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Poems about cheaters usually focus on one person experiencing their partner’s unfaithfulness. Poets explore the ways that cheating affects relationships, individuals’ self-worth, and the way that someone understands or trusts other people.
In poems about cheaters, readers can expect to find accounts of the way that a relationship began and how it ended. These poems may begin optimistically before the poet’s speaker introduces a world-shaking revelation–that their partner has been romantically involved with someone else. The extent of the cheating will also vary depending on the situation that the speaker is depicting, as will the way that the person being cheated on reacts to the news.
Part VI of Geoffrey Chaucer’s ‘The Merchant’s Tale’ explores moral values as May and Damian begin their affair.
Now wol I speke of woful Damyan,
That langwissheth for love, as ye shul heere;
Therfore I speke to hym in this manere:
I seye, "O sely Damyan, allas!
In Part VII of ‘The Merchant’s Tale’, Chaucer delves deep into symbolism as Damian and May make the final arrangements for their affair.
Somme clerkes holden that felicitee
Stant in delit, and therfore certeyn he,
This noble Januarie, with al his myght,
In honest wyse, as longeth to a knyght,
‘Medusa’ by Carol Ann Duffy reinterprets and retells the myth of Medusa with a feminist lens in a modern setting.
A suspicion, a doubt, a jealousy
grew in my mind,
which turned the hairs on my head to filthy snakes,
as though my thoughts
hissed and spat on my scalp.
In Part VIII, while May sets her adulterous plans into motion, deities Pluto and Proserpina debate about the nature of women.
This Januarie, as blynd as is a stoon,
With Mayus in his hand, and no wight mo,
Into his fresshe gardyn is ago,
And clapte to the wyket sodeynly.
Sonnet 138, ‘When my love swears that she is made of truth,’ explores the complex dynamics of love, deception, and trust in a relationship.
When my love swears that she is made of truth,
I do believe her though I know she lies,
That she might think me some untutored youth,
Unlearned in the world's false subtleties.
Sonnet 142, ‘Love is my sin, and thy dear virtue hate,’ explores the dynamics of desire and morality in the speaker’s relationship.
Love is my sin, and thy dear virtue hate,
Hate of my sin, grounded on sinful loving:
O! but with mine compare thou thine own state,
And thou shalt find it merits not reproving;
Adcock’s ‘The Telephone Call’ humorously navigates the illusion of luck, emphasizing life’s experiences over material wealth.
They asked me 'Are you sitting down?
Right? This is Universal Lotteries,'
they said. 'You've won the top prize,
the Ultra-super Global Special.
‘Lord Randall’ shows a mother and son’s conversation about what he did that day and ate for dinner, which takes a dark turn.
"Oh where ha'e ye been, Lord Randall my son?
O where ha'e ye been, my handsome young man?"
"I ha'e been to the wild wood: mother, make my bed soon,
For I’m weary wi' hunting, and fain wald lie down."
Sonnet 151, ‘Love is too young to know what conscience is,’ navigates the complexities of love and lust in the speaker’s relationship.
Love is too young to know what conscience is,
Yet who knows not conscience is born of love?
Then, gentle cheater, urge not my amiss,
Lest guilty of my faults thy sweet self prove:
Alfred Lord Tennyson’s ‘Oenone’ weaves heart-wrenching verses as Oenone, spurned by Paris, faces solitude, despair, and a haunting future.
There lies a vale in Ida, lovelier
Than all the valleys of Ionian hills.
The swimming vapour slopes athwart the glen,
Puts forth an arm, and creeps from pine to pine,
Sylvia Plath’s ‘The Rival’ is about betrayal and conflict, comparing the rival to the cold, distant moon and capturing the frustration of unresolved tension.
If the moon smiled, she would resemble you.
You leave the same impression
Of something beautiful, but annihilating.
Both of you are great light borrowers.
‘Sonnet 110’ or ‘Alas, ’tis true I have gone here and there’ is about the speaker’s realization that he only wants the Fair Youth.
Alas! 'tis true, I have gone here and there,
And made my self a motley to the view,
Gored mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear,
Made old offences of affections new;
‘The Keeper’ explores the emotional weight of secrets, blending surreal imagery and inner struggle to depict betrayal, longing, and the fragility of truth.
Nowadays there are too many things to hide.
I am a keeper. Secrets are my caged animals.
I feed them things. Things they will like.
Each day, a ritual; I keep time, though
In ‘After the Battle,’ Victor Hugo explores compassion amid war, highlighting the moral strength of kindness despite betrayal.
MY father, hero of benignant mien,
On horseback visited the gory scene,
After the battle as the evening fell,
And took with him a trooper loved right well,
‘Late Love’ explores the transformative power of love, contrasting its passionate heights with the fading memories and passage of time.
How they strut about, people in love,
how tall they grow, pleased with themselves,
their hair, glossy, their skin shining.
They don’t remember who they have been.
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