Poems about birds are incredibly popular in the history of verse writing. They explore birds’ qualities and their symbolic power.
Some bird poems are solely dedicated to exploring the animals, their behavior, appearance, habitat, songs, and more. These poems often praise the natural world and are written to inspire the reader to spend more time analyzing the world around them. Bird poems are often written in order to prompt readers to get outside more and love nature’s incredible inhabitants.
In other bird poems, in fact, the majority of them use birds as symbols. Authors like Emily Dickinson and Gerard Manley Hopkins are well-known for poems that do just this. They are usually depicted as symbols of hope, God, faith, change, travel, light, and peace. More often than not, they are represented positively.
‘To a Skylark’ by Percy Bysshe Shelley is an ode. It celebrates the beauty of nature and the bliss of a skylark’s song.
‘To a Skylark’ is an ode to the “blithe” essence of a singing skylark and how human beings can never ever reach that same bliss. The poem begins with the speaker spotting a skylark flying above him. He can hear the song clearly. The bird’s song is “unpremeditated” it is unplanned and beautiful. Shelley is stunned by the music produced by the bird and entranced by its movement as it flies into the clouds and out of sight.
‘Hope is the Thing with Feathers’ by Emily Dickinson is a poem about hope. It is depicted through the famous metaphor of a bird.
‘Hope is a thing with feathers’ is one of Dickinson’s most optimistic poems. It focuses on the personification of hope. She depicts it as a bird that perches inside her soul and sings. The bird asks for nothing. It is at peace and is, therefore, able to impart the same hope and peace to the speaker. She can depend on it, and take pleasure from it.
‘The Eagle’ is a poem that captures the strength of the majestic bird, inspiring readers to reach for the heights of their own potential.
‘The Eagle’ speaks on the power and solitude of a lone eagle on a rocky cliff. The poem begins with the speaker describing how a solitary eagle is standing on the top of a craggy cliff. From where he is perched, with his “crooked hands” gripping the rocks, he can survey the whole “azure world” around and below him.
‘Ode to a Nightingale,’ written in 1819, is one of John Keats’ six famous odes. It’s the longest, with eight 10-line stanzas, and showcases Keats’ signature style of vivid imagery and emotional depth, exploring themes like beauty and mortality.
In ‘Ode to a Nightingale,’ which is likely Keats’s best-known work, the nightingale plays an important role. The speaker listens to it sing and feels jealous of its carefree life. Inspired by the song, he considers giving himself over to the woods and trying to discover the same kind of freedom the nightingale has.
In this poem about perseverance and God’s guiding hand, William Cullen Bryant’s ‘To a Waterfowl’ depicts what it means to walk with strength and determination through life.
In ‘To a Waterfowl,’ the speaker addresses the waterfowl and asks it where it’s going and why. He warns the creature that traveling alone is dangerous. But, he soon states, the bird isn’t alone. He’s accompanied by a higher power—God. This poem was inspired by a similar lonely walk the poet took.
Whither, 'midst falling dew,
While glow the heavens with the last steps of day,
‘The Yellowhammer’s Nest’ by John Clare describes the beautiful and brutal world in which a yellowhammer makes its nest and lays its eggs.
‘The Yellowhammer’s Nest’ describes the beautiful and brutal world in which the yellowhammer lives. The speaker asks his listeners to draw close to a stream and look at a nest nestled there. It contains beautiful eggs with “scribbled” lines on them. He goes on to speak about the beauty of the world of birds and how many things can interrupt it.
‘Song of the Owl,’ a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, describes the hooting of the great black owl. It taps on the themes of silence and darkness.
In this very unusual poem, Longfellow uses very short lines, one to three words in length, to celebrate the nature of the “great black / Owl.” The poem is light-hearted and very much up for interpretation.
‘The Raven’ by Edgar Allan Poe presents an eerie raven who incessantly knocks over the speaker’s door and says only one word – “Nevermore.”
‘The Raven’ is a supernatural, dream-like poem that makes use of his most frequently visited themes. There is loss, death, fear, and, and above all else, the haunting presence of the talking raven. The creature cries throughout the text, a single word: “Nevermore.”
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.
‘A Bird, came down the Walk’ by Emily Dickinson is a beautiful nature poem. It focuses on the actions of a bird going about its everyday life.
This poem describes the simple, yet beautiful, actions of a bird searching for food and then taking flight. It begins with the speaker describing a bird she sees. She’s nearby, allowing her to look at the bird. It does not immediately notice her, though. From where she is situated, she sees the bird pick up an “Angle Worm” and bite it in half. It moves quickly from place to place, showing the anxiety inherent to most of its species.
‘The Swan’ by John Gould Fletcher describes the movements of a swan within a body of water and a speaker’s desire to escape his life.
This is a poem that celebrates the beauty and wonder of birds. Fletcher's use of vivid imagery and sensory language captures the grace and majesty of the swan, inviting the reader to appreciate and enjoy the beauty of all bird species.
‘The Windhover’ is an incredibly important poem that Hopkins considered to be his best. It uses symbolism to speak about God and faith.
‘The Windhover’ is Gerard Manley Hopkins’s most famous poem. It’s also the one that he felt most connected to. In the sonnet, he describes a windhover, or kestrel, and compares it to Christ. Hopkins uses his “sprung rhyme” throughout.
I caught this morning morning’s minion, king-
dom of daylight’s dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
‘The Blossom’ by William Blake illustrates that even the natural world is imbued with a range of emotions, as is seen through the robin, the blossom, and the sparrow.
Birds serve as the central figures of the poem. They each embody a different emotional state. Sparrows and robins are commonly found birds, making them relatable subjects. By elevating these everyday creatures to the level of poetic exploration, Blake underscores their significance.
‘The Nightingale’ is a unique love-lyric that exploits the classical myth of Philomel to morph the personal rue of a lovelorn heart into a superb piece of poetry.
In ‘The Nightingale,’ Sir Philip Sidney describes a nightingale and her song. He makes the traditional allusion to Philomela, and tries to offer the bird some “gladness.” He spends the other lines alluding to the story at the heart of nightingale myth and speaking on mortality and immortality.
‘The Flight of Two Geese’ marvels at nature’s splendor and contemplates the divine design believed responsible for it.
Birds have long evoked and thus represented lofty ideas like freedom, hope, and peace. Ross' poem draws on some of these associations but also focuses on the animals themselves, highlighting the way they appeared to have "honed their craft" (i.e. flying). To the speaker, this seems to be the truly wonderful thing about the geese, their adept efficiency.
The winter air had settled in, today was cold
Two geese slung low, below the clouds
Then, spotted us and climbed up above us
And sounded their presence and it echoed
‘At the Parrot House, Taronga Park’ by Vivian Smith is an interesting poem that uses personification to describe birds and their interactions.
The birds found in Smith's poem are characterized as being beautifully colorful and uniquely temperamental creatures. This contributes to their personification, yet it also speaks to the ways in which we as people project ourselves onto animals as we perceive them. However, that isn't to say that parrots aren't capable of exhibiting traits or mannerisms that evoke vanity, greed, love, or quiet reflection.
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