Favorite poems
“Tell me your favorite poem.”
30 answers from 26 people · Updated Nov 2, 2026
By William Carlos Williams I have eaten the plums that were in the icebox and which you were probably saving for breakfast Forgive me they were delicious so sweet and so cold
5![[i carry your heart with me(i carry it in] (e.e. cummings)](https://lyric-images.gumlet.io/18c8875e-42f9-4ee7-b5f8-a769a1776eca_3000x3000.jpeg?format=webp&compress=true&q=auto&w=1200)
[i carry your heart with me(i carry it in] (e.e. cummings)
i carry your heart with me (i carry it in my heart) i am never without it (anywhere i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done by only me is your doing, my darling) i fear no fate (for you are my fate, my sweet) i want no world (for beautiful you are my world, my true) and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant and whatever a sun will always sing is you here is the deepest secret nobody knows (here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows higher than soul can hope or mind can hide) and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)
71
Perfection as far as poems go, imho. Coconut Bear with me I want to tell you something about happiness it's hard to get at but the thing is I wasn't looking I was looking somewhere else when my son found it in the fruit section and came running holding it out in his small hands asking me what it was and could we keep it it only cost 99 cents hairy and brown hard as a rock and something swishing around inside and what on earth and where on earth and this was happiness this little ball of interest beating inside his chest this interestedness beaming out from his face pleading happiness and because I wasn't happy I said to put it back because I didn't want it because we didn't need it and because he was happy he started to cry right there in aisle five so when we got home we put it in the middle of the kitchen table and sat on either side of it and began to consider how to get inside of it
7
Cinematic and imagistic, this poem has stayed with me since I was young. It’s a welcome haunting.
1
Song of Myself (1892 version) - Walt Whitman
A poem that shows so many ways to think about the world and in so doing, so many to think about yourself. I come back to it…not nearly as often as I should, but it’s words of resonated in me ever since I first read it.
2
The first poem I ever learned by heart. My late mother, a poetry lover taught it to me. She always read us, in particular, poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay. And this one brings me to a peaceful place. Afternoon On A Hill I will be the gladdest thing Under the sun! I will touch a hundred flowers And not pick one. I will look at cliffs and clouds With quiet eyes, Watch the wind bow down the grass, And the grass rise. And when lights begin to show Up from the town, I will mark which must be mine, And then start down! Edna St.Vincent Millay
81
[…]my one hand holding tight my other hand; come celebrate with me that everyday something has tried to kill me and has failed. 💌
1
If I can stop one Heart from breaking (Emily Dickinson)
If I can stop one Heart from breaking I shall not live in vain If I can ease one Life the Aching Or cool one Pain Or help one fainting Robin Unto his Nest again I shall not live in Vain.
9
Spring and Fall by Gerard Manley Hopkins
Another POEM SORRY! Goth girl origin story. A reflection of my life’s deepest sorrow and most terrifying, intimate truth in someone else’s voice from 146 years ago.
Demain dès l'aube - Victor Hugo
it's the most beautiful poem about death or maybe grieving the death of you're loved one. He wrote it for his own daughter who died tragically. (The poem is in french so the traduction is maybe to litteral...) : Tomorrow at dawn Tomorrow, at dawn, when the countryside turns white, I leave. You see, I know you are waiting for me. I will go through the forest, I will go across the mountains. I cannot stay away from you any longer. I will walk with my eyes fixed on my thoughts, Without seeing anything outside, without hearing any noise, Alone, unknown, back bent, hands crossed, Sad, and the day for me will be like night. I will not watch the gold of the falling evening, Nor the sails in the distance descending towards Harfleur, And when I arrive, I'll put on your grave A bouquet of green holly and flowering heather.
3
This poem get me every time
This cuts through all the noise and gets right to the gooey center in all of us. I cannot read it without tearing up.
Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front (Wendell Berry)
I love this for today, when we might not be quite so sure how to celebrate the 4th in this country that was born in the spirit of freedom. " Love the quick profit, the annual raise, vacation with pay. Want more of everything ready-made. Be afraid to know your neighbors and to die. And you will have a window in your head. Not even your future will be a mystery any more. Your mind will be punched in a card and shut away in a little drawer. When they want you to buy something They will call you. When they want you To die for profit they will let you know. So, friends, every day do something that won’t compute. Love the Lord. Love the world. Work for nothing. Take all that you have and be poor. Love someone who does not deserve it. Denounce the government and embrace the flag. Hope to live in that free republic for which it stands. Give your approval to all you cannot understand. Praise ignorance, for what man has not encountered he has not destroyed. Ask the questions that have no answers. Invest in the millennium. Plant sequoias. Say that your main crop is the forest that you did not plant, that you will not live to harvest. Say that the leaves are harvested when they have rotted into the mold. Call that profit. Prophesy such returns. Put your faith in the two inches of humus that will build under the trees every thousand years. Listen to carrion – put your ear close, and hear the faint chattering Of the songs that are to come. Expect the end of the world. Laugh. Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful though you have considered all the facts. So long as women do not go cheap for power, please women more than men. Ask yourself: Will this satisfy a woman satisfied to bear a child? Will this disturb the sleep of a woman near to giving birth? Go with your love to the fields. Lie down in the shade. Rest your head in her lap. Swear allegiance to what is nighest your thoughts. As soon as the generals and the politicos can predict the motions of your mind, lose it. Leave it as a sign to mark the false trail, the way you didn’t go. Be like the fox who makes more tracks than necessary, some in the wrong direction. Practice resurrection."
544
Hope (is the thing with feathers) by Emily Dickinson
Hope is the thing with feathers That perches in the soul, And sings the tune without the words, And never stops at all, And sweetest in the gale is heard; And sore must be the storm That could abash the little bird That kept so many warm. I’ve heard it in the chillest land, And on the strangest sea; Yet, never, in extremity, It asked a crumb of me.
8
One of my all-time favorite poems since my undergraduate poetry seminars. Part of Nick Flynn's first book, given to me by my professor Gaby Calvocoressi. The most surreal thing is relating to it as a young adult and then realizing twenty years later that your toddler thinks this is how the world works.
Du musst das Leben nicht verstehen! (Rilke)
Du musst das Leben nicht verstehen, dann wird es werden wie ein Fest. Und lass dir jeden Tag geschehen so wie ein Kind im Weitergehen von jedem Wehen sich viele Blüten schenken lässt. Sie aufzusammeln und zu sparen, das kommt dem Kind nicht in den Sinn. Es löst sie leise aus den Haaren, drin sie so gern gefangen waren, und hält den lieben jungen Jahren nach neuen seine Hände hin. - Rainer Maria Rilke
“Like you, I was raised on the institution of dreaming. Hand on my heart. Hand on my stupid heart.”
7
Ode to the West Wind (Percy Bysshe Shelley)
This poem made me cry when I read it the other week, which is only partially because I was switching antidepressants. I’ve been really feeling the Romantic poets lately, maybe because of reading so much Gothic fiction. Also everything we learned about Percy Bysshe Shelley in class was so dramatic, I wanted to know if he could back it up with his poetry. Which he can.
2
17 recs
For one reason or another, these poems are important to me. I hope you like them. I put them here for you.
