These impressive nature poems pay homage to the grandeur and mystique of mountains.
They exalt the beauty of rugged landscapes, lofty peaks, and serene valleys. These verses often evoke a sense of awe and reverence for nature’s majesty, inviting readers to journey through snow-capped summits and cascading waterfalls.
Poets use mountains as metaphors for challenges, resilience, and the human spirit’s quest for enlightenment. These poems celebrate the spiritual connections and life lessons found in the towering presence of mountains.
‘Mid-August at Sourdough Mountain Lookout’ by Gary Snyder is a beautiful two-stanza poem. In it, the speaker conveys descriptions from the top of Sourdough Mountain.
Mountains serve as both the setting and a symbol in the poem. They create a vantage point from which the speaker can "look down for miles," offering perspective not just on the valley below but potentially on life itself. The mountain's isolating height amplifies the themes of solitude and reflection.
‘Mont Brevent’ by George Santayana looks up in awe and finds solace in the sight of a majestic mountain peak.
As evidenced by the title, the poem explores the speaker's fascination with a particular mountain. The specific peak itself is perhaps incidental, owed to the Santayana's own experiences. But in many ways, the sonnet gives voice to humanity's fascination with the alpine world that exists far above ours.
‘Liable to Floods’ exposes the deadly cost of ignoring wisdom, as a major’s hubris dooms his men to floodwaters’ wrath.
In Sheers’ ‘Liable to Floods,’ readers find a direct reference to Moel Siabod, a mountain located in Wales. The narrator depicts it as a human being under whose care the American soldiers trained for D-Day.
'Liable to floods' the farmer warned them.
And on the map, the letters arcing down the valley
‘Ram,’ by Gillian Clarke, is an eerie poem on the nature of death and rebirth. The ram serves as a symbol for how decay seeds new life, with his various parts feeding different elements of the natural world.
In 'Ram,' a ram skull symbolizes the entire ecosystem of the Brecon Beacon mountains. Clarke communicates a deep love for these mountains and their ancient history.
‘Csontváry’s Flowers’ is a fascinating insight into one extraordinary artist’s view of the work of another.
Surrounded by mountains, Selmecbánya can appear both protected and trapped by its breathtaking landscape. Bleakney ponders the height at which the artist must have sketched the piece that became the painting.
The thin ribbon of sky, and thinner still,
blued hints of the easterly Carpathians
then down into the whole arboretum of blue-greens and greens
MacCaig’s ‘Below the Green Corrie’ explores the mountains’ dual nature—threatening yet enriching, revealing nature’s profound impact.
This poem is deeply centered around mountains, which are not just part of the setting but seem to have their own character. At first, they appear threatening, as if they surround the speaker like a gang. Later, they become something generous and almost comforting. The mountains are described in great detail and serve as the main focus of the poem. They play a powerful role in shaping the speaker’s experience, emotions, and sense of meaning.
‘Shancoduff’ paints pride in bleak hills, where a poet’s land, scorned by others, holds a wealth of personal value and resilience.
The poem doesn’t just talk about any land—it talks about hills that the speaker sees almost like mountains. He even compares his land to the Alps and names the Matterhorn, one of Europe’s tallest peaks. This shows how much value he places on what others might see as small. By doing this, he’s turning his own little patch of land into something grand in his eyes, like a mountain full of meaning.
My black hills have never seen the sun rising, Eternally they look north towards Armagh. Lot's wife would not be salt if she had been Incurious as my black hills that are happy
‘All Things Bright and Beautiful’ by Cecil Frances Alexander describes how God is responsible for creating all things, positive and negative, big and small, in the world.
Mountains in the poem stand for the greatness and beauty of what God has created. They add a sense of awe and wonder to the poem, showing how majestic the natural world is. This use of mountains enhances the poem's depth, making it a good example of how mountains can symbolize strength and grandeur in poetry.
‘The Prelude’ shares two contrasting views of nature by a speaker who finds themselves spellbound but haunted by its ineffable immensity.
The mountain serves as both a physical presence and a symbolic force. Initially appearing as a mere boundary, it transforms into an animate presence that seems to pursue the speaker. This transformation from a geographical feature to a psychological force demonstrates nature's power to shape human consciousness.
‘Stars’ by Sara Teasdale presents nature’s majesty through the sublime beauty and timelessness of stars providing spiritual truth.
The experience of stargazing from a hill amid the darkness of night constitutes the poem as it conveys the solace, peace, and transcendence achieved amid nature. Observing things from a mountaintop is always considered enchanting, surreal, and peaceful; the 'dark hill' with 'spicy and still' pines in this poem also provides an apt background for the stars to shine or the speaker to gain peace and contentment by watching nature's magical phenomena.
Emily Dickinson’s ‘It sifts from Leaden Sieves’ explores how snow transforms the landscape, showing its impact on our surroundings.
The second stanza, with lines like 'It makes an even Face / Of Mountain, and of Plain—' evokes the visuals of smooth, unblemished, snow-covered white mountains. It personifies the mountains with phrases like 'even Face' and 'Unbroken Forehead,' transforming the mundane natural phenomenon of snowfall into a poetic portrayal of nature's artistry.
‘The Journeyman Paul Cezanne on Mont Sainte Victoire’ by Liz Lochhead discusses the lasting impression of Paul Cezanne’s art.
The mountain that Paul Cezanne painted was one of the main subjects of his work over the years, and he produced over thirty different works of art featuring it. However, the mountain itself is not discussed in great detail, as the poem focuses more on the artist rather than his subject.
‘Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art’ is one of John Keats’ best-loved poems. It uses a star as an image of steadfastness to depict the enduring nature of a lover’s heart.
Mountains appear in the second quatrain as part of the natural landscape the star watches over. They are cold, quiet, and distant, covered in freshly fallen snow. The speaker uses them to show how detached the star is from human life. The mountains are not described with warmth or energy. Instead, they add to the feeling of stillness and separation. Although the mountains are only mentioned once, their image supports the mood and ideas of the poem.
‘Bell Birds’ by Henry Kendall describes the beauty of a local wooded landscape and the passion and inspiration a speaker gains from its depths.
Mountains are one of the images that readers will encounter in this Henry Kendall poem. They are yet another part of the natural world that has an important role to play in his description of the world's beauty.
By channels of coolness the echoes are calling,
And down the dim gorges I hear the creek falling;
It lives in the mountain, where moss and the sedges
Stevenson’s ‘The Land of Nod’ is a poem in which a child speaker relates the intrigue they experience with their dreams.
The mention of mountains is brief. Nonetheless, Stevenson effectively uses it to show two things. The first is the image of this land; the poet shows how vast it is in comparison to the child, thereby heightening the child's wonder. Secondly, the phrase "mountain-sides of dreams" shows how far the speaker metaphorically travels to reach their land.
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