Poems About Self Love

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We’re all of course very familiar with poems about love. But how often do you read poems about self love? Not nearly as often. But they are still so powerful, and so important to read. We featured some poets that you might expect to see when talking poetry about self love: Mary Oliver, Maya Angelou, Walt Whitman. But also some surprises, like Ted Kooser!

Why Poems About Self Love?

Self love is important. Afterall, how could we love others if we don’t even love ourselves? So, in a way reading these types of poems is important. They remind you that we all struggle sometimes, but we all deserve love. These poems inspire you to be the best person you can be, and to give yourself a little grace every now and then as well. I hope you enjoy this collection of poetry about self love!

Phenomenal Woman by Maya Angelou

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I’m telling lies.
I say,
It’s in the reach of my arms,
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It’s the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I’m a woman
Phenomenally.

Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.

Read the full poem here.

Still I Rise by Maya Angelou

You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I’ll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
’Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I’ll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops,
Weakened by my soulful cries?

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don’t you take it awful hard
’Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines
Diggin’ in my own backyard.

O Me! O Life! by Walt Whitman

Oh me! Oh life! of the questions of these recurring,
Of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities fill’d with the foolish,
Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)
Of eyes that vainly crave the light, of the objects mean, of the struggle ever renew’d,
Of the poor results of all, of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me,
Of the empty and useless years of the rest, with the rest me intertwined,
The question, O me! so sad, recurring—What good amid these, O me, O life?

Answer

That you are here—that life exists and identity,
That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.

How to Triumph Like a Girl by Ada Limon

I like the lady horses best,
how they make it all look easy,
like running 40 miles per hour
is as fun as taking a nap, or grass.
I like their lady horse swagger,
after winning. Ears up, girls, ears up!
But mainly, let’s be honest, I like
that they’re ladies. As if this big
dangerous animal is also a part of me,
that somewhere inside the delicate
skin of my body, there pumps
an 8-pound female horse heart,
giant with power, heavy with blood.
Don’t you want to believe it?
Don’t you want to lift my shirt and see
the huge beating genius machine
that thinks, no, it knows,
it’s going to come in first.

Loving the I by Kim Moore

I also love the I, the way it holds everything
I almost know in one great stroke, one great love,
I draw it, though I don’t give it flitches,
have never heard the word until I read it.
Someone tells me about a village called Great Dunmow
where the married couple judged the happiest
are awarded a flitch of bacon. It sounds like hell,
I say, knowing how competitive I am,
imagining dragging my husband down the road,
our smiles stretched across our faces,
never being able to argue—can you imagine,
having to testify: no I have never regretted
our marriage, not for one second, one minute,
one hour, one day. Our arguments taking place
in whispers, frantic snakes of words writhing
in the air between us. All this is to say, my I
does not have flitches. I teach it to my daughter,
top to bottom, I, I, I, the easiest letter
in the world to write. We draw a line of them
marching along the page. I tell her I love you
and she sings out I love you too Mummy.
It takes time for a child to refer to themselves
as I instead of in the third person by name.
But the I is singing in her blood now.
I know what I was before she came.
Now my I throws down its spear
and says I will stand here, and here,
and here, and the I is a stem of a note
without a head, the I is a missing table leg,
the I is running through my poem
like golden thread, look, here I am
trying to write whilst she shouts again and again
Mummy, look at me! I am here!

anthem for my belly after eating too much by Kara Jackson

i look in the mirror, and all the chips i’ve eaten
this month have accumulated
like schoolwork at the bottom of my tummy,
my belly—a country i’m trying to love.
my mouth is a lover devoted to you, my belly, my belly
the birds will string a song together
with wind for you and your army
of solids, militia of grease.
americans love excess, but we also love jeans,
and refuse to make excess comfortable in them.
i step into a fashionable prison,
my middle managed and fastened into
suffering. my gracious gut,
dutiful dome, i will wear a house for you
that you can live in, promise walls
that embrace your growing flesh,
and watch you reach toward everything possible.

Offer by Sam Kilkenny

If only there was a hooded man,
Trauncing about with a scythe in hand,
Asking me every day to trade him my youth,
Maybe then I would guard it
And cherish it more, knowing
There is someone else who wants it.
It could wake me from my sleepwalk,
It could point me in the right direction,
It could be the daily reminder Mary Oliver
Tried to give me when she asked about my plans
For my one wild and precious life.

Tree Branches by Sam Kilkenny

I used to think my flaws
made me ugly and unlovable.

It took me years to realize that people are like trees in winter:
It is the irregularities in their growth that make them interesting.

An Old Friend by C.W. Bryan

You can never know
what opportunity waits
until your feet carry the rest
of your body through the mud

instead of on your usual route
through the park. The rain moved
in last night, quietly, settling into the
spring earth, softening it with all the cool

familiarity of a friend
which you call upon when
things feel particularly human—
particularly confusing. The mud holds

your footsteps, begs you to stay
and share just one more secret, answer
just one more question. Why don’t you take
a little more tea? Why don’t we sit and bake

together in the sun? Let God lay down
a little more Mystery, work our skin like
a kiln, until at last we are as warm as our
souls are meant to be. Until at last we are

steeled against any doubt
that the tulips are unfurling
like an invitation, and that you
are always welcome among them.

How to Make Rhubarb Wine by Ted Kooser

Go to the patch some afternoon
in early summer, fuzzy with beer
and sunlight, and pick a sack
of rhubarb (red or green will do)
and God knows watch for rattlesnakes
or better, listen; they make a sound
like an old lawn mower rolled downhill.
Wear a hat. A straw hat’s best
for the heat but lets the gnats in.
Bunch up the stalks and chop the leaves off
with a buck knife and be careful.
You need ten pounds; a grocery bag
packed full will do it. Then go home
and sit barefooted in the shade
behind the house with a can of beer.
Spread out the rhubarb in the grass
and wash it with cold water
from the garden hose, washing
your feet as well. Then take a nap.
That evening, dice the rhubarb up
and put it in a crock. Then pour
eight quarts of boiling water in,
cover it up with a checkered cloth
to keep the fruit flies out of it,
and let it stand five days or so.
Take time each day to think of it.

Ferment ten days, under the cloth,
sniffing of it from time to time,
then siphon it off, swallowing some
and bottle it. Sit back and watch
the liquid clear to honey yellow,
bottled and ready for the years,
and smile. You’ve done it awfully well.

To Begin With, The Sweet Grass by Mary Oliver

I.
Will the hungry ox stand in the field and not eat
of the sweet grass?
Will the owl bite off its own wings?
Will the lark forget to lift its body in the air or
forget to sing?
Will the rivers run upstream?

Behold, I say—behold
the reliability and the finery and the teachings
of this gritty earth gift.

II.
Eat bread and understand comfort.
Drink water, and understand delight.
Visit the garden where the scarlet trumpets
are opening their bodies for the hummingbirds
who are drinking the sweetness, who are
thrillingly gluttonous.

For one thing leads to another.
Soon you will notice how stones shine underfoot.
Eventually tides will be the only calendar you believe in.

And someone’s face, whom you love, will be as a star
both intimate and ultimate,
and you will be both heart-shaken and respectful.

And you will hear the air itself, like a beloved, whisper:
oh, let me, for a while longer, enter the two
beautiful bodies of your lungs.

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Poems About Self Love - Poetry Is Pretentious (2025)