For February · 24poems & 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

Common questions

What should I write in a Valentine's card?

One short verse plus one true sentence of your own. Early in a relationship, keep it light — a funny rhyme beats a premature sonnet.

What is the most romantic poem ever?

By popular vote, Shakespeare's Sonnet 18 and Burns's 'A Red, Red Rose.' By delivery success rate, whatever you actually copy out by hand.