Long-distance love can be a beautiful struggle, filled with longing and hope.
As someone who’s felt the pangs of separation, I understand the deep emotions that come with loving from afar.
Here are 10 aching poems that capture the essence of love stretched across miles, each poem is a testament to the resilience and depth of love, waiting to resonate with your heart.
Let’s get started!
My favorite long distance poem
#1 “Talk of Him That’s Far Awa” by Robert Burns
Musing on the roaring ocean,
Which divides my love and me;
Wearying heav’n in warm devotion,
For his weal where’er he be.
Hope and Fear’s alternate billow
Yielding late to Nature’s law,
Whispering spirits round my pillow,
Talk of him that’s far awa.
Ye whom sorrow never wounded,
Ye who never shed a tear,
Care-untroubled, joy-surrounded,
Gaudy day to you is dear.
Gentle night, do thou befriend me,
Downy sleep, the curtain draw;
Spirits kind, again attend me,
Talk of him that’s far awa!
This poem, for me, truly captures the essence of missing someone who’s far away.
It beautifully conveys the rollercoaster of hope and fear that comes with long-distance love.
The imagery of whispering spirits and comforting nights feels so relatable, offering a sense of connection despite the distance.
It reminds us that even when separated by miles, love finds a way to bridge the gap.
9 more long distance poems
#2 “Without Her” by Dante Gabriel Rossetti
What of her glass without her? The blank grey
There where the pool is blind of the moon’s face.
Her dress without her? The tossed empty space
Of cloud-rack whence the moon has passed away.
Her paths without her? Day’s appointed sway
Usurped by desolate night. Her pillowed place
Without her? Tears, ah me! for love’s good grace,
And cold forgetfulness of night or day.
What of the heart without her? Nay, poor heart,
Of thee what word remains ere speech be still?
A wayfarer by barren ways and chill,
Steep ways and weary, without her thou art,
Where the long cloud, the long wood’s counterpart,
Sheds double darkness up the labouring hill.
#3 “How Long and Dreary Is the Night” by Robert Burns
How long and dreary is the night,
When I am frae my dearie!
I sleepless lie frae e’en to morn,
Tho’ I were ne’er so weary:
I sleepless lie frae e’en to morn,
Tho’ I were ne’er sae weary!
When I think on the happy days
I spent wi’ you my dearie:
And now what lands between us lie,
How can I be but eerie!
And now what lands between us lie,
How can I be but eerie!
How slow ye move, ye heavy hours,
As ye were wae and weary!
It was na sae ye glinted by,
When I was wi’ my dearie!
It was na sae ye glinted by,
When I was wi’ my dearie!
#4 “The Soldier” by Rupert Brooke
If I should die, think only this of me:
That there’s some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
A body of England’s, breathing English air,
Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.
And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.
#5 “Highland Harry Back Again” by Robert Burns
My Harry was a gallant gay,
Fu’ stately strade he on the plain;
But now he’s banish’d far away,
I’ll never see him back again.
O for him back again!
O for him back again!
I wad gie a’ Knockhaspie’s land
For Highland Harry back again.
When a’ the lave gae to their bed,
I wander dowie up the glen;
I set me down and greet my fill,
And aye I wish him back again.
O for him, &c.
O were some villains hangit high,
And ilka body had their ain!
Then I might see the joyfu’ sight,
My Highland Harry back again.
O for him, &c.
#6 “Algeria” by Richard Hunter
Dolly’s home’s far away,
Far away in Algiers,
On the African coast,
She won’t see it for years.
But she whispers at night,
And her eyes fill with tears;
“How I wish–how I wish,
I were back in Algiers!”
#7 “Divided” by Julia Boynton
I cannot reach thee, we are far, so far
Apart who are so dear! Love, be it so;
Else we might press so close we should not grow.
One doth deny even this so sweet a bar
For fear our souls’ true shape should suffer mar.
Ah, surface-sundered, yet do we not know
A hidden union in the deeps below?
An intertwining where the strong roots are?
Wise husbandmen plant trees, Sweetheart,—a space
Between the trees; but after, soon or late,
High in the sunny air their spreading boughs
Reach forth and meet. In some celestial place,
When thou and I are tall and fair and straight,
We shall clasp hands again,—if God allows.
#8 “Home” by John Clare
O home, however homely,–thoughts of thee
Can never fail to cheer the absent breast;
How oft wild raptures have been felt by me,
When back returning, weary and distrest:
How oft I’ve stood to see the chimney pour
Thick clouds of smoke in columns lightly blue,
And, close beneath, the house-leek’s yellow flower,
While fast approaching to a nearer view.
These, though they’re trifles, ever gave delight;
E’en now they prompt me with a fond desire,
Painting the evening group before my sight,
Of friends and kindred seated round the fire.
O Time! how rapid did thy moments flow,
That chang’d these scenes of joy to scenes of woe.
#9 “Out Over the Forth” by Robert Burns
Out over the Forth, I look to the North;
But what is the north and its Highlands to me?
The south nor the east gie ease to my breast,
The far foreign land, or the wide rolling sea.
But I look to the west when I gae to rest,
That happy my dreams and my slumbers may be;
For far in the west lives he I loe best,
The man that is dear to my babie and me.
#10 “A Mother To The Sea” by Charles Hamilton Musgrove
You are blue, you are blue like the sky,
Cruel and cold and blue,
And I turn from you, voiceless sea,
To a sky that is voiceless, too.
Upward the vast blue arch,
Downward the blue abyss,
With a line of foam where your lips
Meet in a passionless kiss.
But the silence is breaking my heart,
And tears cannot comfort me
With God in His cold blue sky,
And my boy in the cold blue sea.