The following poems about paintings, sculptures, and other forms of visual art, as well as poems about artists and the artistic process, are appropriate for young people. Browse related lesson plans.
“The Painting” by John Balaban
The stream runs clear to its stones…
“Still Life” by Marianne Boruch
Someone arranged them in 1620…
“Fishing on the Susquehanna in July” by Billy Collins
I have never been fishing on the Susquehanna…
“Brian Age Seven” by Mark Doty
Grateful for their tour…
“Art Class” by James Galvin
Let us begin with a simple line…
“Before a Painting” by James Weldon Johnson
I knew not who had wrought with skill so fine…
“Ode on a Grecian Urn” by John Keats
Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness…
“A Table in the Wilderness” by Li-Young Lee
I draw a window…
“Epilogue” by Robert Lowell
Those blessèd structures, plot and rhyme…
“House of Père Lacroix” by Tyler Mills
I thought I would write a novel…
“Weir Farm” by Marilyn Nelson
Not vistas, but a home-sized landscape…
“Having a Coke with You” by Frank O’Hara
Is even more fun than going to San Sebastian, Irún, Hendaye…
“Why I Am Not a Painter” by Frank O’Hara
I am not a painter, I am a poet…
“Replica of The Thinker” by Matthew Olzmann
By the doorstep of The Museum…
“Art Project: Earth” by Karen Skolfield
Balloon, then papier mâché…
“To S.M., a Young African Painter, on Seeing His Works” by Phillis Wheatley
To show the lab’ring bosom’s deep intent…
“Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” by William Carlos Williams
According to Brueghel…
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