There’s no disputing that contemplating and fantasizing about the ocean offers us joy and tranquilly, and genuinely calms our spirit. In moments of stress, we look to the ocean for wise words delivered in the form of poetry. Here are some classic ocean poems for you. 1. Ocean – Mysterious Mistress

Ponder the profound connection between life’s fragility and the eternal vastness of the ocean with these verses that weave a captivating tapestry of emotions. “Crossing the Bar” by Lord Tennyson Alfred by Neruda, Pablo ...Leaning into the afternoons,I cast my sad nets towards your oceanic eyes.There, in the highest blaze my solitude lengthens and flames;Its arms turning like a drowning man's.I send out red signals across your absent eyesThat wave like the sea, or the beach by a lighthouse.You keep only darkness my distant female;>From your regard sometimes, the coast of dread emerges.Leaning into the afternoons... Read More The ocean has had a very significant role in poetry since the dawn of poetry itself. It’s easy to see why. The ocean — both wild and calm, dangerous and beautiful — is a made up of contradictions and mystery. Ocean poems can not only be dedicated to capturing the heart of sea, but to metaphors for love and trauma, among many other things. More than that, the ocean has played a role in the history of many cultures, making it a setting that is both intimately personal, and vastly universal.The oceans are the heart of our globe and all of its inhabitants. They encompass roughly three-quarters of the planet and contain 97 percent of the world’s water. If you want your kids to learn more facts about oceans, share these ocean poems for kids with them. 1. Ocean Mightier than the Land Oceanic is a generous, romantic, and ambitious look at the different stages of life, and how we experience the love and wonder that lead us to become more fully realized and compassionate as we grow each decade… [it’s] Nezhukumatathil’s most cohesive collection to date, as she takes her prior preoccupations and dissects them in new ways that invite, as all of her work does, a sense of marvel and astonishment.” — Tin House

This word mat of under-the-sea adjectives will be a perfect complement to this resource, helping to build a broader range of vocabulary. Permit us to begin with a short poem written by our own founder-editor (the full poem can be found via the link above). Sea glass is glass that has been weathered by the ocean, which turns the broken glass from bottles into natural frosted glass. Alongside these are bite-sized poetry gems that bring to life the visual feast, the symphony, and the soul-stirring sentiments that only the ocean can inspire.Cultural strands are woven into the DNA of her strange, lush… poems. Aphorisms… from another dimension.” — New York Times

Men who have never known hardship would be unlikely to believe the seafarer’s description of the difficulties of life at sea. The seafarer is without a lord, without wine or the company of women: all he has are the waves surrounding him. No man undertaking such a life could fail to fear, at least a little, what the Lord (Jesus) might have in store for him at the end – i.e., what his fate might be. Yet this story of a mariner and his crew, who suffer terrible misfortunes after they ill-advisedly kill an albatross, has become a classic long narrative poem and one of the defining poems of the English Romantic movement. In Watchet in Somerset, there is a statue of the Ancient Mariner, marking the place where Coleridge conceived of the idea for the poem.An English romantic poet, Smith is known as a key figure in the revival of the English sonnet. In this sonnet, the speaker gazes upon a person locally known as a lunatic pacing about a tall cliff above the sea. He is sad, moody, and murmurs to himself, but she says “I see him more with envy than with fear;” because she believes his ignorance provides him bliss. “He seems (uncursed with reason) not to know / The depth or the duration of his woe.” Ocean water encompasses three main quarters of the earth’s surface. The ocean is home to billions of species that collaborate in ways we can never completely comprehend. Much of the ocean is enigmatic. ‎ In this oceanic spirit, Nezhukumatathil’s poems wander an abundance of the planet’s most “humming” places, transporting readers from the Pumpkin Festival in Clarence, New York to the existential sadness of a whale washed ashore on Germany’s North Sea coastline—from the Monte San Salvatore funicular in Switzerland to the Harvard Museum of Natural History’s famous Glass Flowers—and from the elephants and bamboo forest of India’s Periyar National Park to the “cicada-electric Mississippi night.” Likewise, they devote considerable attention to spaces and places that hum in quieter ways: a fresh manicure, a shared brambleberry tart, a childhood bedroom, Prince’s “Starfish and Coffee.” These, without exception, are poems replete with images that last and linger: “the toothy grin of an apple-fed horse,” “the penny-taste of the garden hose,” the “blush-green current of auroras across [a penguin’s] claws.”

These beautiful short ocean poems inform us of our inner strength and tenacity, as well as our love and weaknesses. They assist us in weathering difficult times and trials, knowing that calmer waves will eventually replace the storm. ‎ 1. The Sea Engraving on paper. Sheet: 20 in x 26 in; Plate: 16 ½ in x 23 in; Image: 11 ½ in x 18 ½ in. AC EDM 2003.90. Life thrills in the shallows as well as the deep. The glory of the foreshore is celebrated in Of Sea, Elizabeth-Jane Burnett’s bestiary of the intertidal zone. Mud shrimp drifting with the tide float in “silk light”; ragworm, burrowing in estuarine mud, shimmer “in all the love of being”. The ocean’s grandeur and beauty are breathtaking. From scientists and chemists to explorers and mariners, the ocean and its complete ecology captivate, enthrall, and delight multitudes of people all over the world.Gorgeously written, this poem begins by describing the water as unraveling velvet. Fanning describes how the water fills the earth, but never fully encompasses it. Water is always changing its shape, filling yet fleeting. It is everywhere, yet never within your control. This colourful under the sea poem about ocean life is great for introducing your children to the kinds of creatures that can be found in the sea. It is a great introductory poem if you are planning on teaching a few lessons about ocean life and what happens under the sea. Hear the whispers of the ocean’s salt air through these renowned poems that have captured its essence in words. This well-known ballad poem tells of the beautiful, painful memory of a lost love from the speaker’s youth. The speaker and his love, Annabel Lee, lived “in a kingdom by the sea,” which is depicted with a sense of innocence, youth, and romance. However, after his love’s unexpected death, the speaker juxtaposes the kingdom with “sepulcher there by the sea” to signify a more solid, gothic, and final feeling. How wonderful to watch a writer who was already among the best young poets get even better!” —Terrance Hayes