February 14, 2026
E. E. Cummings - “[up into the silence the green]”
Honestly, if you have time to read this blurb, you have time to read the poem. Read the poem. —Anika Hatzius
This poem is a mess of vulnerability and how I imagine the experience of being in love. It’s a heavy and simple piece, yet the weight of it is not so different from the weight of honesty needed in a 21st century relationship. Love it. —Kendall Cooper
T. S. Eliot - “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”
Existential, anxious desire and a terrified ode of aging perfect for your next situationship. Go roll your trousers, measure days in coffee spoons, and force the moment to its crisis instead of saying “I love you.” —Henry Dallman
Charles Ghigna - “Present Light”
This poem has stuck with me since the first time I read it years ago. It’s so gorgeously simple and sweet; one can only wish for a love equally so. The three stanza organization that plays with sentence vs. sentence fragment slows down the poem just right, and there’s something about the open-hearted declaration paired with the slight longing in “could” and “would” that makes this poem linger. —Sheerea Yu
Leila Jackson - “WHEN SHE TRIES TO BE DEEP BY ASKING ME ‘WHAT MAKES A COUNTRY A COUNTRY?'"
Written by our very own Leila! (Read the DIAGNOSIS Issue. Do it.) —Wyeth Renwick
John Stuart Mill - “Dedication,” in On Liberty
The most romantic thing I have ever read. —Wyeth Renwick
Pablo Neruda - “One Hundred Love Sonnets: XVII”
This poem, which I read originally in Spanish, then in English (I prefer the Spanish version), is the only poem that has made me cry. It is that beautiful. —Emily Igwike
Alfred Noyes - “The Highwayman”
A beautiful ballad filled with such vivid imagery. I first encountered this through the Phil Ochs song - which I have had on repeat forever and highly recommend. The meter creates a captivating rhythm that the melody enhances, but even just on the page the poem is so powerful and striking. —Ailin Sha
Edmund Spenser - “Amoretti LXXV: One Day I Wrote her Name”
The sonnet culture marches towards one end (beyond the fourteenth line): immortalizing a narcissistic poet (or the object of their fleeting attention). But why leave self-love to the early modern writers when we can call for a renaissance this Valentine’s Day? Write me more self-indulgent poems where you throw out the interlocutor. Write me your war declarations where you later decide to lazily wave an embroidered white handkerchief. Write your name into our canon. —Niya Chagantipati
This small poem is so quiet, but it stays awhile, watches from afar with that final list I haven’t been able to forget. Valentine captures the eerie distance surrounding the longing at the beginning or ending of love as time skips forward, stops, or simply continues on. —Elena Ferrari
2026