Read poetry for summer, including poems about warm weather, travel, vacation, and more.
Classic Poems about Summer
“The Fly” by William Blake
Little fly...
“In Summer” by Paul Laurence Dunbar
Oh, summer has clothed the earth...
“For Once, Then, Something” by Robert Frost
Others taught me with having knelt at well-curbs...
“A Boy and His Dad” by Edgar Guest
A boy and his dad on a fishing-trip...
“Summer Holiday” by Robinson Jeffers
When the sun shouts and people abound...
“Long Island Sound” by Emma Lazarus
I see it as it looked one afternoon...
“Bath” by Amy Lowell
The day is fresh-washed and fair...
“Summer Morn in New Hampshire” by Claude McKay
All yesterday it poured, and all night long…
“In the Mountains on a Summer Day” by Li Po
Gently I stir a white feather fan…
“Back Yard” by Carl Sandburg
Shine on, O moon of summer...
“Idyll” by Siegfried Sassoon
In the grey summer garden I shall find you...
“Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? (Sonnet 18)” by William Shakespeare
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?...
“The Idea of Order at Key West” by Wallace Stevens
She sang beyond the genius of the sea....
“Bed in Summer” by Robert Louis Stevenson
In winter I get up at night...
“Summer Night, Riverside” by Sara Teasdale
In the wild soft summer darkness...
“Warm Summer Sun” by Mark Twain
Warm summer sun...
“Miracles” by Walt Whitman
Why, who makes much of a miracle...
“Summer Song” by William Carlos Williams
Wanderer moon...
Contemporary Poems about Summer
“”If You Get There Before I Do” by Dick Allen
Air out the linens, unlatch the shutters on the eastern side,...
“Daffy Duck In Hollywood” by John Ashbery
Something strange is creeping across me....
“They'll spend the summer” by Joshua Beckman
They'll spend the summer...
“And You Thought You Were the Only One” by Mark Bibbins
Someone waits at my door. Because he is...
“The Bargain” by Cyrus Cassells
In the transatlantic fury...
“Fishing on the Susquehanna in July” by Billy Collins
I have never been fishing on the Susquehanna...
“A Green Crab's Shell” by Mark Doty
Not, exactly, green:...
“Vacation” by Rita Dove
I love the hour before takeoff...
“Summer at Blue Creek, North Carolina” by Jack Gilbert
There was no water at my grandfather's...
“Knoxville, Tennessee” by Nikki Giovanni
I always like summer…
“Vespers” by Louise Glück
In your extended absence, you permit me...
“Let Birds” by Linda Gregg
Eight deer on the slope...
“Insect Life of Florida” by Lynda Hull
In those days I thought their endless thrum...
“Ode to Kool-Aid” by Marcus Jackson
You turn the kitchen...
“Ground Swell” by Mark Jarman
Is nothing real but when I was fifteen,...
“Three Songs at the End of Summer” by Jane Kenyon
A second crop of hay lies cut...
“Jack” by Maxine Kumin
How pleasant the yellow butter...
“Summer Haibun” by Aimee Nezhukumatathil
To everything, there is a season of parrots...
“His Speed and Strength” by Alicia Ostriker
His speed and strength, which is the strength of ten…
Wildflower” by Stanley Plumly
Some—the ones with fish names—grow so north...
“Accidental Pastoral” by Maggie Smith
I must have just missed a parade—
June Light” by Richard Wilbur
Your voice, with clear location of June days...
“After Reading Tu Fu, I Go Outside to the Dwarf Orchard” by Charles Wright
East of me, west of me, full summer....
“The Philosopher in Florida” by C. Dale Young
Midsummer lies on this town...