1. Insomniac - written by Maya Angelou
Read 13124 times on American Poems.

There are some nights when
sleep plays coy,
aloof and disdainful.
And all the wiles
that I employ to win
its service to my side
are useless as wounded pride,
and much more painful. (Read full poem)

AH poverties, wincings, and sulky retreats! 
Ah you foes that in conflict have overcome me! 
(For what is my life, or any man’s life, but a conflict with foes—the old, the
	incessant
	war?) 
You degradations—you tussle with passions... (Read full poem)

3. The Visitation - written by Joyce Kilmer
From Main Street and Other Poems. Published in 1917. Read 1395 times on American Poems.

(For Louise Imogen Guiney)

There is a wall of flesh before the eyes
Of John, who yet perceives and hails his King.
It is Our Lady's painful bliss to bring
Before mankind the Glory of the skies.
Her cousin feels her womb's sweet burden... (Read full poem)

This morning Hitler spoke in Danzig, we hear his voice.
A man of genius: that is, of amazing
Ability, courage, devotion, cored on a sick child's soul,
Heard clearly through the dog wrath, a sick child
Wailing in Danzig; invoking destruction and... (Read full poem)

5. The List of Famous Hats - written by James Tate
From Reckoner. Published in 1986. Read 7634 times on American Poems.

Napoleon's hat is an obvious choice I guess to list as a famous
hat, but that's not the hat I have in mind. That was his hat for
show. I am thinking of his private bathing cap, which in all hon-
esty wasn't much different than the one any jerk... (Read full poem)

This is the year the old ones,
the old great ones
leave us alone on the road.

The road leads to the sea.
We have the words in our pockets,
obscure directions. The old ones

have taken away the light of their presence,
we see it moving away... (Read full poem)

7. Portrait Of The Artist As A Prematurely Old Man - written by Ogden Nash
Read 2302 times on American Poems.

It is common knowledge to every schoolboy and even every Bachelor of Arts,
That all sin is divided into two parts.
One kind of sin is called a sin of commission, and that is very important,
And it is what you are doing when you are doing something... (Read full poem)

The stupid jerk I'm obsessed with
stands so close to me
I can feel his breath
on my neck
and smell
the way he would smell
if we slept together
because he is the stupid jerk I'm obsessed with
and that is his primary function in life
to be a stupid... (Read full poem)

9. The Field of Glory - written by Edwin Arlington Robinson
Read 2349 times on American Poems.

War shook the land where Levi dwelt, 
And fired the dismal wrath he felt, 
That such a doom was ever wrought 
As his, to toil while others fought; 
To toil, to dream -- and still to dream, 
With one day barren as another; 
To consummate, as it... (Read full poem)

SPONTANEOUS me, Nature, 
The loving day, the mounting sun, the friend I am happy with, 
The arm of my friend hanging idly over my shoulder, 
The hill-side whiten’d with blossoms of the mountain ash, 
The same, late in autumn—the hues of... (Read full poem)

11. The Great Fires - written by Jack Gilbert
From The Great Fires. Published in 1994. Read 24310 times on American Poems.

Love is apart from all things. 
Desire and excitement are nothing beside it. 
It is not the body that finds love. 
What leads us there is the body. 
What is not love provokes it. 
What is not love quenches it. 
Love lays hold of everything we know.... (Read full poem)

SOMETIMES with one I love, I fill myself with rage, for fear I effuse unreturn’d love; 
But now I think there is no unreturn’d love—the pay is certain, one way or another; 
(I loved a certain person ardently, and my love was not return’d; 
Yet... (Read full poem)

13. Love is Enough - written by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Read 31517 times on American Poems.

Love is enough. Let us not ask for gold. 
Wealth breeds false aims, and pride and selfishness; 
In those serene, Arcadian days of old 
Men gave no thought to princely homes and dress. 
The gods who dwelt on fair Olympia's height 
Lived only... (Read full poem)

When I died, love, when I died
my heart was broken in your care;
I never suffered love so fair
as now I suffer and abide
when I died, love, when I died.

When I died, love, when I died
I wearied in an endless maze
that men have walked for... (Read full poem)

15. Love Much - written by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
Read 1527 times on American Poems.

Love much. Earth has enough of bitter in it.
Cast sweets into its cup whene’er you can.
No heart so hard, but love at last may win it.
Love is the great primæval cause of man.
All hate is foreign to the first great plan.

Love much. Your heart... (Read full poem)

And you love me

I love you.

You are, then, cold coward.

Aye; but, beloved,
When I strive to come to you,
Man's opinions, a thousand thickets,
My interwoven existence,
My life,
Caught in the stubble of the world
Like a tender veil --
This stays... (Read full poem)

17. To My Valentine - written by Ogden Nash
Read 6794 times on American Poems.

More than a catbird hates a cat,
Or a criminal hates a clue,
Or the Axis hates the United States,
That's how much I love you.

I love you more than a duck can swim,
And more than a grapefruit squirts,
I love you more than a gin rummy is a bore,
And... (Read full poem)

up or down from the infinite C E N T E R
B R I M M I N G at the winking rim of time

the voice in my head said

LOVE IS THE DISTANCE
BETWEEN YOU AND WHAT YOU LOVE

WHAT YOU LOVE IS YOUR FATE

           *

then I saw the parade of my loves

those... (Read full poem)

19. Mind Loves - written by Jenny Factor
Read 681 times on American Poems.

Who mind loved would not rather be loved body too.
Since all is all. Want eyes through everything. Like
comb through hair. Like water washing gold. Who
Mind loved would not rather love body to body since
all is more than map making map that... (Read full poem)

PRIMEVAL my love for the woman I love, 
O bride! O wife! more resistless, more enduring than I can tell, the thought of you! 
Then separate, as disembodied, the purest born, 
The ethereal, the last athletic reality, my consolation, 
I ascend—I... (Read full poem)

21. Touched by An Angel - written by Maya Angelou
Read 124871 times on American Poems.

We, unaccustomed to courage
exiles from delight
live coiled in shells of loneliness
until love leaves its high holy temple
and comes into our sight
to liberate us into life.

Love arrives
and in its train come ecstasies
old memories of... (Read full poem)

The first time I drank gin
I thought it must be hair tonic.
My brother swiped the bottle
from a guy whose father owned
a drug store that sold booze
in those ancient, honorable days
when we acknowledged the stuff
was a drug. Three of us passed
the... (Read full poem)

23. Love Incarnate - written by Frank Bidart
From Desire. Published in 1997. Read 2780 times on American Poems.

(Dante, Vita Nuova)


To all those driven berserk or humanized by love
this is offered, for I need help 
deciphering my dream.
When we love our lord is LOVE.

When I recall that at the fourth hour
of the night, watched by shining stars,
LOVE at last... (Read full poem)

Thou dear and well-loved haunt of happy hours,
How often in some distant gallery,
Gained by a little painful spiral stair,
Far from the halls and corridors where throng
The crowd of casual readers, have I passed
Long, peaceful hours seated on... (Read full poem)

25. you being in love... (XII) - written by e.e. cummings
Read 30259 times on American Poems.

you being in love
will tell who softly asks in love,

am i separated from your body smile brain hands merely
to become the jumping puppets of a dream?   oh i mean:
entirely having in my careful how
careful arms created this at length
inexcusable,... (Read full poem)