Poems
Featured Poems
Poem of The Day
From the magazine:Ode on Humidity
By P. Scott Cunningham
What am I if not what happens
when I try to run away?
Water falls out of me like
an opinion. I’m like a screen
door banging between two rivers.
Dear air, what’s inside me
you’re so desperate to take?
I put on the Atlantic like a sweater.
My head bobs on the surface
of a lake I’m named after.
Where do I belong?
My head asks. My body,
exasperated…
when I try to run away?
Water falls out of me like
an opinion. I’m like a screen
door banging between two rivers.
Dear air, what’s inside me
you’re so desperate to take?
I put on the Atlantic like a sweater.
My head bobs on the surface
of a lake I’m named after.
Where do I belong?
My head asks. My body,
exasperated…
Poem of The Day
By Jessica Abughattas
Beside the Ford Thunderbird,
a suitcase splayed open.
She collects her clothes
from the driveway.
The yellow jumper collapses
into a million threads of saffron.
She keeps dropping them.
They wither and dissolve,
petal by petal
into pavement.
Her hands are rivers.
Her eyes, mascara bats.
Her hair is crying.
I am five...
a suitcase splayed open.
She collects her clothes
from the driveway.
The yellow jumper collapses
into a million threads of saffron.
She keeps dropping them.
They wither and dissolve,
petal by petal
into pavement.
Her hands are rivers.
Her eyes, mascara bats.
Her hair is crying.
I am five...
Browse All Poems
Featured Poetic Term
Glossary Terms
A formal, often ceremonious lyric poem that addresses and often celebrates a person, place, thing, or idea. Its stanza forms vary.
Poem Guides
Poem GuideBy Austin AllenThe impersonal power of a confessional classic.
Poem GuideBy Hannah Brooks-MotlThe child elegy and the 19th-century poet.
From the Poetry Magazine Archive
- PoemFrom the magazine:
Despite My Efforts Even My Prayers Have Turned into Threats
By Kaveh AkbarHoly father I can’t pretend
I’m not afraid to see you again
but I’ll say that when the time
comes I believe my courage
will expand like a sponge
cowboy in water. My earth-
father was far braver than me —
coming to America he knew
no English save... - PoemFrom the magazine:
Balm & Lamentation
By Anne WaldmanBlood of an eye: tamarisk gall.
Blood from a shoulder: bear’s breach.
From the loins: chamomile.
Blood from a head: lupine.
A hawk’s heart: heart of wormwood.
— From Coptic & Greek Magical Papyri
Schematic humans ... figures of them, & their helpers ...
pheromones rise
odd jagged breath lines,... - PoemFrom the magazine:
Sun to God (Gaza, 2021)
By Ladan OsmanA boy recovers trinkets
from his rubbled home.
I glint and glimmer
the objects he seeks.
My love drawing thirst,
my love a fatigue.
He fills his bucket.
He takes stock,
his small smile another sun
on a cluster of plastic roses.
A man says: You’ll get new toys.
You don’t...
Featured terms
- Glossary Terms
- Glossary Terms
- Glossary Terms
- Glossary Terms
- Glossary Terms