Explore Poems: Epistle

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To You, from Your Secret Admirer
By Sharon Olds
I love the conversations we have
after making love—of course it’s just me, making
love to myself, talking to you,
loving you—though I do not really
know you, so I guess not loving you—
craving the dream of knowing you.
“When will I be able to...
Love
Desire & Passion
The Body
Relationships
Meters
Free Verse
Techniques
Imagery
Types/Modes
Epistle
Passion
+ 4 more
Meeting Elizabeth Bishop in Madras
By Tishani Doshi
So far from Worcester, Massachusetts.
Elizabeth—you, here! At my dentist's
in Madras, sitting with pressed knees,
leafing through back copies of Femina.
Teeth haven't changed much, except
now we have comfort sedation for root
canals, so there's little reason to cry,
which doesn't occlude the possibility
for epiphany, just...
Love
Desire & Passion
Social Commentaries
Crime & Punishment
Gender & Sexuality
Popular Culture
Race & Ethnicity
History & Politics
Living
Health & Illness
The Body
Relationships
Activities
Arts & Sciences
Poetry & Poets
Types/Modes
Epistle
Disappointment
Grief
Humor
+ 13 more
Letter Written on a Ferry While Crossing Long Island Sound
By Anne Sexton
I am surprised to see
that the ocean is still going on.
Now I am going back
and I have ripped my hand
from your hand as I said I would
and I have made it this far
as I said I would
and I am on...
Nature
Seas, Rivers, & Streams
Living
Separation & Divorce
Techniques
Confessional
Types/Modes
Epistle
Open Memo To The Congressional Appropriations Committee And The Military Department Of Defense

By Sandra Maria Esteves
To Whom It Does Concern:

Could we please have just one space flight,
one nine-million dollar adventure into the great breath,
so that we could divide the loaves and...
Social Commentaries
Money & Economics
War & Conflict
History & Politics
Types/Modes
Epistle
Anger
Blame
To Frank Parker
By Robert Lowell
Forty years ago we were here
where we are now,
the same erotic May-wind blew
the trees from there to here—

the same tang of metal in the mouth,
the dirt-pierced wood of Cambridge.

Sometimes
you are so much younger than your face,
I know I am seeing...
Relationships
Friends & Enemies
Arts & Sciences
Painting & Sculpture
Techniques
Confessional
Types/Modes
Epistle
A Letter
By Louise Bogan
I came here, being stricken, stumbling out
At last from streets; the sun, decreasing, took me
For days, the time being the last of autumn,
The thickets not yet stark, but quivering
With tiny colors, like some brush strokes in
The manner of the pointillists;...
Nature
Living
Life Choices
Sorrow & Grieving
The Mind
Types/Modes
Epistle
Disappointment
Grief
+ 2 more
notes
By Danez Smith
dear suicide

how is the war? is it eating?
tell me of the girls charging
backwards into dumb tides
death’s wet mouth lapping
their ankles, knees, eyebrows.
tell me of the sissies like drunk
fireworks, rocketing into earth
afterimage burned into river
& cement memory.
how is the war? does...
Social Commentaries
Race & Ethnicity
Living
Death
Life Choices
The Mind
Relationships
Family & Ancestors
Friends & Enemies
Types/Modes
Epistle
Anxiety & Insecurity
Grief
+ 6 more
Letter from the Mountains
By James K. Baxter
There was a message. I have forgotten it.
There was a journey to make. It did not come to anything.
But these nights, my friend, under the iron roof
Of this old rabbiters' hut where the traps
Are still hanging up on nails,
Lying in...
Nature
Social Commentaries
Cities & Urban Life
Living
Sorrow & Grieving
Relationships
Friends & Enemies
Types/Modes
Epistle
+ 2 more
The Highland
By Linda Bierds
Dear One,

Do you have the time? Can you take
the time? Can you make
the time?

To visit me? The hospital doors have opened to spring,
and its land is high, dear one, each slope
with a vapor of crocuses. Its citizens, alas,

are low. Despondent, in...
Activities
Indoor Activities
Arts & Sciences
Music
Types/Modes
Epistle
Student Letter
By Stephen Sandy
After the declaration by emperor
to stop the war
many people in Tokyo killed themselves,
for instance, in front of the imperial palace.
But few people knows those facts.

Hence you must teach me
where you got the news or what sort of book
gave you the...
Social Commentaries
War & Conflict
History & Politics
Relationships
Activities
School & Learning
Arts & Sciences
Language & Linguistics
Reading & Books
Meters
Free Verse
Types/Modes
Epistle
+ 6 more
Dear Bryan Wynter
By W. S. Graham
1

This is only a note
To say how sorry I am
You died. You will realize
What a position it puts
Me in. I couldn’t really
Have died for you if so
I were inclined...
Living
Death
The Mind
Memory & Nostalgia
Relationships
Friends & Enemies
Arts & Sciences
Painting & Sculpture
Meters
Free Verse
Types/Modes
Epistle
Series/Sequence
Grief
+ 7 more
A Stone Knife
By James Schuyler
Dear Kenward,
What a pearl
of a letter knife. It's just
the thing I needed, something
to rest my eyes on, and always
wanted, which is to say
it's that of which I
felt the...
Nature
Relationships
Friends & Enemies
Types/Modes
Epistle
Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot
By Alexander Pope
Shut, shut the door, good John! fatigu'd, I said,
Tie up the knocker, say I'm sick, I'm dead.
The dog-star rages! nay 'tis past a doubt,
All Bedlam, or Parnassus, is let out:
Fire in each eye, and papers in...
Social Commentaries
Relationships
Friends & Enemies
Arts & Sciences
Humor & Satire
Poetry & Poets
Stanza Forms
Couplet
Types/Modes
Epistle
+ 3 more
Dear Gaybashers
By Jill McDonough
The night we got bashed we told Rusty how
they drove up, yelled QUEER, threw a hot dog, sped off.

Rusty: Now, is that gaybashing? Or
are they just calling you queer? Good point.

Josey pitied the fools: who buys a perfectly good pack...
Social Commentaries
Gender & Sexuality
Relationships
Friends & Enemies
LGBTQ+
Stanza Forms
Couplet
Types/Modes
Epistle
+ 2 more
Report to Crazy Horse
By William E. Stafford
All the Sioux were defeated. Our clan
got poor, but a few got richer.
They fought two wars. I did not
take part. No one remembers your vision
or even your real name. Now
the children go to town and like
loud music. I married a...
Social Commentaries
Race & Ethnicity
History & Politics
Religion
The Mind
Memory & Nostalgia
Relationships
Family & Ancestors
Meters
Free Verse
Types/Modes
Epistle
Anxiety & Insecurity
Blame
Grief
+ 8 more
[Dear Angry Mob,]
By Kim Addonizio, Donald C. Babcock, Alan Ayling, Mary Aldis, Walter Albert, Zoë Akins, John Adams & Harold Acton
Dear Angry Mob,

Oak Wood Trail is closed to you. We
feel it unnecessary to defend our position,
for we have always thought of ourselves
(and rightly, I venture) as a haven for
those seeking a quiet and solitary
contemplation. We are truly sorry
for the inconvenience.

Signed,

...
Nature
Social Commentaries
Activities
Sports & Outdoor Activities
Arts & Sciences
Humor & Satire
Meters
Free Verse
Types/Modes
Epistle
+ 3 more
Love Poem to Be Read to an Illiterate Friend
By Tess Gallagher
I have had to write this down
in my absence and yours. These
things happen. Thinking
of a voice added
I imagine a sympathy outside us
that protects the message
from what can’t help,
being said.

The times you’ve kept
your secret, putting on
glasses or glancing into a page
with...
Love
Relationships
Friends & Enemies
Arts & Sciences
Language & Linguistics
Meters
Free Verse
Types/Modes
Epistle
+ 2 more
Letter to Martín Espada
By Doug Anderson
Dear Martín:
In Izalco, while Christ waits for Easter
in his glass tomb in the cathedral
a single long note is blown on a trumpet
en el parque central. Los perros flacco
forage at the feet of la gente.
Los poetas mount the stage in a...
Love
Desire & Passion
Social Commentaries
Popular Culture
War & Conflict
History & Politics
Religion
Christianity
Relationships
Friends & Enemies
Arts & Sciences
Poetry & Poets
Types/Modes
Epistle
Gratitude
+ 8 more
A Love Letter
By Russell Edson
Dear Miss,
First of all I want to say that I have enjoyed the imaginary possibility, built of course on the fact that such possibility does exist in nature: I have seen the birds and other forms of nonhumanity occur in...
Love
Desire & Passion
Nature
The Body
Relationships
Men & Women
Types/Modes
Epistle
Prose Poem
+ 2 more
Posthumous
By Jean Nordhaus
Would it surprise you to learn
that years beyond your longest winter
you still get letters from your bank, your old
philanthropies, cold flakes drifting
through the mail-slot with your name?
Though it's been a long time since your face
interrupted the light in my door-frame,
and...
Social Commentaries
Money & Economics
Living
Death
Sorrow & Grieving
Funerals
Meters
Free Verse
Techniques
Metaphor
Types/Modes
Elegy
Epistle
+ 6 more

p1To You, from Your Secret Admirer

p1notes

p1Posthumous

To You, from Your Secret Admirer

notes

Posthumous