QuillOak Writing desk

For February · 24 poems & readings

Valentine's Day Poems

Beyond roses-are-red: classic and original poems to sign a card with — romantic, playful, or both.

Valentine's verse has been a going concern since Chaucer linked the saint's day to lovebirds in the 1380s, and the assignment hasn't changed: something short enough to fit in a card and true enough to sign. The roses-are-red quatrain remains the people's template — endlessly sincere, endlessly spoofable — but the classics give you range: Burns for sweep, Shakespeare for permanence, a limerick for the relationship that runs on jokes.

Calibration is the real skill. Long-married couples can absorb a sonnet; a three-week romance cannot. When in doubt, go funny with one sincere line hidden at the end — it's the emotional equivalent of a firm handshake that turns into a hug.

LengthForm

How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43)

Elizabeth Barrett Browning · 1850

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.I love thee to the depth and breadth and heightMy soul can reach, when feeling out of sight

14 lines · sonnet

A Red, Red Rose

Robert Burns · 1794

O my Luve is like a red, red roseThat's newly sprung in June;O my Luve is like the melody

16 lines · ballad

She Walks in Beauty

Lord Byron · 1814

She walks in beauty, like the nightOf cloudless climes and starry skies;And all that's best of dark and bright

18 lines · lyric

Roses Are Red (Yes, It's Another One of These)

The QuillOak Editors

Roses are red, this format is tired,I had until midnight; a poem was required.But cliché or not, every word here is true:

4 lines · roses are red

Roses Are Red (For Her, Who Hates Mornings)

The QuillOak Editors

Roses are red, the kettle is on,you're grumpy and gorgeous each day before dawn;and I'd give up sunrises, gladly, forever,

4 lines · roses are red

Roses Are Red (But They Fade in a Day)

The QuillOak Editors

Roses are red, but they fade in a day;the chocolates get eaten, the cards thrown away.So here is the one gift that time won't undo:

4 lines · roses are red

Roses Are Red (For the One Who Steals the Blankets)

The QuillOak Editors

Roses are red, my feet are like ice,you've stolen the duvet — not once, dear, but twice;yet I'd shiver forever, frostbitten and blue,

4 lines · roses are red

Roses Are Red (For the Man Who Fixes Things)

The QuillOak Editors

Roses are red. The stair doesn't squeak,the door doesn't stick — you fixed both this week.Some men declare love with a speech or a song;

4 lines · roses are red

Roses Are Red (His Hand Finds Mine)

The QuillOak Editors

Roses are red, your hand finds my handin crowds, in the car, without thought, without plan;and that, more than roses, is how I stay sure:

4 lines · roses are red

Roses Are Red (You're Hopeless at Dancing)

The QuillOak Editors

Roses are red, you're hopeless at dancing,but somehow you're great at this whole romancing:you remember my coffee, my mother, my dreams —

4 lines · roses are red

L-O-V-E (an Acrostic)

The QuillOak Editors

Listening, even to the boring parts,Overlooking the socks on the floor,Voting for you, every day, in everything,

4 lines · acrostic

Text Me When You Land

The QuillOak Editors

You rarely say "I love you."You say "text me when you land."You say "I filled your tank this morning."

6 lines · free verse

What I Mean by Beautiful

The QuillOak Editors

You think it's the dress.It isn't the dress.It's you on a Tuesday,

7 lines · free verse

Your Laugh Arrives First

The QuillOak Editors

Your laugh arrives before you do —down hallways, up stairwells,through the bad day I was having.

7 lines · free verse

He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven

W. B. Yeats · 1899

Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,Enwrought with golden and silver light,The blue and the dim and the dark cloths

8 lines · lyric

How You Take Your Coffee

The QuillOak Editors

I know the way you take your coffee,half a sugar, too much cream;I know which song you skip, embarrassed,

8 lines · lyric

Evidence

The QuillOak Editors

For her, who asks if I love her:see attached —one umbrella tilted your way all of March,

8 lines · free verse

Slow Dance in the Kitchen

The QuillOak Editors

We never learned the proper steps,we sway more than we dance,the dinner's burning on the stove,

8 lines · lyric

Across the Table

The QuillOak Editors

You across the table,sleeves rolled, telling me the storyof your day like it's an epic —

8 lines · free verse

Jenny Kissed Me

Leigh Hunt · 1838

Jenny kiss'd me when we met,Jumping from the chair she sat in;Time, you thief, who love to get

8 lines · rondeau

The Look

Sara Teasdale · 1915

Strephon kissed me in the spring,Robin in the fall,But Colin only looked at me

8 lines · lyric

Sonnet 38: First time he kissed me

Elizabeth Barrett Browning · 1850

First time he kissed me, he but only kissedThe fingers of this hand wherewith I write;And ever since, it grew more clean and white,

14 lines · sonnet

Love's Philosophy

Percy Bysshe Shelley · 1819

The fountains mingle with the riverAnd the rivers with the ocean,The winds of heaven mix for ever

16 lines · lyric

Song: To Celia (Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes)

Ben Jonson · 1616

Drink to me only with thine eyes, And I will pledge with mine;Or leave a kiss but in the cup,

16 lines · lyric