full of wild orchids, feeling so awestruck by the beauty that it feels almost sacred. They gather some flowers and whisper a quiet prayer, hoping that whoever mows the field will leave this spot
A brief six-line poem where Sandburg observes fog entering Chicago harbor, likening it to a cat that quietly sneaks in on soft paws, pauses to survey its surroundings, and then continues on its way. Though it's one of the shortest poems in
A speaker is so struck by the beauty of a harvest-season orchard that she collapses to the ground and pleads with a god to intervene — the beauty feels nearly unbearable. She then presents an offering of fallen fruit to a rough, unadorned d
Sea Garden is H.D.'s debut collection (1916), and the title poem establishes the book's tone: a garden by the sea that defies the notion of a delicate, picturesque garden — instead, it's battered, salt-crusted, and fierce. H.D. discovers a
A sea lily (a type of flower or marine creature) endures harsh winds, sand, and waves, yet it doesn't get destroyed; it rises instead. The poem explores how something delicate can withstand significant hardships and still thrive. H.D. uses
A storm rips through a grove of trees, breaking branches and tearing leaves apart with fierce intensity. H. D. observes closely, capturing the destruction in vivid detail — splintered wood, crushed greenery, a lone leaf whirling away like a
Grass is a brief, haunting poem that gives voice to the grass itself, which calmly declares its intent to cover the bodies left behind by renowned battles — Austerlitz, Waterloo, Gettysburg, Ypres, Verdun — until train passengers can no lon
In this brief, haunting poem, the grass narrates in the first person, sharing that its role is to conceal the fallen from renowned battlefields. It shows no concern for history or sorrow — it simply continues to grow, silently covering ever
A traveler halts his horse on a dark winter night to take in the sight of a snow-covered forest, even though he knows he shouldn't stay too long. The woods exude a magical allure, tempting him to linger, but he reminds himself of the respon
This poem is Longfellow's love letter to April, capturing the essence of spring as it emerges from winter — warm sunshine, budding trees, birds singing, and evenings under the stars. Each stanza focuses on a unique moment of the season, fro
A speaker recounts a surprising encounter with a snake hidden in the grass—its movements, habitat, and the shock of stumbling upon it. While the speaker generally feels a sense of friendliness toward most wildlife, this snake evokes a diffe
It's a spring day in the Canadian hills, and the speaker steps outside to find the snow melting, birds chirping, and water flowing all around. The beauty of the landscape lifts him from his gloomy mood, filling him with energy and joy. By t
Arethusa is a water nymph who runs across mountains and oceans to evade Alpheus, the river-god pursuing her out of love. The sea separates to make way for her, and ultimately, the two rivers unite and flow together in Sicily, joined for ete
This poem suggests that everything in the world — whether it's a kingfisher, a dragonfly, or a stone plopping into a well — exists to reveal its true nature, nothing more and nothing less. Hopkins takes this idea further by relating it to p
A woman strolls down a lane, gathering blackberries as she heads toward the sea. As she approaches, the landscape transforms into something vast and indifferent. The berries are rich and abundant at first, but ultimately, the ocean gives no
This poem comes from Longfellow's epic *The Song of Hiawatha* and narrates the tale of the Ojibwe hero Hiawatha and his wife Minnehaha as they safeguard and tend to their cornfields through rituals, clever tactics, and community spirit. At
A winter brook pushes its way stubbornly beneath and through a landscape frozen in ice and snow, its quiet movement showing that life hasn’t stopped even in the coldest month. Lampman observes the water with close, patient attention, discov
This short poem envisions a bird's nest as a cradle, where baby birds sway gently in the breeze, bathed in sunlight and shaded from below. Longfellow employs this imagery to represent something deeply personal: the delicate, tender life tha
This brief choral piece is drawn from Longfellow's dramatic poem *Prometheus, or the Legend of Kezbeh*. The woodland nymphs, known as Dryads, see Prometheus coming and quickly urge one of their own to hide in the forest before he sees her.
Longfellow envisions mountain spirits, known as Oreades, singing about the ancient and timeless peaks they call home. These mountains are so majestic and enduring that storms, snow, and drifting clouds seem like mere fleeting moments in the
This short poem reimagines the Greek myth of Syrinx, a nymph who escaped from the god Pan and was turned into reeds, which Pan then crafted into his well-known pipes. Longfellow suggests that the sound produced by those reeds — that soft, h
A young boy who enjoyed collecting frogspawn from a nearby flax dam slowly loses his innocent joy in nature when he sees the frogs coming back to reclaim their eggs — and feels more fear than fascination. The poem captures the precise momen
Fern Hill is Dylan Thomas's ode to the carefree summers of his childhood on his aunt's farm in Wales, where life felt enchanting, eternal, and unrestricted. The poem takes us through the speaker's golden joy of youth and the wonders of natu
A brief, vivid poem that showcases Carl Sandburg's hallmark free-verse style, "Fog over the Sea" observes a thick fog drifting in across the water and gently enveloping the world before it passes. Similar to his well-known "Fog" (1916), thi