Poems on the Underground Archive

Sets of Poems on the Underground posters displayed on London Underground from 2013 to 2021

Click on the title of the poem to see the poster

2013: A year-long celebration of 150 years of London Underground

Set 84 February 2013 : London Then and Now

From The Prelude William Wordsworth

Vacillation W.B.Yeats

Stations Connie Bensley

Gherkin Music Jo Shapcott

Barter Nii Ayikwei Parkes

Bam Chi Chi La La London 1969 Lorna Goodison

Set 85 June 2013: London in motion

From Jerusalem William Blake

At Lord’s Francis Thompson

Buses on the Strand R. P. Lister

The Conversation of Old Men Thom Gunn

Our Meetings Andrew Waterman

Moment in a Peace March Grace Nichols

Set 86 October 2013 : London Underground 150

Composed upon Westminster Bridge William Wordsworth

From Summoned by Bells John Betjeman

Spooner Goes Under Brian O’Connor

On the Thames Karen McCarthy Woolf

Thank you London Underground John Hegley

Like a Beacon Grace Nichols

Set 87 January 2014: Greek Poems and Poets

As a gale on the mountainside Sappho tr. Cicely Herbert and

This place is Aphrodite’s Anyte of Tegea ‘’  tr.  Peter Constantine

Ionian Song C.P. Cavafy

From “Amorgos” Nikos Gatsos

On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer John Keats

From “Don Juan” Lord Byron

Bread Dipped in Olive Oil and Salt Theo Dorgan

Set 88 June 2014: Welsh Poems and Poets

From “Fern Hill” Dylan Thomas

Mysteries Dannie Abse

In a young time Gerard Benson

Six bells Gillian Clarke

Small brown job Gwyneth Lewis

Skirrid Fawr Owen Sheers

Set 89 October 2014 : War Poems

In Memoriam (Easter 1915) by Edward Thomas

Bach and the Sentry Ivor Gurney

The General by Siegfried Sassoon

Fratelli/Brothers by Giuseppe Ungaretti  translated by Patrick Creagh

Im Osten / In the East by Georg Trakl, a new translation by David Constantine

La Petite Auto/The Little Car by Guillaume Apollinaire translated by the Editors

Set 90 January 2015:  Yeats 150 (throughout 2015) and Irish Poetry

Sailing to Byzantium W.B. Yeats

He wishes for the Cloths of Heaven W.B. Yeats

I am Raftery the Poet Lady Augusta Gregory

What is Truth Louis MacNeice

Legends Eavan Boland

Not Weeding Paula Meehan

Set 91 Yeats 150 Summer Poems on the Underground June 2015

When You Are Old W.B. Yeats

Westron wynde when wylt thou blow Anon

Cuts Sam Riviere

Had I not been awake Seamus Heaney

Stationery Agha Shahid Ali

from Labour Ward Anna T Szabó

Set 92 October 2015:  Young Poets on the Underground

Playtime Matt Broomfield

Boy Imogen Cassels

Circulation Laura Harray

An Irish Airman foresees his Death W.B. Yeats

The Sloth Theodore Roethke

Bam Chi Chi La La: London, 1969 Lorna Goodison

Set 93 January 2016: Repeat of our first set for 30th anniversary of Poems on the Underground 1986 – 2016

Up in the Morning Early Robert Burns

Ozymandias Percy Bysshe Shelley

This Is Just to Say William Carlos Williams

The Railway Children Seamus Heaney

Like a Beacon Grace Nichols

Set 94 July 2016 Shakespeare’s 400th Anniversary

Sonnet 116 William Shakespeare

Ariel’s song, from The Tempest William Shakespeare

From King Lear William Shakespeare

With a Guitar, To Jane P.B. Shelley

Hour Carol Ann Duffy, from Rapture

The Sonnets Michael Longley

Set 95 November 2016: London is Open

A Trojan Horse in Trafalgar Square George Szirtes –

London Fields Michael Rosen

Chilling Out Beside the Thames John Agard

 Our Town with the Whole of India Daljit Nagra

 No. 3 from Uses for the Thames Jane Draycott

 Autumn Journal Louis MacNeice

Set 96 February 2017: International poetry by Israeli, Palestinian, Italian and British poets

Green the land of my poem Mahmoud Darwish

Ein Yahav’ from “ Israeli Travel: Otherness is All, Otherness is Love” Yehuda Amichai

And suddenly it’s evening Salvatore Quasimodo

Fear no more the heat o’ the sun from Cymbeline William Shakespeare

Delay Elizabeth Jennings

Funeral Blues W.H. Auden

Set 97 August 2017: Indian Poems on the Underground

Pilgrim Eunice de Souza

This Morning Mona Arshi

Today Sujata Bhatt

The Butterfly Arun Kolatkar

Approaching Fifty Arvind Krishna Mehrotra

Stationery Agha Shahid Ali

Set 98 February 2018 editors’ choice (with two Young Poets Foyle Young Poets of the Year

Layers of Kant reveal Safrina Ahmed

Astral Enlightenment Kyle Spencer

Grasmere Journal, 1801 Sinéad Morrissey

Look there he goes even now, my father Daljit Nagra

Love Hannah Lowe

A Date on Sunday Antanas Šimkus,

Cuckoo (‘Has it flown away’) Fujiwara no Toshinari, translated by Geoffrey Bownas and Anthony Thwaite

Set 99 August 2018 : Windrush 70, A Celebration of Caribbean poetry

A dream of leavin James Berry (1924-2017)

History and Away Andrew Salkey  (1928-1995)

dreamer Jean Binta Breeze

Dew Kwame Dawes

I Am Becoming my Mother Lorna Goodison.

Epilogue Grace Nichols

Set 100 November 2018: Armistice, November 1918

Everyone Sang Siegfried Sassoon

Thaw Edward Thomas, killed on 9 April 1917 during the Battle of Arras

Heroes  Kathleen Raine

Armistice Day Charles Causley

The place where we are right Yehuda Amichai

Inscription for a War A.D. Hope, with the famous ‘Inscription at Thermopylae’:  Stranger, go tell the Spartans / we died here obedient to their commands

Set 101 February 2019 :  Love, then and now

 John Anderson, my jo, Robert Burns

Meeting at Night, Robert Browning

Wild Nights! Emily Dickinson

Hops Boris Pasternak, translated from Russian by Jon Stallworthy and Peter France

The Present, by Michael Donaghy

India, by Jane Draycott

Set 102 July 2019: : The Natural World

The Meaning of Existence Les Murray

Still Life with Sea Pinks and High Tide Maura Dooley

I Am the Song Charles Causley

The shaft Helen Dunmore

My life closed twice before its close Emily Dickinson

Set 103 November 2019: : Time and memory

Music when soft voices die P.B. Shelley

All Souls Night Frances Cornford

My Father Yehuda Amichai

Suddenly Salvatore Quasimodo

Diary Katrina Naomi

For the House Sparrow in Decline Paul Farley

Set 104 February 2020: Love and Nature, youth and age

Sonnet 98 (‘From you I have been absent in the spring’) William Shakespeare

Honesty, from ‘Talking to the Weeds’, Kit Wright

The Gulls Jacob Polley

Prayer for My Father as a Child Miriam Nash

Fear Ciaran Carson

Perseverance Marin Sorescu, translated by D.J. Enright

Set 105 August 2020 : Poems of hope in difficult times

And if I speak of Paradise Roger Robinson

Cordón Laura Chalar, translated by Erica Mena

Everything Changes Cicely Herbert

London Fields Michael Rosen

Note Leanne O’Sullivan

Time to be slow John O’Donohue

Set 106 October/November 2020 : Poems for Black History Month

Naima Kamau Brathwaite

Benediction James Berry

I am Becoming my Mother Lorna Goodison

I Sing of Change Niyi Osundare

BOM Mumbai Airport Nick Makoha

Dew Kwame Dawes

Set 107 February 2021 : John Keats. Bicentenary of his death

from ‘Endymion’ John Keats

When I have fears that I may cease to be John Keats

from Adonais Percy Bysshe Shelley

Wish You Were Here Julia Fiedorczuk, translated by Bill Johnston

rising Jean Binta Breeze

I go inside the tree Jo Shapcott

Set 108 July 2021: International Poets

Remembering Summer W.S. Merwin

Her Glasses Pascale Petit

In the Bright Sleeve of the Sky Ilya Kaminsky

Consider the Grass Growing Patrick Kavanagh

An epigram from The Greek Anthology by Anyte of Tegea, translated by David Constantine

Black Ink Fawzi Karim