on March 8 | in Culture, Vintage | by Boo Paterson | with 5 Comments

We’ve tracked down the 11 best poems about New York – some joyful, some sad, but all beautiful.

From Allen Ginsberg writing about the ‘streets I’ve done feats in’ to the heartbreak of Sara Teasdale’s ‘man I love who loves me not’, New York is always the backdrop and the inspiration for the poets’ work.

The best poems about New York take you from the bright lights of 1930s Harlem, through Union Square and the Lower East Side, right down to the Staten Island Ferry.

View across Manhattan from the RCA building

My Sad Self – Allen Ginsberg

Read the full poem here, or get the book.

Manhattan skyline at dusk

On Mother’s Day – Grace Paley

Read the full poem here, or get the book

Watertowers on rooftops in New York in winter

Gamin – Frank O’Hara

Read the full poem here, or get the book.

Wet streets at Union Square, New York

Union Square – Sara Teasdale

Read the full poem here, or get the book.

Vintage photo showing Broadway at night

On Broadway – Claude McKay

Read the full poem here, or get the book.

Windows lit up around Central Park at night

Observation – Dorothy Parker

Read the full poem here, or get the book.

Atmospheric Harlem at night

Juke Box Love Song – Langston Hughes

Read the full poem here, or get the book.

Manhattan bridge from Brooklyn in the 1970s

Refugee Blues – WH Auden

Read the full poem here, or get the book.

New York tenements. Photo by Arnold Eagle ©MCNY

A Song of the Moon – Claude McKay

Read the full poem here, or get the book.

Tenement building at 103rd Street, New York

Let Me Please Look into my Window – Gerald Stern

Read the full poem here, or get the book.

Pillars in New York subway station

Walk about the Subway Station – Charles Reznikoff

Read the full poem here, or get the book.

About the Author: Boo Paterson

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