Theme · 23 poems

Poems About Happiness

Poems of plain joy — spring mornings, dancing daffodils, and hearts that leap up. Keep one handy for good days and better ones for bad days.

LengthForm

A Birthday

Christina Rossetti · 1861

My heart is like a singing birdWhose nest is in a water'd shoot;My heart is like an apple-tree

16 lines · lyric

I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud

William Wordsworth · 1807

I wandered lonely as a cloudThat floats on high o'er vales and hills,When all at once I saw a crowd,

24 lines · lyric

A Visit from St. Nicholas

Clement Clarke Moore · 1823

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all thro' the houseNot a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,

56 lines · narrative

A Birthday Blessing

The QuillOak Editors

May your coffee stay hot, may your phone hold its charge,may small luck find you daily and big luck loom large;may the year rolling toward you arrive like a friend —

4 lines · quatrain

Puppy (a Cinquain)

The QuillOak Editors

Puppywiggly, hopefulchewing, chasing, flopping

5 lines · cinquain

A Wish with a Face

The QuillOak Editors

We painted a room for a rumor,bought socks for a hope,hummed songs to a heartbeat

6 lines · free verse

Another Trip Around the Sun

The QuillOak Editors

Another trip around the sun,another year of you —of all the laughter you have caused,

8 lines · lyric

Roses Are Red (A Toast in Eight Lines)

The QuillOak Editors

Roses are red, the aisle has been walked,the rings have been fumbled, the toasts have been talked;now comes the part that the cameras won't see:

8 lines · roses are red

A Word from the Fire Marshal

The QuillOak Editors

We bought the pack of candles,then went back and bought two more;the cake is now a fire risk

8 lines · lyric

Better Birthday Math

The QuillOak Editors

The candles say one number;the calendar agrees.But you can't measure someone

8 lines · lyric

Out of Office (Forever)

The QuillOak Editors

The out-of-office messageis permanent today:"I'm sorry, I have plans now.

8 lines · lyric

Boss of Time

The QuillOak Editors

You gave the work your mornings,your Mondays, and your prime;now comes the great reversal —

8 lines · lyric

Advice for the Newly Arrived

The QuillOak Editors

Welcome, small one. You arriveknowing nothing of Tuesdays, taxes,or how to spell your own name —

8 lines · free verse

The Smallest Star

The QuillOak Editors

You weigh less than the groceries,you can't control your hands,and yet the whole house orbits you:

8 lines · lyric

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

Pippa's Song

Robert Browning · 1841

PippaPassesRobert

10 lines · lyric

I Hear America Singing

Walt Whitman · 1860

I hear America singing, the varied carols I hear,Those of mechanics, each one singing his as it should be blithe and strong,The carpenter singing his as he measures his plank or beam,

11 lines · free verse

Afternoon on a Hill

Edna St. Vincent Millay · 1917

I will be the gladdest thingUnder the sun!I will touch a hundred flowers

12 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

I taste a liquor never brewed

Emily Dickinson · 1890

I TASTE a liquor never brewed,From tankards scooped in pearl;Not all the vats upon the Rhine

16 lines · lyric

Barter

Sara Teasdale · 1917

Life has loveliness to sell,All beautiful and splendid things,Blue waves whitened on a cliff,

18 lines · lyric

The Children's Hour

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow · 1860

Between the dark and the daylight,When the night is beginning to lower,Comes a pause in the day's occupation,

40 lines · lyric

To a Skylark

Percy Bysshe Shelley · 1820

Hail to thee, blithe Spirit!Bird thou never wert,That from Heaven, or near it,

105 lines · ode