“

Now reading

SUSPENSE

Elysium is as far as to
The very nearest room,
If in that room a friend await
Felicity or doom.
What fortitude the soul contains,
That it can so endure
The accent of a coming foot,
The opening of a door!

41,493

poems

4,155

poets

207

poetic terms

Browse the collection

Explore the archive →
01

By feeling

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

Emotions →
02

By form

Follow the sonnet, ghazal, villanelle, ode, and every shape in between.

The glossary →
03

By constellation

Move between a poet, their influences, peers, translations, and afterlives.

Poets →

Selected

Poems worth returning to

a line of faces borders the strangler’s work …

Tom Raworth

OÎCHE …

Anonymous

To develop new banana exports …

Paul Hlava Ceballos

SPECIMENS …

Stanley S. Newman

Hark, hark! the lark at heaven's gate sings, …

William Shakespeare

How fares it with the happy dead? …

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

In school, we read a ridiculous story by Aesop, …

Richie Hofmann

The neighbors will soon spread their confounding potluck before you. …

Dobby Gibson

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