Nature Poetry
Top Nature Poems
I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
by William Wordsworth
I wandered lonely as a cloud That floats on high o'er vales and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host, of golden daffodils...
Wordsworth's beloved 1807 poem captures the soul-uplifting beauty of nature—especially a memory of daffodils dancing in the breeze. It became a cornerstone of British Romantic poetry and is inspired by a walk he took with his sister Dorothy.
The Lake Isle of Innisfree
by W.B. Yeats
I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made...
Yeats' famous 1890 poem expresses a timeless yearning for peace and solitude through the imagined retreat to a small island in Lough Gill. It embodies the Irish landscape and inner stillness.
The Snow Man
by Wallace Stevens
One must have a mind of winter To regard the frost and the boughs Of the pine-trees crusted with snow...
Published in 1921, Stevens' modernist poem challenges readers to strip away emotion to perceive the world as it is—cold, clear, and unfiltered. It's a chilling meditation on perspective.
When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer
by Walt Whitman
When I heard the learn'd astronomer, When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me...
In this 1865 poem, Whitman draws a line between scientific analysis and poetic experience. The stars, he suggests, are better felt than measured—a deeply naturalistic view of wonder.
The Summer Day
by Mary Oliver
Who made the world? Who made the swan, and the black bear? Who made the grasshopper?...
One of Oliver’s most quoted poems, it gently nudges us to be more present in the natural world. Her reverent observation of a grasshopper leads to the now-famous question: 'Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?'