John Keats’s poetry is a treasure trove of beauty, emotion, and timeless romance.
His words speak directly to those who feel deeply, dream vividly, and find solace in art and nature.
Imagine discovering 10 evocative poems that capture love, longing, and life’s fleeting beauty—perfect for tender-hearted women who cherish poetic expression.
Let’s dive in!
My favorite poem by John Keats for tender-hearted women
#1 “The Human Seasons” by John Keats
Four Seasons fill the measure of the year;
There are four seasons in the mind of man:
He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear
Takes in all beauty with an easy span:
He has his Summer, when luxuriously
Spring’s honey’d cud of youthful thought he loves
To ruminate, and by such dreaming high
Is nearest unto Heaven : quiet coves
His soul has in its Autumn, when his wings
He furleth close ; contented so to look
On mists in idleness-to let fair things
Pass by unheeded as a threshold brook.
He has his Winter too of pale misfeature,
Or else he would forego his mortal nature.
This poem beautifully captures the emotional journey of life through the metaphor of seasons.
Each line reflects the cycles of joy, reflection, and challenge that resonate deeply with tender-hearted women.
I find comfort and connection in Keats’s vivid portrayal of Spring’s hope, Summer’s bliss, Autumn’s peace, and Winter’s solemnity—all echoing your own experiences.
9 more poems by John Keats for tender-hearted women
#2 “Bright Star” by John Keats
Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art
Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night
And watching, with eternal lids apart,
Like nature’s patient, sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priest-like task
Of pure ablution round earth’s human shores,
Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask
Of snow upon the mountains and the moors
No, yet still stedfast, still unchangeable,
Pillow’d upon my fair love’s ripening breast,
To feel for ever its soft fall and swell,
Awake for ever in a sweet unrest,
Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so live ever, or else swoon to death.
#3 “The Day Is Gone” by John Keats
The day is gone, and all its sweets are gone!
Sweet voice, sweet lips, soft hand, and softer breast,
Warm breath, light whisper, tender semitone,
Bright eyes, accomplished shape, and lang’rous waist!
Faded the flower and all its budded charms,
Faded the sight of beauty from my eyes,
Faded the shape of beauty from my arms,
Faded the voice, warmth, whiteness, paradise,
Vanished unseasonably at shut of eve,
When the dusk holiday, or holinight
Of fragrant-curtained love begins to weave
The woof of darkness thick, for hid delight;
But, as I’ve read love’s missal through today,
He’ll let me sleep, seeing I fast and pray.
#4 “When I Have Fears” by John Keats
When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has glean’d my teeming brain,
Before high-piled books, in charact’ry,
Hold like full garners the full- ripen’d grain;
When I behold, upon the night’s starr’d face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And feel that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance;
And when I feel, fair creature of an hour!
That I shall never look upon thee more,
Never have relish in the faery power
Of unreflecting love!–then on the shore
Of the wide world I stand alone, and think,
Till Love and Fame to nothingness do sink.
#5 “Written In Burns’ Cottage” by John Keats
This mortal body of a thousand days
Now fills, O Burns, a space in thine own room,
Where thou didst dream alone on budded bays,
Happy and thoughtless of thy day of doom!
My pulse is warm with thine own Barley-bree,
My head is light with pledging a great soul,
My eyes are wandering, and I cannot see,
Fancy is dead and drunken at its goal;
Yet can I stamp my foot upon thy floor,
Yet can I ope thy window-sash to find
The meadow thou hast tramped o’er and o’er, –
Yet can I think of thee till thought is blind, –
Yet can I gulp a bumper to thy name,-
O smile among the shades, for this is fame!
#6 “This Living Hand” by John Keats
This living hand, now warm and capable
Of earnest grasping, would, if it were cold
And in the icy silence of the tomb,
So haunt thy days and chill thy dreaming nights
That thou wouldst wish thine own heart dry of blood
So in my veins red life might stream again,
And thou be conscience-calmed, see here it is
I hold it towards you.
#7 “Asleep! O Sleep A Little While, White Pearl!” by John Keats
Asleep! O sleep a little while, white pearl!
And let me kneel, and let me pray to thee,
And let me call Heaven’s blessing on thine eyes,
And let me breathe into the happy air,
That doth enfold and touch thee all about,
Vows of my slavery, my giving up,
My sudden adoration, my great love!
#8 “Modern Love” by John Keats
And what is love? It is a doll, dress’d up,
For idleness to cosset, nurse and dandle;
A thing of soft misnomers, so divine
That silly youth doth think to make itself
Divine by loving, and so goes on
Yawning and doting a whole summer long,
Till Miss’s comb is made a pearl tiara,
And common Wellingtons turn Romeo boots;
Then Cleopatra lives at number seven,
And Antony resides in Brunswick Square.
Fools! if some passions high have warm’d the world,
If Queens and Soldiers have play’d deep for hearts,
It is no reason why such agonies
Should be more common than the growth of weeds.
Fools! make me whole again that weighty pearl
The Queen of Egypt melted, and I’ll say
That ye may love in spite of beaver hats.
#9 “The Dove” by John Keats
I had a dove, and the sweet dove died;
And I have thought it died of grieving;
O, what could it grieve for ? its feet were tied
With a single thread of my own hand’s weaving;
Sweet little red feet, why should you die?
Why should you leave me, sweet bird, why?
You lived alone in the forest tree,
Why, pretty thing ! would you not live with me?
I kissed you oft and gave you white peas;
Why not live sweetly, as in the green trees?
#10 “To Fanny” by John Keats
I cry your mercy, pity, love! aye, love!
Merciful love that tantalizes not,
One-thoughted, never-wandering, guileless love,
Unmasked, and being seen, without a blot!
O! let me have thee whole, all, all, be mine!
That shape, that fairness, that sweet minor zest
Of love, your kiss, those hands, those eyes divine,
That warm, white, lucent, million-pleasured breast,
Yourself, your soul, in pity give me all,
Withhold no atom’s atom or I die,
Or living on, perhaps, your wretched thrall,
Forget, in the mist of idle misery,
Life’s purposes, the palate of my mind
Losing its gust, and my ambition blind!