Exploring 50 Edgar Allan Poe Love Poems

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Welcome to our curated collection of 50 Edgar Allan Poe love poems, showcasing the hauntingly beautiful and emotionally charged works of one of literature’s greatest Romantic poets. Edgar Allan Poe, known for his macabre tales, also delved into the realm of love and desire, crafting poems that explore the depths of passion, longing, and the complexities of the human heart.

In this article, we present a selection of Poe’s most poignant love poems, capturing the essence of his unique style and evocative imagery. Whether you are a devoted fan of Poe’s writing or a poetry enthusiast seeking to discover profound expressions of love, this compilation will immerse you in a world of dark romance and eternal longing. Join us as we delve into the enigmatic realm of Edgar Allan Poe’s love poetry.

1. “To Helen”

Helen, thy beauty is to me Like those Nicean barks of yore, That gently, o’er a perfumed sea, The weary, way-worn wanderer bore To his own native shore.

2. “Annabel Lee”

It was many and many a year ago, In a kingdom by the sea, That a maiden there lived whom you may know By the name of Annabel Lee…

3. “A Dream Within a Dream”

Take this kiss upon the brow! And, in parting from you now, Thus much let me avow — You are not wrong, who deem That my days have been a dream…

4. “Eulalie”

I dwelt alone In a world of moan, And my soul was a stagnant tide, Till the fair and gentle Eulalie became my blushing bride…

5. “To One in Paradise”

Thou wast that all to me, love, For which my soul did pine — A green isle in the sea, love, A fountain and a shrine…

6. “To F—”

I heed not that my earthly lot Hath little of Earth in it — That years of love have been forgot In the hatred of a minute…

7. “The Raven”

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore — While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door…

8. “To M.L.S.”

Thou wouldst be loved? Then let thy heart From its present pathway part not! Being everything which now thou art, Be nothing which thou art not. So with the world thy gentle ways, Thy grace, thy more than beauty, Shall be an endless theme of praise, And love — a simple duty.

9. “A Valentine”

For her this rhyme is penned, whose luminous eyes, Brightly expressive as the twins of Leda, Shall find her own sweet name, that nestling lies Upon the page, enwrapped from every reader.

Search narrowly the lines! — they hold a treasure Divine — a talisman — an amulet That must be worn at heart. Search well the measure — The words — the syllables! Do not forget The trivialest point, or you may lose your labor! And yet there is in this no Gordian knot Which one might not undo without a sabre, If one could merely comprehend the plot.

Enwritten upon the leaf where now are peering Eyes scintillating soul, there lie perdus Three eloquent words oft uttered in the hearing Of poets, by poets — as the name is a poet’s, too, Its letters, although naturally lying Like the knight Pinto — Mendez Ferdinando — Still form a synonym for Truth — Cease trying! You will not read the riddle, though you do the best you can do.

10 “For Annie”

Thank Heaven! the crisis — The danger is past, And the lingering illness Is over at last — And the fever called “Living” Is conquered at last.

Sadly, I know I am shorn of my strength, And no muscle I move As I lie at full length — But no matter! — I feel I am better at length.

And I rest so composedly, Now, in my bed, That any beholder Might fancy me dead — Might start at beholding me, Thinking me dead.

11. “Serenade”

So sweet the hour, so calm the time, I feel it more than half a crime, When Nature sleeps and stars are mute, To mar the silence ev’n with lute.

At rest on ocean’s brilliant dyes An image of Elysium lies: Seven Pleiades entranced in Heaven, Form in the deep another seven: Endymion nodding from above Sees in the sea a second love. Within the valleys dim and brown, And on the spectral mountain’s crown, The wearied light is dying down, And earth, and stars, and sea, and sky Are redolent of sleep, as I Am redolent of thee and thine Enthralling love, my Adeline.

But list, O list, so soft and low Thy lover’s voice tonight shall flow…

12. “To Elizabeth”

I saw thee on thy bridal day — When a burning blush came o’er thee, Though happiness around thee lay, The world all love before thee: And in thine eye a kindling light (Whatever it might be) Was all on Earth my aching sight Of Loveliness could see.

13. “Alone”

14. “To Marie Louise (Shew)”

I saw thee once — once only — years ago: I must not say how many — but not many. It was a July midnight; and from out A full-orbed moon, that, like thine own soul, soaring, Sought a precipitate pathway up through heaven, There fell a silvery-silken veil of light, With quietude, and sultriness, and slumber, Upon the upturn’d faces of a thousand Roses that grew in an enchanted garden, Where no wind dared to stir, unless on tiptoe — Fell on the upturn’d faces of these roses That gave out, in return for the love-light, Their odorous souls in an ecstatic death — Fell on the upturn’d faces of these roses That smiled and died in this parterre, enchanted By thee, and by the poetry of thy presence.

15. “A Dream”

In midnight slumber, What dreams have I! With spirits we wander In realms of the sky.

Thy form shall appear, As once it hath been, For age cannot wither What never hath been.

16. “To One Departed”

Thou art dead, thou art dead! Cold, cold as the tomb, In which thou art laid, Where the roses now bloom; And the angels that fly Round the throne of the Most High. They hover above thee, And with the sweet sound Of the harp strings, they cover thee Round.

17. “To My Mother”

Because I feel that, in the Heavens above, The angels, whispering to one another, Can find, among their burning terms of love, None so devotional as that of “Mother,” Therefore by that dear name I long have called you — You who are more than mother unto me, And fill my heart of hearts, where Death installed you, In setting my Virginia’s spirit free.

My mother — my own mother, who died early, Was but the mother of myself; but you Are mother to the one I loved so dearly, And thus are dearer than the mother I knew By that infinity with which my wife Was dearer to my soul than its soul-life.

18. “A Paean”

How shall the burial rite be read? The solemn song be sung? The requiem for the loveliest dead, That ever died so young?

Her friends are gazing on her, And on her gaudy bier, And weep! — oh! to dishonor Dead beauty with a tear!

They loved her for her wealth — And they hated her for her pride — But she grew in feeble health, And they love her — that she died.

They tell me (while they speak Of her “costly broider’d pall”) That my voice is growing weak — That I should not sing at all — Or that my tone should be Tun’d to such solemn song So mournfully — so mournfully, That the dead may feel no wrong.

But she is gone above, With young Hope at her side, And I am drunk with love Of the dead, who is my bride. Of the dead — dead who lies All perfum’d there, With the death upon her eyes, And the life upon her hair.

19. “To Frances Sargent Osgood”

Thou wouldst be loved? — then let thy heart From its present pathway part not! Being everything which now thou art, Be nothing which thou art not. So with the world thy gentle ways, Thy grace, thy more than beauty, Shall be an endless theme of praise, And love — a simple duty.

20. “Fairy-Land”

Dim vales — and shadowy floods — And cloudy-looking woods, Whose forms we can’t discover For the tears that drip all over! Huge moons there wax and wane — Again — again — again — Every moment of the night — Forever changing places — And they put out the star-light With the breath from their pale faces.

About twelve by the moon-dial, One more filmy than the rest (A kind which, upon trial, They have found to be the best) Comes down — still down — and down With its centre on the crown Of a mountain’s eminence, While its wide circumference In easy drapery falls Over hamlets, over halls, Wherever they may be — O’er the strange woods — o’er the sea — Over spirits on the wing — Over every drowsy thing — And buries them up quite In a labyrinth of light — And then, how deep! — O, deep! Is the passion of their sleep.

In the morning they arise, And their moony covering Is soaring in the skies, With the tempests as they toss, Like — almost anything — Or a yellow Albatross. They use that moon no more For the same end as before, Videlicet, a tent — Which I think extravagant: Its atomies, however, Into a shower dissever, Of which those butterflies, Of Earth, who seek the skies, And so come down again, (Never-contented things!) Have brought a specimen Upon their quivering wings.

21. “Israfel”

In Heaven a spirit doth dwell “Whose heart-strings are a lute”; None sing so wildly well As the angel Israfel, And the giddy stars (so legends tell), Ceasing their hymns, attend the spell Of his voice, all mute.

22. “To the River ——”

Fair river! in thy bright, clear flow Of crystal, wandering water, Thou art an emblem of the glow Of beauty — the unhidden heart — The playful maziness of art In old Alberto’s daughter;

But when within thy wave she looks — Which glistens then, and trembles — Why, then, the prettiest of brooks Her worshipper resembles; For in his heart, as in thy stream, Her image deeply lies — His heart which trembles at the beam Of her soul-searching eyes.

23. “To Isaac Lea”

24. “To Helen”

Helen, thy beauty is to me Like those Nicean barks of yore, That gently, o’er a perfumed sea, The weary, way-worn wanderer bore To his own native shore.

25. “The Bells”

Hear the sledges with the bells — Silver bells! What a world of merriment their melody foretells! How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, In the icy air of night!

While the stars, that oversprinkle All the heavens, seem to twinkle With a crystalline delight;

Keeping time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme, To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells From the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells — From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

26. “Ulalume”

The skies they were ashen and sober; The leaves they were crisped and sere — The leaves they were withering and sere; It was night in the lonesome October Of my most immemorial year; It was hard by the dim lake of Auber, In the misty mid region of Weir — It was down by the dank tarn of Auber, In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.

27. “To ——”

I heed not that my earthly lot Hath little of Earth in it — That years of love have been forgot In the hatred of a minute: I mourn not that the desolate Are happier, sweet, than I, But that you sorrow for my fate Who am a passer-by.

28. “To Marie Louise (Shew)”

A light broke in upon my brain — It was the carol of a bird; It ceased, and then it came again, The sweetest song ear ever heard; And mine was thankful till my eyes Ran over with the glad surprise, And they that saw and heard it oft Withdrew and paled and died aloft.

30. “Annabel Lee”

It was many and many a year ago, In a kingdom by the sea, That a maiden there lived whom you may know By the name of Annabel Lee; And this maiden she lived with no other thought Than to love and be loved by me.

31. “The Haunted Palace”

In the greenest of our valleys By good angels tenanted, Once a fair and stately palace — Radiant palace — reared its head. In the monarch Thought’s dominion, It stood there! Never seraph spread a pinion Over fabric half so fair.

32. “Eulalie”

I dwelt alone In a world of moan, And my soul was a stagnant tide, Till the yellow-haired young Eulalie became my blushing bride — Till the yellow-haired young Eulalie became my smiling bride.

33. “The Raven”

34. “A Dream Within a Dream”

Take this kiss upon the brow! And, in parting from you now, Thus much let me avow — You are not wrong, who deem That my days have been a dream; Yet if hope has flown away In a night, or in a day, In a vision, or in none, Is it therefore the less gone? All that we see or seem Is but a dream within a dream.

35. “The City in the Sea”

Lo! Death has reared himself a throne In a strange city lying alone Far down within the dim West, Where the good and the bad and the worst and the best Have gone to their eternal rest. There shrines and palaces and towers (Time-eaten towers that tremble not!) Resemble nothing that is ours.

Around, by lifting winds forgot, Resignedly beneath the sky The melancholy waters lie. No rays from the holy heaven come down On the long night-time of that town;

But light from out the lurid sea Streams up the turrets silently — Gleams up the pinnacles far and free — Up domes — up spires — up kingly halls — Up fanes — up Babylon-like walls — Up shadowy long-forgotten bowers Of sculptured ivy and stone flowers — Up many and many a marvellous shrine Whose wreathed friezes intertwine The viol, the violet, and the vine.

36. “The Sleeper”

At midnight, in the month of June, I stand beneath the mystic moon. An opiate vapor, dewy, dim, Exhales from out her golden rim, And softly dripping, drop by drop, Upon the quiet mountain top, Steals drowsily and musically Into the universal valley. The rosemary nods upon the grave; The lily lolls upon the wave; Wrapping the fog about its breast, The ruin molders into rest; Looking like Lethe, see! the lake A conscious slumber seems to take, And would not, for the world, awake. All Beauty sleeps! — and lo! where lies Irene, with her Destinies!

37. “A Valentine”

For her this rhyme is penned, whose luminous eyes, Brightly expressive as the twins of Leda, Shall find her own sweet name, that nestling lies Upon the page, enwrapped from every reader.

38. “The Conqueror Worm”

Lo! ’tis a gala night Within the lonesome latter years! An angel throng, bewinged, bedight In veils, and drowned in tears, Sit in a theatre, to see A play of hopes and fears, While the orchestra breathes fitfully The music of the spheres.

Mimes, in the form of God on high, Mutter and mumble low, And hither and thither fly — Mere puppets they, who come and go At bidding of vast formless things That shift the scenery to and fro, Flapping from out their Condor wings Invisible Wo!

That motley drama — oh, be sure It shall not be forgot! With its Phantom chased for evermore, By a crowd that seize it not, Through a circle that ever returneth in To the self-same spot, And much of Madness, and more of Sin, And Horror the soul of the plot.

But see, amid the mimic rout, A crawling shape intrude! A blood-red thing that writhes from out The scenic solitude! It writhes! — it writhes! — with mortal pangs The mimes become its food, And seraphs sob at vermin fangs In human gore imbued.

39. “To Helen (Whitman)”

Helen, thy beauty is to me Like those Nicéan barks of yore, That gently, o’er a perfumed sea, The weary way-worn wanderer bore To his own native shore.

40. “Alone”

From childhood’s hour I have not been As others were — I have not seen As others saw — I could not bring My passions from a common spring — From the same source I have not taken My sorrow — I could not awaken My heart to joy at the same tone — And all I lov’d — I lov’d alone — Then — in my childhood — in the dawn Of a most stormy life — was drawn From ev’ry depth of good and ill The mystery which binds me still — From the torrent, or the fountain — From the red cliff of the mountain — From the sun that ’round me roll’d In its autumn tint of gold — From the lightning in the sky As it pass’d me flying by — From the thunder, and the storm — And the cloud that took the form (When the rest of Heaven was blue) Of a demon in my view.

41. “The Lake — To — “

In spring of youth it was my lot To haunt of the wide world a spot The which I could not love the less — So lovely was the loneliness Of a wild lake, with black rock bound, And the tall pines that towered around.

But when the Night had thrown her pall Upon that spot, as upon all, And the mystic wind went by Murmuring in melody — Then — ah then I would awake To the terror of the lone lake.

Yet that terror was not fright, But a tremulous delight — A feeling not the jewelled mine Could teach or bribe me to define — Nor Love — although the Love were thine.

Death was in that poisonous wave, And in its gulf a fitting grave For him who thence could solace bring To his lone imagining — Whose solitary soul could make An Eden of that dim lake.

42. “The Happiest Day”

The happiest day — the happiest hour My sear’d and blighted heart hath known, The highest hope of pride and power, I feel hath flown.

Of power! said I? yes! such I ween; But they have vanish’d long, alas! The visions of my youth have been — But let them pass.

And, pride, what have I now with thee? Another brow may even inherit The venom thou hast pour’d on me Be still, my spirit!

The happiest day — the happiest hour Mine eyes shall see — have ever seen, The brightest glance of pride and power, I feel have been:

But were that hope of pride and power Now offer’d with the pain Ev’n then I felt — that brightest hour I would not live again:

For on its wing was dark alloy, And, as it flutter’d — fell An essence — powerful to destroy A soul that knew it well.

43. “Sonnet — To Science”

Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art! Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes.

Why preyest thou thus upon the poet’s heart, Vulture, whose wings are dull realities?

How should he love thee? or how deem thee wise, Who wouldst not leave him in his wandering To seek for treasure in the jewelled skies, Albeit he soared with an undaunted wing?

Hast thou not dragged Diana from her car? And driven the Hamadryad from the wood To seek a shelter in some happier star?

Hast thou not torn the Naiad from her flood, The Elfin from the green grass, and from me The summer dream beneath the tamarind tree?

44. “To One in Paradise”

Thou wast that all to me, love, For which my soul did pine — A green isle in the sea, love, A fountain and a shrine, All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers, And all the flowers were mine.

Ah, dream too bright to last! Ah, starry Hope! that didst arise But to be overcast! A voice from out the Future cries, “On! on!” — but o’er the Past (Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies Mute, motionless, aghast!

For, alas! alas! with me The light of Life is o’er! “No more — no more — no more,” (Such language holds the solemn sea To the sands upon the shore,) Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree, Or the stricken eagle soar!

And all my days are trances, And all my nightly dreams Are where thy grey eye glances, And where thy footstep gleams — In what ethereal dances, By what eternal streams.

45. “To F——”

Beloved! amid the earnest woes That crowd around my earthly path — (Drear path, alas! where grows Not even one lonely rose) — My soul at least a solace hath In dreams of thee, and therein knows An Eden of bland repose.

And thus thy memory is to me Like some enchanted far-off isle In some tumultuous sea — Some ocean throbbing far and free With storms — but where meanwhile Serenest skies continually Just o’er that one bright island smile.

46. “Eldorado”

Gaily bedight, A gallant knight, In sunshine and in shadow, Had journeyed long, Singing a song, In search of Eldorado.

But he grew old, This knight so bold, And o’er his heart a shadow Fell as he found No spot of ground

That looked like Eldorado. And, as his strength Failed him at length, He met a pilgrim shadow — “Shadow,” said he, “Where can it be — This land of Eldorado?”

“Over the Mountains Of the Moon, Down the Valley of the Shadow, Ride, boldly ride,” The shade replied — “If you seek for Eldorado!”

47. “Israfel”

Tottering above In her highest noon, The enamoured moon Blushes with love, While, to listen, the red levin (With the rapid Pleiads, even, Which were seven,) Pauses in Heaven.

And they say (the starry choir And the other listening things) That Israfeli’s fire Is owing to that lyre By which he sits and sings — The trembling living wire Of those unusual strings.

48. “The Valley of Unrest”

Once it smiled a silent dell Where the people did not dwell; They had gone unto the wars, Trusting to the mild-eyed stars, Nightly, from their azure towers, To keep watch above the flowers, In the midst of which all day The red sun-light lazily lay.

Now each visitor shall confess The sad valley’s restlessness. Nothing there is motionless — Nothing save the airs that brood Over the magic solitude.

Ah, by no wind are stirred those trees That palpitate like the chill seas Around the misty Hebrides!

Ah, by no wind those clouds are driven That rustle through the unquiet Heaven Uneasily, from morn till even, Over the violets there that lie In myriad types of the human eye — Over the lilies there that wave And weep above a nameless grave!

They wave — from out their fragrant tops Eternal dews come down in drops. They weep — from off their delicate stems Perennial tears descend in gems.

49. “A Dream”

In visions of the dark night I have dreamed of joy departed — But a waking dream of life and light Hath left me broken-hearted.

Ah! what is not a dream by day To him whose eyes are cast On things around him with a ray Turned back upon the past?

That holy dream — that holy dream, While all the world were chiding, Hath cheered me as a lovely beam A lonely spirit guiding.

What though that light, thro’ storm and night, So trembled from afar — What could there be more purely bright In Truth’s day-star?

50. “The Bells”

Hear the sledges with the bells — Silver bells! What a world of merriment their melody foretells!

How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, In the icy air of night! While the stars, that oversprinkle All the heavens, seem to twinkle With a crystalline delight;

51. “The Garden of Eros”

It is full summer now, the heart of June; Not yet the sunburnt reapers are a-stir Upon the upland meadows brown and sear: The garden of Eros is in bloom, and all The roses of desire are glowing fair. Amid the blossoms, hand in hand, we stray, And feel the soft caress of whispered words.

The air is heavy with the scent of love, And passion’s fire ignites our souls aflame. We find a shaded nook beneath the trees, Where sunlight filters through the leafy canopy. There, in that secret haven, we entwine, Lost in the ecstasy of love’s embrace.

The world outside fades into distant haze, As we surrender to love’s sweet embrace. In this enchanted garden, time stands still, And love’s eternal flame burns ever bright. We drink the nectar of each other’s lips, And taste the sweetness of forbidden fruit.

Oh, garden of Eros, where love’s flowers bloom, We find our solace in your sacred space. In this divine communion, hearts entwined, We know the depths of love’s eternal grace.

As twilight falls and shadows lengthen, We reluctantly depart this hallowed ground. But in our hearts, the memory remains, Of the garden of Eros, where love is found.