It's like living in a light bulb, with the leaves
Like filaments and the sky a shell of thin, transparent glass
Enclosing the late heaven of a summer day, a canopy
Of incandescent blue above the dappled sunlight golden
on the grass...
From Sally's Hair 
by John Koethe
Summer Poems
| A Boy and His Dad by Edgar Guest A boy and his dad on a fishing-trip... |
| A Green Crab's Shell by Mark Doty Not, exactly, green:... |
| A Lesson for This Sunday by Derek Walcott The growing idleness of summer grass... |
| A Path Between Houses by Greg Rappleye The enigma of August.... |
| After Reading Tu Fu, I Go Outside to the Dwarf Orchard by Charles Wright East of me, west of me, full summer.... |
| Aftermath by Tony Connor Slumped in a prickly armchair... |
| Alice at Seventeen: Like a Blind Child by Darcy Cummings One summer afternoon, I learned by body... |
| Anastasia & Sandman by Larry Levis The brow of a horse in that moment when... |
| And You Thought You Were the Only One by Mark Bibbins Someone waits at my door. Because he is... |
| Arms by Richard Tayson I'm late for the birth-... |
| Back Yard by Carl Sandburg Shine on, O moon of summer... |
| Bath by Amy Lowell The day is fresh-washed and fair... |
| Bed in Summer by Robert Louis Stevenson In winter I get up at night... |
| Daffy Duck In Hollywood by John Ashbery Something strange is creeping across me.... |
| Fat Southern Men in Summer Suits by Liam Rector Fat Southern men in their summer suits... |
| Fishing on the Susquehanna in July by Billy Collins I have never been fishing on the Susquehanna... |
| For Once, Then, Something by Robert Frost Others taught me with having knelt at well-curbs... |
| Ground Swell by Mark Jarman Is nothing real but when I was fifteen,... |
| I, Up they soar by Inger Christensen I / Up they soar, the planet's butterflies,... |
| Idyll by Siegfried Sassoon In the grey summer garden I shall find you... |
| If You Get There Before I Do by Dick Allen Air out the linens, unlatch the shutters on the eastern side,... |
| In Summer by Paul Laurence Dunbar Oh, summer has clothed the earth... |
| Insect Life of Florida by Lynda Hull In those days I thought their endless thrum... |
| Jack by Maxine Kumin How pleasant the yellow butter... |
| Jet by Tony Hoagland Sometimes I wish I were still out... |
| June Light by Richard Wilbur Your voice, with clear location of June days... |
| Let Birds by Linda Gregg Eight deer on the slope... |
| Long Island Sound by Emma Lazarus I see it as it looked one afternoon... |
| Making the Bed by Burt Kimmelman Summer country. In the morning the leaves... |
| Miracles by Walt Whitman Why, who makes much of a miracle... |
| My Mother on an Evening in Late Summer by Mark Strand When the moon appears... |
| On 52nd Street by Philip Levine Down sat Bud, raised his hands,... |
| On the Grasshopper and the Cricket by John Keats The poetry of earth is never dead:... |
| Poem at Thirty by Michael Ryan The rich little kids across the street... |
| Poem for Adlai Stevenson and Yellow Jackets by David Young It's summer, 1956, in Maine, a camp resort... |
| Psychoanalysis: An Elegy by Jack Spicer What are you thinking about?... |
| Rhode Island by William Meredith Here at the seashore they use the clouds over & over... |
| Sally's Hair by John Koethe It's like living in a light bulb, with the leaves... |
| Shaking the Grass by Janice N. Harrington Evening, and all my ghosts come back to me... |
| Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? (Sonnet 18) by William Shakespeare Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?... |
| Summer at Blue Creek, North Carolina by Jack Gilbert There was no water at my grandfather's... |
| Summer Holiday by Robinson Jeffers When the sun shouts and people abound... |
| Summer Night, Riverside by Sara Teasdale In the wild soft summer darkness... |
| Summer Past by John Gray There was the summer. There... |
| Summer Song by William Carlos Williams Wanderer moon... |
| Summer X-Rays by Nina Cassian Fabulous days... |
| The Abduction by Stanley Kunitz Some things I do not profess... |
| The Bargain by Cyrus Cassells In the transatlantic fury... |
| The Family Photograph by Vona Groarke In the window of the drawing-room... |
| The Fishermen at Guasti Park by Maurya Simon In the first days of summer... |
| The Fly by William Blake Little fly... |
| The Idea of Order at Key West by Wallace Stevens She sang beyond the genius of the sea.... |
| The Last Slow Days of Summer by Phillip Lopate "BE YOUR OWN MASTER!" says the Vedanta Society sign... |
| The Philosopher in Florida by C. Dale Young Midsummer lies on this town... |
| The Summer House by Tony Connor The Danube glitters and toils... |
| The White Room by Charles Simic The obvious is difficult... |
| They'll spend the summer by Joshua Beckman They'll spend the summer... |
| Vacation by Rita Dove I love the hour before takeoff... |
| Vertumnal [excerpt] by Stephen Yenser Close call, close call, close... |
| Vespers by Louise Glück In your extended absence, you permit me... |
| Warm Summer Sun by Mark Twain Warm summer sun... |
| Wildflower by Stanley Plumly Some—the ones with fish names—grow so north... |