World Poetry Day 2026

We celebrate World Poetry Day with recordings by poets Paula Meehan, John Glenday, George Szirtes, Valerie Bloom, Niall Campbell, Blake Morrison, Nick Makoha, Sheenagh Pugh, Cyril Wong, Linda Anderson, Kerry Shawn Keys, Jane Hirshfield, Nii Ayikwei Parkes, Ruth Padel, Ian Duhig, Brian O’Connor, Elizabeth Cook and Patience Agbabi reading favourite poems from Poems on the Underground

from Requiem, Anna Akhmatova (1889-1966)Translated by Richard McKane 'The hour of remembrance has drawn close again. I see you, hear you, feel you: the one they could hardly get to the window, the one who no longer walks on this earth, the one who shook her beautiful head, and said: 'Coming here is like coming home.' I would like to name them all but they took away the list and there's no way of finding them. For them I have woven a wide shroud from the humble words I heard among them. I remember them always, everywhere, I will never forget them, whatever comes.'

Listen to Requiem by Anna Akhmatova read by Paula Meehan

Listen to all the World Poetry Day Recordings

Poetry speaks to our common humanity and our shared values, transforming the simplest of poems into a powerful catalyst for dialogue, thought and peace.

Since 1986, Poems on the Underground has brought more than 600 poems, old and new, familiar and unfamiliar, to all who travel on London Underground. Poets who have featured on the Underground have recorded some of their favourite Poems on the Underground for World Poetry Day giving us the opportunity to be reminded of the beauty that surrounds us and of the resilience of the human spirit.

Fear by Ciaran Carson read by Paula Meehan

When you are Old, W. B. Yeats ' When you are old and grey and full of sleep, And nodding by the fire, take down this book, And slowly read, and dream of the soft look Your eyes had once, and of their shadows deep;'

When You Are Old by W B Yeats read by Paula Meehan

Distances, Philippe Jaccottet (b.1925) Translated by Derek Mahon 'Les distances Tournent les martinets dans les hauteurs de l' air: plus haut encore tournent les astres invisibles. Que le jour se retire aux extrémités de la terre, apparaîtront ces feux sur l' etendue de sombre sable… Ainsi nous habitons un domaine de mouvements et de distances; ainsi le coeur va de l' arbre à l' oiseau, de l' oiseau aux astres lointains, de l' astre à son amour. Ainsi l' amour dans la maison fermée s' accroît, tourne et travaille, serviteur des soucieux portant une lampe à la main. Swifts turn in the heights of the air; higher still turn the invisible stars. When day withdraws to the ends of the earth their fires shine on a dark expanse of sand. We live in a world of motion and distance. The heart flies from tree to bird, from bird to distant star, from star to love; and love grows in the quiet house, turning and working, servant of thought, a lamp held in one hand. '

Distances by Philippe Jaccottet read by John Glenday

The Exiles translated from the author's own Gaelic by Iain Crichton Smith (b.1928) ' The many ships that left our country with white wings for Canada. They are like handkerchiefs in our memories and the brine like tears and in their masts sailors singing like birds on branches. That sea of May running in such blue, a moon at night, a sun at daytime, and the moon like a yellow fruit, like a plate on a wall to which they raise their hands like a silver magnet with piercing rays streaming into the heart. ' Reprinted by permission of Carcanet from Selected Poems (1985) Poems on the Underground 1995 The British Council. The British Library (Zweig Programme). Designed by Tom Davidson.

The Exiles by Iain Crichton Smith read by John Glenday

Loving the rituals by Palladas (4th century AD) tr. Tony Harrison Poems on the Underground 1999 1,000 years of poetry in English ‘Loving the rituals that keep men close, Nature created means for friends apart: pen, paper, ink, the alphabet, signs for the distant and disconsolate heart.’

Loving the Rituals by Palladas read by John Glenday

A Red, Red Rose by Robert Burns Poems on the Underground 1992 poster 'O my Luve's like a red, red rose, That’s newly sprung in June; O my Luve's like the melodie That’s sweetly play'd in tune. As fair art thou, my bonnie lass, So deep in luve am I; And I will love thee still, my Dear, Till a’ the seas gang dry. Till a’ the seas gang dry, my Dear, And the rocks melt wi’ the sun: O I will love thee still, my Dear, While the sands o’ life shall run. And fare thee weel, my only Luve! And fare thee weel, a while! And I will come again, my Luve, Tho' it were ten thousand mile!'

A Red Red Rose by Robert Burns read by John Glenday

Green the land of my poem, Mahmoud Darwish ‘Green the land of my poem is green and high Slowly I tell it slowly with the grace of a seagull riding the waves on the book of water I bequeath it written down to the one who asks to whom shall we sing when salt poisons the dew?’

Green the land of my poem by Mahmoud Darwish read by John Glenday

World Poems on the Underground Boy with Orange (out of Kosovo) Lotte Kramer. A boy holding an orange in his hands has crossed the border in uncertainty

Boy with Orange by Lotte Kramer read by John Glenday

World Poems on the Underground And now goodbye, Jaroslav Seifert. Poetry is with us from the start.

And Now Goodbye by Jaroslav Seifert read by John Glenday

Epitaph on a Tyrant by W H Auden Perfection, of a kind, was what he was after, And the poetry he invented was easy to understand; He knew human folly like the back of his hand, And was greatly interested in armies and fleets; When he laughed, respectable senators burst with laughter, And when he cried the little children died in the streets.

Epitaph on a Tyrant by W H Auden read by George Szirtes

Overcrowding by Katalin Szlukovényi translated by George Szirtes Too much memory. Too many people and things. Each move we make drags a whole wagon of consequences in its wake, opening old wounds. We should try to live out of one suitcase and tread the grass barefoot, not treading on wasps’ nests. Reprinted by permission of the author and translator

Overcrowding by Katalin Szlukovenyi read by George Szirtes

Piano , D.H. Lawrence 1989 poster 'Softly, in the dusk, a woman is singing to me; Taking me back down the vista of years, till I see A child sitting under the piano, in the boom of the tingling strings And pressing the small, poised feet of a mother who smiles as she sings. In spite of myself, the insidious mastery of song Betrays me back, till the heart of me weeps to belong To the old Sunday evenings at home, with winter outside And hymns in the cosy parlour, the tinkling piano our guide. So now it is vain for the singer to burst into clamour With the great black piano appassionato. The glamour Of childish days is upon me, my manhood is cast Down in the flood of remembrance, I weep like a child for the past.'

Piano by D H Lawrence read by George Szirtes

Belgrade by Vasko Popa, translated from the Serbo-Croat by Anne Pennington ' White bone among the clouds Your arise out of your pyre out of your ploughed-up barrows Out of your scattered ashes You arise out of your disappearance The sun keeps you In its golden reliquary High above the yapping of centuries And bears you to the marriage Of the fourth river of Paradise With the thirty-sixth river of Earth White bone among the clouds Bone of our bones'

Belgrade by Vasko Popa read by George Szirtes

What Am I After All, Walt Whitman ' What am I after all but a child, pleas'd with the sound of my own name? repeating it over and over; I stand apart to hear- it never tires me.'

What Am I After All by Walt Whitman read by George Szirtes

Virtue, George Herbert 'Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright The bridal of the earth and sky: The dew shall weep thy fall tonight, For thou must die. Sweet rose, whose hue, angry and brave, Bids the rash gazer wipe his eyes: Thy root is ever in its grave, And thou must die. Sweet spring, full of sweet days and roses, A box where sweets compacted lie: My music shows ye have your closes, And all must die. Only a sweet and virtuous soul, Like seasoned timber, never gives; But though the whole world turn to coal. Then chiefly lives.'

Virtue by George Herbert read by George Szirtes

won’t you celebrate with me by Lucille Clifton won’t you celebrate with me what i have shaped into a kind of life? i had no model. born in babylon both nonwhite and woman what did i see to be except myself? i made it up here on this bridge between starshine and clay, my one hand holding tight my other hand; come celebrate with me that everyday something has tried to kill me and has failed. from The Book of Light. Copyright © 1993 by Lucille Clifton. Reprinted with the permission of The Permissions Company, LLC on behalf of Copper Canyon Press

Won’t you celebrate with me by Lucille Clifton read by Valerie Bloom

Late Summer Fires, Les Murray ' The paddocks shave black with a foam of smoke that stays, welling out of red-black wounds. In the white of a drought this happens. The hardcourt game. Logs that fume are mostly cattle, inverted, stubby. Tree stumps are kilns. Walloped, wiped, hand-pumped, even this day rolls over, slowly. At dusk, a family drives sheep out through the yellow of the Aboriginal flag.'

Late Summer Fires by Les Murray read by Niall Campbell

Inversnaid by Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-89) Poems on the Underground 1995 ' This darksome burn, horseback brown, His rollrock highroad roaring down, In coop and in comb the fleece of his foam Flutes and low to the lake falls home. A windpuff-bonnet of fawn-froth Turns and twindles over the broth Of a pool so pitchblack, fell-frowning ,It rounds and rounds Despair to drowning. Degged with dew, dappled with dew Are the groins of the braes that the brook treads through, Wiry heathpacks, flitches of fern, And the beadbonny ash that sits over the burn. What would the world be, once bereft Of wet and of wildness? Let them be left, O let them be left, wildness and wet; Long live the weeds and wilderness yet.' Poems on the Underground The British Library (Zweig Programme) London Arts Board .Design Tom Davidson.

Inversnaid by Gerard Manley Hopkins read by Niall Campbell

Narcissus Thinking the boiler had packed up from lack of oil I climbed the rusty tank to peer down the hatch and there I was, bright-faced and young again, in the viscous black pool at the bottom. Blake Morrison Reprinted by permission of Chatto & Windus from Shingle Street (2015)

Narcissus written and read by Blake Morrison

ROUNDEL from THE PARLIAMENT OF FOWLS Geoffrey Chaucer (1340?-1400) Manuscript reproduced by permission of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library 'Now welcome Summer with thy sunne soft, That hast these winter's weathers overshake And driven away the longe nightes black. Saint Valentine, that art full high aloft, Thus singen smalle fowles for thy sake, Now welcome Summer with thy sunne soft, That hast these winter's weathers overshake. Well have they cause for to gladden oft, Since each of them recovered hath his make; Full blissful may they singe when they wake, Now welcome Summer with thy sunne soft, That hast these winter's weathers overshake And driven away the longe nightes black. '

Roundel by Geoffrey Chaucer read by Nick Makoha

The Visitor, Carolyn Forché ' In Spanish he whispers there is no time left. It is the sound of scythes arcing in wheat, the ache of some field song in Salvador. The wind along the prison, cautious as Francisco's hands on the inside, touching the walls as he walks, it is his wife's breath slipping into his cell each night while he imagines his hand to be hers. It is a small country. There is nothing one man will not do to another'

The Visitor by Carolyn Forché read by Nick Makoha

The Red Cockatoo Sent as a present from Annam – A red cockatoo. Coloured like the peach-tree blossom, Speaking with the speech of men. And they did to it what is always done To the learned and eloquent. They took a cage with stout bars And shut it up inside. Po Chu-i Translated by Arthur Waley Reprinted by permission of Estate of Arthur Waley. Calligraphy by Qu Lei Lei

The Red Cockatoo by Po Chu-I read by Nick Makoha

Season by Wole Soyinka Poems on the Underground 1999 'Rust is ripeness, rust And the wilted corn-plume; Pollen is mating-time when swallows Weave a dance Of feathered arrows Thread corn-stalks in winged Streaks of light. And, we loved to hear Spliced phrases of the wind, to hear Rasps in the field, where corn leaves Pierce like bamboo slivers. Now, garnerers we, Awaiting rust on tassels, draw Long shadows from the dusk, wreathe Dry thatch in woodsmoke. Laden stalks Ride the germ's decay - we await The promise of the rust .Wole Soyinka (b.1934) Reprinted by permission of Methuen from Idanre and Other Poems (1986) Poems on the Underground 1,000 Years of Poetry in English

Season by Wole Soyinka read by Nick Makoha

Love Without Hope, Robert Graves 'Love without hope, as when the young bird-catcher Swept off his tall hat to the Squire's own daughter, So let the imprisoned larks escape and fly Singing about her head, as she rode by.'

Love Without Hope by Robert Graves read by Nick Makoha

Dreams by Robert Herrick (1591-1674) ' Here we are all, by day; by night we're hurled By dreams, each one, into a several world.'

Dreams by Robert Herrick read by Nick Makoha

Vase, Yang Lian 'a word eradicates the world a feather drifts down and yet, a bird's nest in each of its fragments preserves the whole'

Vase by Yang Lian read by Cyril Wong

Days of November 2009 by Sheenagh Pugh Short days, long shadows: sun rising low skims the hill. Mending, making good, days full of outdoor jobs, folk racing to finish before dark, before winter. Angled light, always on the edge of leaving. These days when every little thing feels urgent, unmissable, when all you want is to hold on to a lit rack of cirrus, the taste of woodsmoke catching your throat, a sleek seal slipping back under, the farewell of geese, scribbled in black arrows. Reprinted by permission of Seren from Short Days, Long Shadows (2014)

Days of November 2009 written and read by Sheenagh Pugh

Thread suns, Paul Celan (1920 - 70) translated by Michael Hamburger 'Thread suns above the grey-black wilderness. A tree - high thought tunes in to light's pitch: there are still songs to be sung on the other side of mankind.'

Thread Suns by Paul Celan read by Kerry Shawn Keys

Meeting at Night, Robert Browning Poems on the Underground 1988 Poster 'The grey sea and the long black land; And the yellow half-moon large and low; And the startled little waves that leap In fiery ringlets from their sleep, As I gain the cove with pushing prow, And quench its speed i' the slushy sand. Then a mile of warm sea-scented beach; Three fields to cross till a farm appears; A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch And blue spurt of a lighted match, And a voice less loud, thro' its joys and fears, Than the two hearts beating each to each!'

Meeting at Night by Robert Browning read by Kerry Shawn Keys

Charles Causley, I am the Song ' I am the song that sings the bird. I am the leaf that grows the land. I am the tide that moves the moon. I am the stream that halts the sand.'

I am the song by Charles Causley read by Kerry Shawn Keys

Elizabeth Bishop Song 'Summer is over upon the sea. The pleasure yacht, the social being, that danced on the endless polished floor, stepped and side-stepped like Fred Astaire, is gone, is gone, docked somewhere ashore. The friends have left, the sea is bare that was strewn with floating, fresh green weeds. Only the rusty-sided freighters go past the moon's marketless craters and the stars are the only ships of pleasure.'

Song by Elizabeth Bishop read by Linda Anderson

Ragwort, Anne Stevenson 'They won't let railways alone, those yellow flowers. They're that remorseless joy of dereliction

Ragwort by Anne Stevenson read by Linda Anderson

Close Close All Night by Elizabeth Bishop read by Linda Anderson

Da Capo Take the used-up heart like a pebble and throw it far out. Soon there is nothing left. Soon the last ripple exhausts itself in the weeds. Returning home, slice carrots, onions, celery. Glaze them in oil before adding the lentils, water, and herbs. Then the roasted chestnuts, a little pepper, the salt. Finish with goat cheese and parsley. Eat. You may do this, I tell you, it is permitted. Begin again the story of your life. Jane Hirshfield Reprinted by permission of Bloodaxe Books from The Asking: New & Selected Poems (Bloodaxe Books, 2024)

Da Capo written and read by Jane Hirshfield

Copyright © Janet Frame 2006

I Take Into My Arms More Than I Can Bear To Hold by Janet Frame I take into my arms more than I can bear to hold I am toppled by the world a creation of ladders, pianos, stairs cut into the rock a devouring world of teeth where even the common snail eats the heart out of a forest as you and I do, who are human, at night yet still I take into my arms more than I can bear to hold Reprinted by permission of The Wylie Agency from Storms Will Tell: Selected Poems (Bloodaxe Books 2008)

I Take Into My Arms More Than I Can Bear to Hold by Janet Frame read by Jane Hirshfield

Barter, Nii Ayikwei Parkes ‘That first winter alone, the true meaning Barter of all the classroom rhymes that juggled snow and go, old and cold, acquired new leanings.’

Barter written and read by Nii Ayikwei Parkes

African Poems on the Underground: Tin Roof: Nii Ayikwei Parkes. Wild harmattan winds whip you but still you stay;

Tin Roof written and read by Nii Ayikwei Parkes

To My First White Hairs, Wole Soyinka ' Hirsute hell chimney-spouts, black thunderthroes confluence of coarse cloudfleeces- my head sir!- scourbrush in bitumen, past fossil beyond fingers of light- until...!'

To My First White Hairs by Wole Soyinka read by Nii Ayikwei Parkes

The Palm Trees at Chigawe. Jack Mapanje 'You stood like women in green Proud travellers in panama hats and java print'

The Palm Trees at Chigawe by Jack Mapanje read by Nii Ayikwei Parkes

Sea-Song One Come on Seawash of travel Expose new layers of skin Come on calm voice of sea Come and settle on land Sea’s tumble wash Change our rags for riches Come on – tumble wash of sea Clear away the bloody waters Clear away the bloody waters James Berry Reprinted by permission of Bloodaxe Books from Windrush Songs, reprinted in A Story I Am In: Selected Poems (2011)

Sea-Song One by James Berry read by Nii Ayikwei Parkes

Sonnet from the Portuguese, Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Poems on the Underground Poster from April 1988 'How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee to the depth and breadth and height My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight For the ends of being and ideal grace. I love thee to the level of every day’s Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light. I love thee freely, as men strive for right; I love thee purely, as they turn from praise. I love thee with the passion put to use In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith. I love thee with a love I seemed to lose With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath, Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose, I shall but love thee better after death.'

How do I Love Thee by Elizabeth Barrett Browning read by Ruth Padel

Consider the Grass Growing , Patrick Kavanagh ‘Consider the grass growing As it grew last year and the year before, Cool about the ankles like summer rivers, When we walked on a May evening through the meadows To watch the mare that was going to foal.’

Consider the Grass Growing by Patrick Kavanagh read by Ian Duhig

I am Raftery the poet read by Ian Duhig

A Collector, Erich Fried tr. Stuart Hood 'The things I found But they'll scatter them again to the four winds as soon as I am dead Old gadgets fossilised plants and shells books broken dolls coloured postcards And all the words I have found my incomplete my unsatisfied words '

A Collector by Erich Fried read by Ian Duhig

'Ich am of Irlonde' Anon (14th Century) ' I am of Ireland, And of the holy land Of Ireland. Good sir, pray I thee, For of saint charity, Come and dance with me In Ireland. '

Ich am of Ireland Anon read by Brian O’ Connor

Snow by Louis MacNeice ' The room was suddenly rich and the great bay-window was Spawning snow and pink roses against it Soundlessly collateral and incompatible: World is suddener than we fancy it. World is crazier and more of it than we think, Incorrigibly plural. I peel and portion A tangerine and spit the pips and feel The drunkenness of things being various. And the fire flames with a bubbling sound for the world Is more spiteful and gay than one supposes - On the tongue on the eyes on the ears in the palms of one's hands -There is more than glass between the snow and the huge roses. 'Louis MacNeice (1907-1963 )Reprinted by permission of Faber & Faber from The Collected Poems of Louis MacNeice 100 Poems on the Underground

Snow by Louis MacNeice read by Brian O’ Connor

Bowl by Elizabeth Cook Give me a bowl, wide and shallow. Patient to light as a landscape open to the whole weight of a deepening sky. Give me a bowl which turns for ever on a curve so gentle a child could bear it and beasts lap fearless at its low rim.' Poems on the Underground Reprinted by permission of Worple Press from Bowl (2006)

Bowl written and read by by Elizabeth Cook

A Dead Statesman, Rudyard Kipling 'I could not dig: I dared not rob: Therefore I lied to please the mob. Now all my lies are proved untrue And I must face the men I slew. What tale shall serve me here among Mine angry and defrauded young?'

A Dead Statesman by Rudyard Kipling read by Elizabeth Cook

A Short Piece of Choral Music It’s an evening in late March and in the kitchen I’m listening to a short piece of choral music, when my son comes in to fetch himself a bowl of breakfast cereal which, he tells me, helps with his revision. And another thing, he goes on, I shouldn’t worry about him because he’s going to be fine: exams, work, life, everything, is going to be fine. That’s a relief, I say to myself, thanks, now I can listen to this music, which turns out to be just some fancy noise, nothing compared with a boy’s cheerfulness. Jonathan Davidson Reprinted by permission of The Poetry Business from Early Train (Smith/Doorstop 2011)

A Short Piece of Choral Music written and read by by Jonathan Davidson

The London Eye, Patience Agbabi 'Through my gold-tinted Gucci sunglasses, the sightseers. Big Ben's quarter chime strikes the convoy of number 12 buses that bleeds into the city's monochrome. Through somebody's zoom lens, me shouting to you, "Hello...on...bridge...'minster!' The aerial view postcard, the man writing squat words like black cabs in rush hour. The South Bank buzzes with a rising treble. You kiss my cheek, formal as a blind date. We enter Cupid's Capsule, a thought bubble where I think, 'Space age!', you think 'She was late.' Big Ben strikes six, my SKIN. Beat blinks, replies 18.02. We're moving anti-clockwise.'

The London Eye by Patience Agbabi

The Present by Michael Donaghy Poems on the Underground 2001 ' For the present there is just one moon, though every level pond gives back another .But the bright disc shining in the black lagoon, perceived by astrophysicist and lover ,is milliseconds old. And even that light's seven minutes older than its source. And the stars we think we see on moonless nights are long extinguished. And, of course, this very moment, as you read this line, is literally gone before you know it. Forget the here-and-now. We have no time but this device of wantonness and wit. Make me this present then: your hand in mine, and we'll live out our lives in it.'

The Present by Michael Donaghy read by Patience Agbabi