Poems about heartbreak delve into the profound pain and emotional turmoil that accompanies the loss of love or the shattering of relationships.
These poems capture the depths of sorrow, longing, and grief experienced during a broken heart. They often explore themes of betrayal, disappointment, and loss that come with a shattered bond. Poems about heartbreak may employ metaphorical language to depict the anguish and vulnerability of a wounded soul.
They offer solace, validation, and a means of catharsis for those navigating the complex emotions associated with heartbreak. These poems serve as a reminder of the resilience of the human spirit and the potential for healing and growth in the face of emotional pain.
‘Because I Liked You Better’ by A. E. Housman is a love poem that taps on the theme of unrequited love. Like his “A Shropshire Lad” poems, it also touches on the theme of death.
This poem is suggestive of the poet’s sexuality if one reads the lines as coming from the poet’s own perspective. The speaker describes following his lover’s directive—to put him out of his mind and carry on with his life. This is a common theme in heartbreak poems, but it is harder to follow the advice than to read it.
Read Shakespeare’s Sonnet 87, ‘Farewell, thou art too dear for my possessing,’ with a summary and complete analysis of the poem.
In this well-known “Fair Youth” sonnet, the poet addresses a young man that he loves. He tells the man that he means a lot to him, but, at the same time, he knows, due to the young man’s actions, that their relationship is not going to be what it could’ve been. The youth has realized that he is worth much more than he previously thought.
The ‘Hymn to Aphrodite’ by Sappho is an ancient lyric in which Sappho begs for Aphrodite’s help in managing her turbulent love life.
'Hymn to Aphrodite' is a timeless classic because it chronicles Sappho's 2,500+-year-old feelings of heartbreak, and they are the exact same emotions that we all go through after getting rejected. This poem, thus, is the original heartbreak poem, and it has also inspired thousands of heartbreak poems all across the world.
Raine’s ‘Passion’ journeys from heartbreak to self-renewal, finding strength in nature and the choice to embrace life with newfound passion.
This is an eight-stanza poem about heartbreak written in the first person. The speaker describes the feelings of heartbreak one experiences after someone they love turns them down. One has to choose to move on and rebuild their life. If they don’t, they’ll never live as happily as they could’ve.
Full of desire I lay, the sky wounding me,
Each cloud a ship without me sailing, each tree
Possessing what my soul lacked, tranquillity.
‘I Am Not Yours’ by Sara Teasdale describes the emotions of a speaker who is seeking out a love which does not strive to confine her.
In this lovely poem, Teasdale addresses someone who claims to love her or her speaker. She tells them that she is not theirs. The speaker takes control of this relationship, telling them that she does not want to be loved in the way that they seem to want to love her.
“Never Give All The Heart” by William Butler Yeats is a poem written in advice against heartbreak. The poem is urging never to devote yourself completely.
This lesser-read W.B. Yeats poem is a thoughtful piece that’s suited to someone experiencing heartbreak. It addresses how purposeless it can feel to give one’s heart to another person, only to have it ripped out. Women, the speaker states, “Have given their hearts up to the play.” The speaker warns against losing oneself to love.
Millay’s ‘Love Is Not All’ ponders love’s limits vs. survival, concluding its intangible worth outweighs tangible needs.
The piece explores the ways that human beings suffer for love, as one might suffer after a heartbreak. She notes that love is not “all.” There are many ways that it cannot help someone make it through life. It does not provide food, shelter, water, or sleep. She continues on to write about how love cannot cure disease “nor set the fractured bone.”
‘Love’s Deity’ by John Donne is a complex and beautiful poem that delves into the evolution of love. The poet explores its meaning and role have changed over time
This poem is a wonderful example of the topic of heartbreak. It is key to understanding the poem. Within the text, the speaker's heartbreak over his unreturned love is clear. Donne captures the isolation and sorrow of this experience.
‘A Kind of Love, Some Say’ by Maya Angelou explores the horrors of abusive relationships, highlighting that there is no love in pain.
Heartbreak is an incredibly important theme in this poem, as the speaker removes the stigma from feeling sad and heartbroken in the wake of an abusive relationship. While many would encourage victims to be angry rather than heartbroken, Angelou embraces it as a natural consequence. The speaker longs to think about the "lost romance" rather than the hurt they feel, showing the form heartbreak takes when abuse is involved. The heartbreak in this poem comes not only from the conclusion of a relationship, but also from the realisation that love can devolve into abuse.
‘How Heavy The Days’ by Hermann Hesse is a gloomy poem that illustrates the overbearing disillusionment shouldered by a heartbroken speaker.
A topic that's touched on in this poem by Hermann Hesse is heartbreak. In so many words, this is the pain and anguish that marred the speaker's worldview. The fact that love can perish or fade into nothingness is a devastating revelation that leaves them more than just heartbroken — but hopeless as well.
‘He would not stay for me, and who can wonder’ appears in A. E. Housman’s “Additional Poems”. It taps on the themes of separation and leave-taking.
This short poem describes a speaker waiting for “him,” a person they care about. They suggest that if they’d done a few things differently, their entire life would’ve changed.
‘Tess’s Lament’ by Thomas Hardy is a depressing poem that agonizes over the grief and regret of one woman’s tragic heartbreak.
The root cause of Tess's lament is heartbreak, which leaves the speaker drained of any desire to go on living, as well as racked with grief and remorse. If there's one thing that Hardy excels at it's depicting the passions of such anguish with earnest clarity, using both imagery and figurative language to articulate the burden those emotions can have on the heart and mind. Transforming someone once robust and full of life into a shell of their former selves.
‘Tonight I Can Write’ by Pablo Neruda explores love’s transient nature and enduring impact, capturing poignant emotions felt after a breakup.
The poem encapsulates the intense sorrow and melancholy that accompany the end of a romantic relationship. Neruda excellently draws the landscape of emotional devastation, conveying the profound emptiness that follows the separation from a once-beloved partner, leading to heartbreak. The poem portrays the speaker's vulnerability as he paints a portrait of his shattered heart bearing the weight of lost love. It captures the nuances of human emotions, including intense longing, passion, and sadness, allowing readers to empathize with the speaker's pain.
Tonight I can write the saddest lines.
Write, for example, 'The night is starry and the stars are blue and shiver in the distance.'
‘Havisham’ by Carol Ann Duffy explores the psychological reality of Dickens’ Miss Havisham from a feminist perspective.
This poem captures the life-altering experience of a heartbreak as the speaker aptly concludes it, telling 'Don't think it's only the heart that b-b-b-breaks,' as if sobbing. The abandonment and betrayal of the speaker by her ex-fiancé on their wedding day, when she was dressed in her wedding dress, breaks the speaker's heart and thrusts her into such deep emotional and psychological upheaval that she couldn't overcome it for her entire life. Her mind gets trapped in chaotic emotions ranging from desires of revenge, rage, hatred, to depths of sorrow, grief, anguish, and longing for the lost love and life, while her body ages and decays. The sorrow of heartbreak fixates her mind on that loss so much so that she loses her sense of self and identity, and continues to be haunted by the memories.
Beloved sweetheart bastard. Not a day since then
I haven’t wished him dead. Prayed for it
so hard I’ve dark green pebbles for eyes,
ropes on the back of my hands I could strangle with.
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