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The vast expanse of space has long fascinated humanity, inspiring countless explorers, artists, and scientists to delve deeper into its mysteries.
From the twinkling stars and galaxies that dot the night sky to the complex systems that make up our solar system, space offers endless opportunities for discovery and wonder.
In poetry, space is often used as a metaphor for the unknown, the vastness of human potential, and the depths of our imagination.
Poets have explored the mysteries of space through vivid imagery, symbolism, and lyrical language, capturing the beauty and awe-inspiring nature of the cosmos.
In this collection of poems about space, we will journey through the stars and explore the mysteries of the universe.
So let’s read some space poems!
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Best Poems about Space
Space has long been a source of inspiration for poets, offering a canvas to explore the mysteries of the universe. Here are some of the best space poems.
1. Around the Sun
by Katharine Lee Bates
The weazen planet Mercury,
Whose song is done,
— Rash heart that drew too near
His dazzling lord the Sun!—
Forgets that life was dear,
So shriveled now and sere
The goblin planet Mercury.
But Venus, thou mysterious, Enveilèd one,
Fairest of lights that fleet
Around the radiant Sun,
Do not thy pulses beat
To music blithe and sweet,
O Venus, veiled, mysterious?
And Earth, our shadow-haunted Earth,
Hast thou, too, won
The graces of a star
From the glory of the Sun?
Do poets dream afar
That here all lusters are,
Upon our blind, bewildered Earth?
We dream that mighty forms on Mars,
With wisdom spun
From subtler brain than man’s,
Are hoarding snow and sun,
Wringing a few more spans
Of life, fierce artisans,
From their deep-grooved, worn planet Mars.
But thou, colossal Jupiter,
World just begun,
Wild globe of golden steam,
Chief nursling of the Sun,
Transcendest human dream,
That faints before the gleam
Of thy vast splendor, Jupiter.
And for what rare delight,
Or woes to shun,
Of races increate,
New lovers of the Sun,
Was Saturn ringed with great
Rivers illuminate,
Ethereal jewel of delight?
Far from his fellows, Uranus
Doth lonely run
In his appointed ways
Around the sovereign Sun, —
Wide journeys that amaze
Our weak and toiling gaze,
Searching the path of Uranus.
But on the awful verge
Of voids that stun
The spirit, Neptune keeps
The frontier of the Sun.
Over the deeps on deeps
He glows, a torch that sweeps
The circle of that shuddering verge.
On each bright planet waits
Oblivion,
Who casts beneath her feet
Ashes of star and sun,
But when all ruby heat.
Is frost, a Heart shall beat,
Where God, within the darkness, waits.
2. XXXI
by Bliss Carman
On the meridian of the night
Alcar the Tester marks high June;
Arcturus knows his zenith fame;
No grass-head sleeps upon the dune.
And up from the southeastern sea,
Antares, the red summer star,
Brings back the ardours of the earth,
Like fire opals in a jar:
The frail and misty sense of things
Beyond mortality’s ado,
The soft delirium of dream,
And joy pale virgins never knew.
3. Big Dipper
by Hilda Conkling
The Big Dipper spilled stars down over the roofs,
I felt the way the wind whirled stars
Over the town roofs. . . .
I felt the town asleep:
I felt people there in the great crisp dark.
When morning came in a waver of light
There was a breath of change … all the dreams going away from the dreamers
As dreams do go away in the morning.
A ring of hills . . . one river . . . some streets
Make a design.
Stars make a design
And it is a Big Dipper
Or the Pleiades like a bunch of grapes. . . .
It is harder to say what the roofs mean:
I don’t know . . .
Maybe I’m not yet far enough
Away.
4. The Milky Way
by Annette Wynne
Once there was a little dream
That mounted to the sky;
It rode upon a water beam
And climbed the star way high.
But when it wanted to come home
Along the silver track
The lights had all gone out, and O!
It never could get back.
And you may look now any night,
And see it if you will,
A gauzy milky veil of light,
That’s hanging up there still.
5. The Milky Way
by Anonymous
Evening has come; and across the skies—
Out through the darkness that, quivering, dies—
Beautiful, broad, and white,
Fashioned of many a silver ray
Stolen out of the ruins of Day,
Grows the pale bridge of the Milky Way,
Built by the architect Night.
Dim with shadows, and bright with stars,
Hung like gold lights on invisible bars
Stirred by the wind’s spent breath,
Rising on cloud-shapen pillars of grey,
Perfect it stands, like a tangible way
Binding to-morrow with yesterday,
Reaching to Life from Death.
Dark show the heavens on either side;
Soft flows the blue in a waveless tide
Under the silver arch;
Never a footstep is heard below,
Echoing earthward, as measured and slow,
Over the bridge the still hours go
Bound on their trackless march.
Is it a pathway leading to Heaven
Over Earth’s sin-clouds, rent and riven
With its supernal light,
Crossed by the souls of the loved who have flown
Stilly away from our arms, and alone
Up to the beautiful, great, white Throne
Pass in the hush of night?
Is it the road that our wild dreams walk,
Far beyond reach of our waking talk,
Out to the vague and grand
Far beyond Fancy’s uttermost range,
Out to the Dream-world of marvel and change,
Out to the mystic, unreal and strange—
Out to the Wonderland?
Is it the way that the angels take
When they come down by night to wake
Over the slumbering Earth?
Is it the way the faint stars go back,
Driven by insolent Day from his track
Into the distant mysterious Black
Where their bright souls had birth?
What may it be? Who may certainly say?
Over the shadowy Milky Way
No human foot hath trod.
Aons have passed; but unsullied and white,
Still it stands, fair as a rainbow of night,
Held like a promise above our dark sight,
Guiding our thoughts to God.
6. The Milky Way
by Hilda Conkling
Down the highroad of the Milky Way
We go riding
On horses made of stars.
The clouds flit like white butterflies;
We are dry . . . we do not know it is raining
Upon earth.
Roses of opal and pearl
Sway back and forth in the muisical wind . . .
Pine trees like emeralds hang . . .
A pheasant’s wing like a fan is spread . . .
White mountain-peaks gleam . . .
Purple and silver is the sunrise.
Quiet lakes shine along the Milky Way
Like mirrors you hang on cottage walls.
When I am asleep
This is what I shall dream.
Things can never really go,
They come again and stay.
When your thoughts are put on beautiful things
They come alive and stay alive
In your mind.
Famous Poems about Space
The cosmos has captured the imaginations of poets for centuries, inspiring some of the most famous works of literature. Here are some of the most famous space poems.
1. The Galaxy
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Torrent of light and river of the air,
Along whose bed the glimmering stars are seen
Like gold and silver sands in some ravine
Where mountain streams have left their channels bare!
The Spaniard sees in thee the pathway, where
His patron saint descended in the sheen
Of his celestial armor, on serene
And quiet nights, when all the heavens were fair.
Not this I see, nor yet the ancient fable
Of Phaeton’s wild course, that scorched the skies
Where’er the hoofs of his hot coursers trod;
But the white drift of worlds o’er chasms of sable,
The star-dust that is whirled aloft and flies
From the invisible chariot-wheels of God.
2. The Comet
by Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.
The Comet! He is on his way,
And singing as he flies;
The whizzing planets shrink before
The spectre of the skies;
Ah! well may regal orbs burn blue,
And satellites turn pale,
Ten million cubic miles of head,
Ten billion leagues of tail!
On, on by whistling spheres of light
He flashes and he flames;
He turns not to the left nor right,
He asks them not their names;
One spurn from his demoniac heel,—
Away, away they fly,
Where darkness might be bottled up
And sold for “Tyrian dye.”
And what would happen to the land,
And how would look the sea,
If in the bearded devil’s path
Our earth should chance to be?
Full hot and high the sea would boil,
Full red the forests gleam;
Methought I saw and heard it all
In a dyspeptic dream!
I saw a tutor take his tube
The Comet’s course to spy;
I heard a scream,— the gathered rays
Had stewed the tutor’s eye;
I saw a fort,— the soldiers all
Were armed with goggles green;
Pop cracked the guns! whiz flew the balls!
Bang went the magazine!
I saw a poet dip a scroll
Each moment in a tub,
I read upon the warping back,
“The Dream of Beelzebub;”
He could not see his verses burn,
Although his brain was fried,
And ever and anon he bent
To wet them as they dried.
I saw the scalding pitch roll down
The crackling, sweating pines,
And streams of smoke, like water-spouts,
Burst through the rumbling mines;
I asked the firemen why they made
Such noise about the town;
They answered not,— but all the while
The brakes went up and down.
I saw a roasting pullet sit
Upon a baking egg;
I saw a cripple scorch his hand
Extinguishing his leg;
I saw nine geese upon the wing
Towards the frozen pole,
And every mother’s gosling fell
Crisped to a crackling coal.
I saw the ox that browsed the grass
Writhe in the blistering rays,
The herbage in his shrinking jaws
Was all a fiery blaze;
I saw huge fishes, boiled to rags,
Bob through the bubbling brine;
And thoughts of supper crossed my soul;
I had been rash at mine.
Strange sights! strange sounds! O fearful dream!
Its memory haunts me still,
The steaming sea, the crimson glare,
That wreathed each wooded hill;
Stranger! if through thy reeling brain
Such midnight visions sweep,
Spare, spare, oh, spare thine evening meal,
And sweet shall be thy sleep!
3. The Meteor
by Hannah Flagg Gould
Ye, who look with wondering eye,
Tell me what in me ye find,
As I shoot across the sky,
But an emblem of your kind!
Darting from my hidden source,
I behold no resting place;
But must ever urge my course
Onward, till I end my race!
While I keep my native height,
I appear to all below
Radiant with celestial light,
That is brightening as I go.
When I lose my hold on heaven,
Down to shadowy earth I tend,
From my pure companions driven;
And in darkness I must end!
4. Maker of Heaven and Earth (All Things Bright and Beautiful)
by Cecil Frances Alexander
All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful,
The Lord God made them all.
Each little flower that opens,
Each little bird that sings,
He made their glowing colours,
He made their tiny wings.
The rich man in his castle,
The poor man at his gate,
God made them, high or lowly,
And ordered their estate.
The purple-headed mountain,
The river running by,
The sunset, and the morning,
That brightens up the sky;
The cold wind in the winter,
The pleasant summer sun,
The ripe fruits in the garden,
He made them every one.
The tall trees in the greenwood,
The meadows where we play,
The rushes by the water,
We gather every day;—
He gave us eyes to see them,
And lips that we might tell,
How great is God Almighty,
Who has made all things well.
5. The Spacious Firmament on High
The spacious firmament on high,
With all the blue ethereal sky,
And spangled heavens, a shining frame
Their great Original proclaim.
Th’unwearied sun, from day to day,
Does his creator’s powers display,
And publishes to every land
The work of an almighty hand.
Soon as the evening shades prevail
The moon takes up the wondrous tale,
And nightly to the listening earth
Repeats the story of her birth;
While all the stars that round her burn
And all the planets in their turn,
Confirm the tidings as they roll,
And spread the truth from pole to pole.
What though in solemn silence all
Move round the dark terrestrial ball?
What though no real voice nor sound
Amid the radiant orbs be found?
In reason’s ear they all rejoice,
And utter forth a glorious voice,
Forever singing as they shine,
“The hand that made us is divine.”
Funny Poems about Space
Sometimes, the best way to explore the mysteries of space is through laughter. Here are some interesting poems about space about the cosmos that are sure to make you smile.
1. A Ride into Space
By Anonymous
I thought I could wow them with poems from earth
Poems of joy and humor, poems extolling it’s worth
So I laid out poems from Michael, Gail, and me
From Andrea, David, Gwen, and Ilene
From PD, Harry, Mandy, and Chris
From Jack, Craig, Cyndi, and Liz…
For I was sure once they read our beautiful works
They would embrace us and love our humanly quirks!
So last night I taped them all over my skin
Knowing they’d find them if they took me again…
When I woke up, they were gone and I had a reply:
“We enjoyed reading those poems last night,
And thanks for the names of the earthlings too –
We have many more experiments to do!”
2. Is There Life on Mars
By Anonymous
Two Martians went on a blind date
They agreed to meet at half eight
Dressed as harlequins
They looked like two twins
Them meeting was just down to fate
They sat down and ordered some beer
Drank it up and were soon full of cheer
They went to a star
Which wasn’t too far
And agreed Mars had no atmosphere
They decided to visit our earth
Most earthlings gave them a wide berth
A photo was taken
The image is makin’
A fortune – just think of its worth!
Both settled in the US of A
Martians friends came on a holiday
Wearing such clever disguise
They look like regular guys
Area 51 is where they stay
3. Bending Spoons
By Anonymous
…A poem
is a spoon
that you can bend
with your mind.
It depends on psi
if you
are mutant
X or Y
a paranormal opportunity
or a wild talent
of psionic penmanship .
Stare at the pattern
on the handle
as you imagine
the handle
either roses or unicorns
are emblazon here.
So much the better
as your mind
bends the words
and the metal obeys…
Spoon begins to tremble
there is no knife
to run away with.
Then comes
the period
like an empty plate.
to contain
a bent spoon
with squeezed letters…
4. Space Cadet
By Anonymous
You’ll find it is a good idea,
now and then,
to look at the bigger picture:
see with a broader view
the workings of your fellow men.
A word of advice, if I may,
please, don’t stay too long,
be sure to always come back soon!
One learns next to nothing
about mankind
by looking at the earth
while standing on the moon.
5. To Eire is Who, Man
By Anonymous
All the fighting Irish see stars
Over pints of Guinness in bars
But Jan has a plan
To transport each man
Its called, “Cork, Uranus to Mars”
6. Solitude: To Yoda, An Ode
By Anonymous
Green bark a prism creates,
Feel the pull of earth, you must.
Rotates, a slime of endless hates,
Can hold me not, this world’s crust.
Friendship’s ties, isolation Deflates,
Succumbs, my spaceship, to bitter rust.
Mist, my soul forever permeates,
Lift-off, booms the rocket’s thrust.
My spirit when light returns, elates,
Swamps swell, swallowed hope’s swirling dust.
Trapped, I am, until student from fate
Arrives to learn; Cloud City or bust.
7. In Space or Spaced Out
By Anonymous
Bones grow feeble without gravity
This is a serious matter, not to be taken lightly
Blood fails to reach the brain
We must bear this in mind
Space cannot be navigated by the light headed
The semi conscious, on a journey with such a faint map
Think on this seriously, it is not a joke
Spaceships lost in the heavens is a hellish consequence
Sentient beings drifting half conscious is senseless
Concentrate your thoughts so that we do not scatter
Debris in the galaxies, cleverly made
And stupidly lost.
Poems about Space Exploration
The quest to explore the universe has been a driving force for humanity. These poems about space capture the wonder and curiosity that inspire us to reach for the stars.
1. Hymn to Time
By Ursula K. Le Guin
Time says “Let there be”
every moment and instantly
there is space and the radiance
of each bright galaxy.
And eyes beholding radiance.
And the gnats’ flickering dance.
And the seas’ expanse.
And death, and chance.
Time makes room
for going and coming home
and in time’s womb
begins all ending.
Time is being and being
time, it is all one thing,
the shining, the seeing,
the dark abounding.
2. Planet
By Catherine Pierce
This morning this planet is covered by winds and blue.
This morning this planet glows with dustless perfect light,
enough that I can see one million sharp leaves
from where I stand. I walk on this planet, its hard-packed
dirt and prickling grass, and I don’t fall off. I come down
soft if I choose, hard if I choose. I never float away.
Sometimes I want to be weightless on this planet, and so
I wade into a brown river or dive through a wave
and for a while feel nothing under my feet.
Sometimes I want to hear what it was like before the air,
and so I duck under the water and listen to the muted hums.
I’m ashamed to say that most days I forget this planet.
That most days I think about dentist appointments
and plagiarists and the various ways
I can try to protect my body from itself.
Last weekend I saw Jupiter through a giant telescope,
its storm stripes, four of its sixty-seven moons,
and was filled with fierce longing,
bitter that instead of Ganymede or Europa,
I had only one moon floating in my sky,
the moon called Moon, its face familiar and stale.
But this morning I stepped outside
and the wind nearly knocked me down.
This morning I stepped outside
and the blue nearly crushed me.
This morning this planet is so loud with itself—
its winds, its insects, its grackles and mourning doves—
that I can hardly hear my own lamentations. This planet.
All its grooved bark, all its sand of quartz
and bones and volcanic glass,
all its creeping thistle lacing the yards with spiny purple.
I’m trying to come down soft today.
I’m trying to see this place even as I’m walking through it.
Final Thoughts
Exploring the mysteries of space has been a source of inspiration for poets for centuries, from the earliest oral traditions to modern-day writers.
Through vivid imagery, symbolism, and lyrical language, poets have captured the awe-inspiring nature of the cosmos, the excitement of space travel, and the interplay of space and time.
Whether exploring the vast expanse of the universe or delving into the depths of human potential, the subject of space offers endless opportunities for poetic expression.
These poems for space capture the magic of the night sky, the beauty of the stars, and the mysteries of the cosmos, inspiring readers to reach for the stars and explore the wonders of the universe.
So did you like this collection of space poems?
