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The Fox

A fox looked at his shadow at sunrise and said, “I will have
 a camel for lunch today.”  And all morning he went about looking
 for camels.  But at noon he saw his shadow again—and he said, “A
 mouse will do.”

41,493

poems

4,155

poets

207

poetic terms

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By feeling

Grief, desire, revolt, wonder. Start where the poem meets your life.

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02

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03

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Selected

Poems worth returning to

Heart, oh heart, …

Cynthia Huntington

It came to pass …

Jenny Bornholdt

OF nearness to her sundered things …

Emily Dickinson

The heat came on as did the radio …

Steve Kronen

Imagine the lunchroom, …

Tina Boyer Brown

The Iron Horse is rusting, …

Thomas McGrath

Silk spool of the recluse as she confects her eventual mythomania. …

Lucie Brock-Broido

If you asked an Elizabethan …

Ron Padgett

The glossary

The language about poetry

From aubade to zuihitsu, 207 definitions of the forms, figures, and schools that shape the line.

Explore the glossary→
Accentual verseAccentual-syllabic verseAcmeismAlcaicAlexandrineAmbiguity