citing a poem in an essay apa

APA (7th ed.) referencing guide (Online): Poetry

• Paraphrasing
• Direct quotes
• Secondary Referencing
• More than one work cited
• Author with two or more works cited in the same year
• Personal Communication
• In-text citations

Reference list

• Referencing Tools
• Books with one author
• Books with two authors
• Books with three or more authors
• Edited book
• Chapter in an edited book
• Anthologies and Collected Works
• Critical Editions
• Multivolume work
• Religious and classical Works
• Thesis / Dissertation
• Translation
• Work within an Anthology
• Conference Paper
• Journal article with one author
• Journal article with two authors
• Journal articles with three or more authors
• Journal article with no identified author/anonymous author
• Newspaper articles
• Magazine articles
• Book review in a journal or newspaper
• Act of Parliament
• Law report (case law)
• Business Reports
• Statistics & Datasets
• Government reports
• YouTube/online videos
• Episode of a TV Show
• Radio Broadcast

Below you will find guidance and examples of how to reference a poem in the body of your work and in the reference list at the end.

This source is not covered by the APA Style manual. You should also check with your lecturer when using these suggestions.

In text citations

You should cite the poem with the name of the poet and the publication date of the source you are using.

"O, my America, my Newfoundland" (Donne, 2003, p.14)

Hardy (1930) experiments with...

If you wish to include a line reference you can add (line xx) or (lines xx -yy) at an appropriate point in your text. 

 As Donne (2003, p. 11) argues  "Love, all alike, no season knows nor clime  Nor hours, days, months which are the rags of time" (lines 9-10).

There are three ways to reference a poem in APA.

A single author collection of poetry

These should be treated like a single author book.

Pope, A. (1963). The poems of Alexander Pope .   (J. Butt, Ed.).  Methuen .

Hardy, T. (1930). The collected poems of Thomas Hardy (4th ed.).  Macmillan.

An Anthology of Poetry

These should be treated as a work within an anthology

Wordsworth, W., & Coleridge, S. T. (1798). Lyrical ballads. In D. Wu (Ed.),  Romanticism: An anthology  (pp. 333-415).  Cambridge University Press.

Donne, J. (2003). To his mistress going to bed . http://www.luminarium.org/sevenlit/donne/elegy20.htm

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How to Cite a Poem Using APA Style

Last Updated: December 18, 2023 Fact Checked

This article was co-authored by Michelle Golden, PhD . Michelle Golden is an English teacher in Athens, Georgia. She received her MA in Language Arts Teacher Education in 2008 and received her PhD in English from Georgia State University in 2015. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 162,286 times.

The American Psychological Association (APA) style guide is very popular, especially in the social sciences. If you need to write a paper in APA style, there are a lot of different formatting rules to consider. Citing sources, such as poems, can be one of the most confusing things, but if you follow a few simple rules, you'll have perfectly formatted citations.

Quoting a Poem in Your Essay

• For example, introduce a short quote like this. Frost writes, "Some say the world will end in fire."

• For example, cite two line of a poem like this: "Some say the world will end end fire, / Some say in ice."

• You should not use quotation marks with block quotes. It is not necessary because the indentation signifies that it is a quote.
• Be sure to maintain the same double spacing that you have in the rest of your paper.

Using Proper In-Text Citations

• If you mention the author's name in the sentence that introduces the quote, include the year in parentheses after the author's name, and the page number in parentheses after the end of quote. For example: In his poem "Fire and Ice," Robert Frost (1923) says, "Some say the world will end in fire." (p. 1)
• If you don't include the author's name in the sentence that introduces the quote, provide all three pieces of information, separated by commas, in parentheses after the end of the quote. For example: "Some say the world will end in fire." (Frost, 1923, p. 1)
• Parenthetical citations should always come after the punctuation of the preceding sentence.

• If you are not referring to one specific page of the poem, you may omit the page number from your parenthetical citation, although you are encouraged to provide a page number whenever possible.

• Capitalize all major words in the title of any work.
• Put quotation marks around the titles of shorter works (such as most poems).
• Italicize or underline the title of longer works (such as anthologies).

Citing a Poem in Your Works Cited

• Author's last name, Author's first name (Year of publication). Title of work: Subtitle. Location: Publisher.

• Author's last name, Author's first name (Year of publication). Title of poem. In Editor's first and last name (Eds.), Title of book (pp. page #). Location: Publisher.

• In general, if your source does not provide a specific piece of information, it is okay to omit it from the citation.
• Note that when citing multiple pages you should notate it with "pp." instead of "p."

• For a website, include the words "Retrieved from" followed by the full web address at the end of your citation.
• For an e-book, include the e-book format in square brackets directly after the title of the book (for example, [Kindle DX version]). Then include the words "Available from" followed by the website from which you retrieved the e-book at the end of your citation.

• Capitalize only the first word of the title of a book, not every word.
• Do not surround the title of a poem with quotation marks.
• Use the title References at the top of your page.
• Alphabetize your entries by the author's last name. If you have more than one source by the same author, use the date of publication to list them chronologically.
• The first line of each citation should not be indented, but all additional lines should be indented 1 ⁄ 2 inch (1.3 cm) (two spaces) from the left margin.
• Maintain the same double spacing you have throughout the rest of your paper.
• If you are providing annotations (descriptions of your sources), provide them directly beneath your citation, indented two spaces further than the second line of your citation.

Community Q&A

• If you plan on writing a lot of papers using APA format, it's a good idea to buy a print copy of the manual or pay for online access. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0
• APA is not the only style guide out there, so double check that your teacher wants you to use APA. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

• Be sure to cite all of the sources that you quote, paraphrase, or even refer to when writing a paper so that you avoid all appearances of plagiarism. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0
• Don’t forget that you will also have to compose your entire essay or paper according to the APA style. This includes using the APA rules regarding line and paragraph spacing, typeface, margins, etc. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

You Might Also Like

• ↑ https://libguides.swansea.ac.uk/APA7Referencing/Poetry
• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/general_writing/punctuation/quotation_marks/quotation_marks_with_fiction.html
• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/in_text_citations_author_authors.html
• ↑ https://penandthepad.com/cite-poem-apa-format-5072453.html
• ↑ https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/reference_list_basic_rules.html

About This Article

If you want to cite a poem using the APA style, include your quote from a poem in quotation marks if it's less than 40 words, and use forward slashes to indicate line breaks. To cite a longer passage, begin the quote on a new line and indent it to create a block quotation. For your in-text citation, include the author's name, year of publication, and page number, preceded by the letter "p." When it comes to the title, capitalize all major words, place short titles in quotes, and italicize longer titles. To learn how to include your citation in the works cited section of your essay, keep reading! Did this summary help you? Yes No

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How to Quote a Poem in APA Referencing

3-minute read

• 31st July 2019

Many style guides have special rules for quoting poetry in an essay . In this post, for example, we will look at how to quote a poem using APA referencing. This will cover:

• How to present quoted verse on the page
• How to format in-text citations for a poem in APA referencing

If you are writing about poetry, then, make sure to follow the rules below.

How to Quote a Poem

The basic rules for quoting a line of poetry are the same as for quoting any other source. As such, to quote a poem, you should:

• Place the quoted text within quotation marks.
• Cite the author’s surname and year of publication in brackets.
• If available, include a page number for the quoted passage.

Otherwise, a single line of poetry will look like any other quote.

If you’re quoting two lines from a poem, though, you will need to include a include a forward slash to show where the line break was in the original text. A two-line quotation would therefore look like this:

One of the most famous examples of nonsense poetry is “The Owl and the Pussy-Cat,” which begins thus: “The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea / In a beautiful pea-green boat” (Lear, 1871/1983, p. 34).

Here, we’re quoting the first two lines of an Edward Lear poem (we include two dates because this is a republished version of the original work). The page numbers in the citation, meanwhile, show us where this poem appears in the book.

Quoting Three or More Lines of Poetry

If you’re using more than two lines from a poem, present it as a block quote . Ideally, you will recreate the presentation of the lines on the page from the original source:

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The final stanza begins with an interspecies wedding: “Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling    Your ring?” Said the Piggy, “I will.” So they took it away, and were married next day    By the Turkey who lives on the hill. (Lear, 1871/1983, p. 34)

Here, for example, we indent the second and final lines more than the rest of the quote. This is because the original poem is presented in the same way.

Furthermore, as with any APA block quote, the citation here comes after the final punctuation in the quote, not before it.

Adding a Poem to an APA Reference List

Finally, if you quote a poem anywhere in your work, it should also appear in the reference list at the end of your document. The correct reference format to use, however, will depend on how the poem was published:

• For long poems published as standalone works, use the standard book format . You can do this for anthologies with a single author, too, but make sure to name the editor as well as the author of the poems themselves.
• List poems published in an anthology as chapters from an edited book (i.e., include details for both poem and container volume).
• List a single poem found online as a web page .

Whatever their format, make sure to provide full publication information for all poems and their container volumes (i.e., the book or website where you found the poem). This will allow your reader to find them if required.

And if you need anyone to check your document for errors – including in citations and the reference list – don’t forget that we have expert academic proofreaders on hand and ready to help 24/7.

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How to Cite a Poem: MLA and APA Formatting Quotations

Writing, and all of its connected skills, are essential to succeed in studying — especially humanities. One such skill is the proper use of quotations. To make a quotation means to place the exact words of another author in your essay — these words could be lines from a poem as well.

When to Use Poem Quotes

When is it appropriate to cite a poem? Most often, quotes from poems are used by liberal art students, literature students, and language students. It is hard to imagine writing an essay about a poet without including some pieces of his works, or describing some poetry trend without providing examples. Also, you may find poem lines used in descriptive, reflective, argumentative, and compare and contrast essays.

Nevertheless, even if you are not a humanities student, you are not limited to use poem citations in your works if the meaning of the line(s) you have chosen is relevant. While there are no rules on where you may cite a poem, there are a lot on how you should do it in different formatting styles. Continue reading to find out more about how to cite a poem correctly or simply use professional help. Need help? You can buy custom essay at EssayPro.

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Citing Poem Quotes in MLA Style

The most popular formatting style is MLA (Modern Language Association). Despite it possibly being the easiest style to use, you will need some time to learn all of the rules, and time to train to apply them.

You might also be interested in how to style an essay using MLA FORMAT

The rules of citing a poem in MLA style depend on the citation’s length. Quotes up to three lines are considered to be short, and quotes longer than three lines – long.

Citing a Short Quote

• There is no need to start a short quote on a new line; you may write it just between the text.
• Though, it is obligatory to put it in quotation marks.
• If question or exclamation marks are part of the poem, put them inside the quotation marks.; leave them outside if they are a part of your text.
• Use a slash to mark line breaks, or a double slash if there is a stanza break; put a space before and after the slash.
• Start each line of the poem with a capital letter (at the beginning and after the slash marks).

Example: In “Song of Myself”, Walt Whitman wrote, “I exist as I am, that is enough, / If no other in the world be aware I sit content, / And if each and all be aware I sit content.”

Citing a Long Quote

• If you choose a long quote, some rules are just the opposite of how you would properly write a small quote — and you should be really careful not to mix them up.
• Start your quotation from a new line, with a half-inch indent from the left margin.
• Put it in a block quote. Include line breaks in the quote as they are in the original.
• Keep the original formatting and punctuation as part of the author’s style.
• Use double-space spacing inside the quote.
• There is no need for quotation marks or slashes, just skip them.

Example: Emily Dickinson wrote: Because I could not stop for Death, He kindly stopped for me; The carriage held but just ourselves And Immortality.

Citing the Title of the Poem

Regardless of the length of a quote, you should clearly indicate the poet’s last name. You should also include the title of the poem if you cite more than one poem by the same author in your work. You may do it in two ways: mention it before the quotation in the main text, or include it in a parenthetical citation at the end of the lines. If you mentioned the name and the title before the quote, but you’re not sure if it will be obvious for the reader, you may repeat it in a parenthetical citation — it won’t be considered as a mistake.

Besides the poet’s last name and the title of the poem, a parenthetical citation should include a line or page number. Here are some brief rules for parenthetical citations:

• If a poem was published with line numbers in the margin, put the line number. Use the word “line”, or “lines”, in the first quotation of your work. Only use numbers in all of the following quotations from the same sources you’ve already quoted.

Example: “Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— / I took the one less traveled by, / And that has made all the difference.” (Frost, lines 18-20)

• If there are no line numbers in the margin, put the page number in parenthetical citation after the poet’s last name instead. Do not use a comma between the poet’s name and page number.

Example: “Your head so much concerned with outer, / Mine with inner, weather.” (Frost 126)

• If you found the poem from a website, or the page numbers are not available for other reasons, don’t put any numbers at all. Leave only the poet’s last name and poem’s title (if required as mentioned above).

Example: “Tell me, what is it you plan to do / with your one wild and precious life?” (Mary Oliver)

• If you mentioned the poet’s last name and poem’s title before the citation (if required as mentioned above), and you have no lines or page number, don’t make an in-text citation after the quote at all.

Example: Here is what Pablo Neruda wrote about this feeling, “I love you as certain dark things are to be loved, / in secret, between the shadow and the soul.”

• If you would like to cite the title of the poem not in a parenthetical citation, but inside your text, there are two ways to do it, and it depends on the title’s length. Short poem titles should be cited in quotation marks.

Examples: “A Book”, “Fire and Ice”, or “Nothing Gold can’t Stay”

• Long poem titles should be cited in italics.

Example: Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening, Because I could not Stop for Death.

• Don't forget to write a full reference for each source you use in your Works Cited page at the end of your essay. If the poem citation was taken from a book, it should be made in the following format: Poet’s Last Name, First Name. “Title of Poem.” Title of Book: Subtitle (if any) , edited by Editor’s First Name Last Name, Edition (if given and is not first), Publisher’s Name (often shortened), Year of Publication, pp. xx-xx.

Examples: Dickinson, Emily. “A Book.” Emily Dickinson: Selected Poems , edited by Anthony Eyre, Mount Orleans Press, 2019, pp. 55-56.

• If the poem citation was taken from a website, it should be made in the following format: Poet’s Last Name, First Name. “Title of Poem.” Title of Book: Subtitle (if any) , Edition (if given and is not first), Publisher Name (often shortened), Year of Publication, Website Name, URL. Accessed Access Date.

Example: Frost, Robert. “Fire and Ice”. Poetry Foundation , https://poetryfoundation.org/poems/44263/fire-and-ice. Accessed 28 Nov. 2019.

You may also be interested in how to write a conclusion for a research paper . This information will be useful for all kinds of student papers, whether you need just to cite a poem or write a political science essay .

How to Cite a Poem in APA Style?

APA is the abbreviation for American Psychological Association, and is the second most popular formatting style — used mainly in social studies. Here are some APA rules for poem citations that you need to know from our service:

• For poem quotes up to 40 words (short quotes), using quotation marks is obligatory.
• You don’t have to start a short quote from a new line.
• Line breaks in short quotes should be marked by a slash.
• Block citations should be used for quotes longer than 40 words (long quotes).
• You have to start a block citation from a new line.
• Do not use quotation marks for block citations
• Block quotations should be indented 1.3 cm from the left margin, and in double-space formatting.

A Short Quote Example: Robert Frost, in his poem Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening , wrote: “The woods are lovely, dark, and deep, / But I have promises to keep, / And miles to go before I sleep, / And miles to go before I sleep.”

A Long Quote Example: Here is how Emily Dickinson describes the meaning of a book: There is no frigate like a book To take us lands away, Nor any coursers like a page Of prancing poetry. This traverse may the poorest take Without oppress of toll; How frugal is the chariot That bears a human soul! 2019.

If your quote is taken from a book, a full reference to the source in the Works Cited page (in APA style) should be made according to the following template: Poet’s Last Name, First Initial. (Year). Poem title. In Editor Initial. Last Name (Ed.), Book title (pp. xx-xx). Location: Publisher.

Example: Dickinson, E. (2019). A book. A. Eyre (Ed.), Emily Dickinson: Selected Poems (pp.55-56). Cricklade, U.K.: Mount Orleans Press.

If a quotation was taken from a website, the following template should be used: Poet’s Last Name, First Initial. (Year, Month Day). Poem title. Retrieved from http://WebAddress.

Example: Dickinson, E. (2019, November 28). I'm Nobody! Who are you? Retrieved from https://poets.org/poem/im-nobody-who-are-you-260.

Tips and Tricks on How to Cite a Poem

Here are a few recommendations on how to format poem quotations properly. They will be useful whether or not you are a beginner or advanced user of poem citations, regardless of what formatting style you are using.

• Read the whole poem to be sure you understand the meaning of the citation and author’s message correctly. Then, decide which lines can be used as a quote for your work.
• Write a few words about: why you chose the lines from your poem, their message, and what their connection is with your essay topic.
• Do not overuse quotations in your work. You may also paraphrase, instead of quoting, in order to share other’s views. Moreover, it is your own work and you shouldn’t rely on others’ words the whole time.
• There is no need to cite the entire poem if you need a few lines in the beginning and a few in the end. Omit middle lines that you don’t need (use ellipses to point out that you will skip words), or create two quotations that connect with your text between them.
• Use embedded quotes. These are quotes that are implemented as a part of your sentence. You may put it at the beginning, in the middle, or at the end of your sentence. The idea is to make it an organic part of your text. Example: As well as Robert Frost, at first “I hold with those who favor fire”.
• When citing a specific source (periodicals or a website perhaps), check the specifics on how to cite it in MLA or another format — as there are some particularities we didn’t have time to cover.
• Together with the final review of your essay, proofread your cited quotes for both: appropriate usage, and correct formatting.

As with any other skill, practice is the best way to learn the details of citing a poem; you will not only need to make one poem citation to become an expert in the matter. Though, we truly believe that you will succeed — we gave you the main rules, and shared some of the most important tips on how to cite a poem. For now, before you hone your professional skills, we are here to help you! Do not hesitate to contact our service, no matter what kind of help you need, whether it's a poem citations or physics help .

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A Work (e.g., essay, short story) in an Anthology or Compilation

When you are citing a work from an anthology, you will treat the work as being republished and not reprinted.  Consult section 9.40 in the APA Style Guide for more information.

Author of Work Within Book Last Name, First initial. (Publication year of the anthology). Title of the particular story/chapter/essay/poem. In Editor             first initial. Last name (Ed.),  Title of the anthology ( pp. of chapter/essay/poem). Publisher. URL or DOI, if available (Original work published             XXXX)                      

Note:  The reference list entry for a republished or reissued work should contain information about the new publication that was used. Follow the new publication information with the year the work was originally published in parentheses using the following format:  (Original work published XXXX)

Frost, R. (2006).The road not taken. In J. Parini (Ed.), T he Wadsworth anthology of poetry ( p. 598). Cengage Learning. (Original work published 1916)          

Parenthetical Citation: (Frost, 1916/2006)

Narrative Citation: Frost (1916/2006)

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How to Cite a Poem in the APA Format

American Psychological Association style offers several ways to cite a poem, depending on whether the source is the Web, an anthology or a poet collection.

Citations on Reference Page

For a poem retrieved from an anthology, include poet's name, anthology publication year, poem title, editors' names, anthology name in italics, page numbers, publishing city and publisher name in the following format:

Cleveland, J. (1972). To the state of love, or the senses festival. In H. Gardner (Ed.), The metaphysical poets (pp. 218-220). Harmonsworth: Penguin.

For a poem retrieved from a poet collection, include poet's name, year of publication, name of collection, collection edition, publishing city and publisher in the following format:

Hardy, T. (1930). The collected poems of Thomas Hardy (4th ed.). London: Macmillan.

For a poem retrieved from the Web, include poet's name, year of publication, poem title, retrieval date and web address in the following format:

Poe, E., A. (1849). Annabel Lee. Retrieved, October 14, 2014, from http://poestories.com/read/annabellee

For all three types, indent all lines after the first in the citation.

In-Text Citations

In-text citations consist of the poet's last name and year of publication if it is from an online source. If it is from an anthology or collection, also include page numbers. This information is included in parentheses after the quote.

For example, cite a poem from the Web as follows:

"With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven Coveted her and me," (Poe, 1849).

Cite a poem retrieved from a collection or anthology as:

"All things did with his Love conspire," (Behn, 2001, p. 367).

If the name of the poet is stated in your sentence, include the year and page number, if necessary, in the parentheses.

• Noodle Tools: [APA] How Do I Cite a Poem?
• University of Portsmouth: Poetry [Using APA 6th ed.]

Based in Gatineau, Canada, Kat Walcott has been writing entertainment and informative articles since 2008. Her work has appeared in major publications including Her Campus, Equals6 and Uppercase. She holds an honors diploma in social science from Heritage College and is currently majoring in communication studies and minoring in sexuality studies.

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Quoting a Poem in APA Referencing

3-minute read

• 12th January 2019

Many style guides have special rules for quoting poetry in an essay. In this post, for example, we will look at how to quote poetry using APA referencing. This will cover:

• How to present quoted verse on the page
• How to format in-text citations for a poem in APA referencing

If you are quoting poetry, then, make sure to follow the rules below.

Quoting a Poem

The basic rules for quoting one line of poetry are the same as for quoting any other source. This means you should:

• Place the quoted text within quotation marks.
• Cite the author’s surname and year of publication in brackets.
• Include a page number for the quoted passage in brackets (if available).

However, if you’re quoting two lines of poetry, you need to include a forward slash to show where the line break is in the original text. For example:

One classic example of nonsense poetry is ‘The Owl and the Pussy-Cat’, which begins thus: ‘The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea / In a beautiful pea-green boat’ (Lear, 1871/1983, p. 34).

Here, we’re quoting the first two lines of an Edward Lear poem (we include two dates because this is a republished version of the original work). The page numbers in the citation, meanwhile, show us where this poem appears in the book.

Quoting Three or More Lines of Poetry

If you’re using more than two lines from a poem, present it as a block quote . Ideally, you will recreate the presentation of the lines on the page from the original source:

Find this useful?

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The final stanza begins with an interspecies wedding:                 ‘Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling    Your ring?’ Said the Piggy, ‘I will.’ So they took it away, and were married next da    By the Turkey who lives on the hill. (Lear, 1871/1983, p. 34)

Here, for example, we have indented the second and final lines more than the rest of the quote. This is because the original poem is presented in the same way.

Furthermore, as with any APA block quote, the citation here comes after the final punctuation in the quote, not before it.

Poems in an APA Reference List

Finally, poems cited in your work should also appear in the reference list at the end of your document. The correct reference format to use, however, will depend on how the poem was published:

• For long poems published by themselves, use the standard book format . You can do this for anthologies with a single author, too, but make sure to name the editor as well as the author of the poems themselves.
• List poems published in an anthology as chapters from an edited book .
• List a single poem found online as a web page.

Make sure to provide full publication information for all poems and their container volumes (i.e. the book or website where you found the poem). This will allow your reader to find them if required.

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Everything You Need to Know About Citing a Poem

Academic study, especially in literature, will likely bring you to a moment when you'll need to cite a poem in an essay. When that happens, don't worry, we have you covered. We're going to look at citing poetry in the two most common citation styles, APA and MLA, including in-text citations and those required for footnotes/endnotes and Reference or Works Cited pages.

Although commonly used for citing sources within the field of behavioral and social sciences, APA is the style guide of the American Psychological Association (APA) and can be required for essays citing poetry.

In-text citations

For an in-text citation of a poem, APA requires that you add parentheses to the end of the quote and include the last name of the author, followed by a comma and the year of publication of the source. If you are quoting a poem that is online, you can simply use the date of publication of the poem. If you found the poem in a collection or anthology, the in-text citation should include the page number in the anthology where the poem is printed.

But we loved with a love that was more than love--

I and my Annabel Lee--

With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven

Coveted her and me. (Poe, 1849)

Note that since the above quoted poem is three or more lines, it is formatted within the text like a block quote. Quotation marks are not used and the poem is written exactly as it is in the source. Also note that each line is indented and the section is double spaced, with an in-text citation placed after the final punctuation of the quote.

For poetry quotes that are a single line, this should be treated like any other quote. For example:

In his poem Annabel Lee, Poe writes "But we loved with a love that was more than love--," (1849).

Notice that the in-text citation is placed before the final punctuation and the citation only includes the date since the author (Poe) has already been mentioned.

If the poetry quote contains two lines, treat it like any other quote but include a slash mark (/) where the line breaks in the original source. For example:

The author writes, "But we loved with a love that was more than love--/I and my Annabel Lee--,"(Poe, 1849).

Reference page citation

If you found the poem in an anthology, include the poet's name, anthology publication year, poem title, editors' names, anthology name in italics, page numbers, publishing city and publisher name in the following format:

Eliot, T.S. (1970). Journey of the magi. In A. Allison and H. Barrows (Eds.), The Norton Anthology of Poetry (Third Edition) (pp. 1012-1013). New York: W.W. Norton & Company.

If you found the poem on the Web, include the poet's name, year of publication, poem title, retrieval date and web address in the following format:

Poe, E., A. (1849). Annabel Lee. Retrieved, November 30, 2019, from https://poestories.com/read/annabellee

Published by the Modern Language Association (MLA), the MLA style is often used for English studies, modern languages and literatures, literary criticism, and media studies.

For an in-text citation of a poem, MLA requires that you add parentheses to the end of the quote and include the last name of the author. However, this is where the similarity to APA style ends. After stating the name of the author, you'll need to include a comma followed by line numbers of the poem quotes. If there are no line numbers in the text, include the page number where the poem was found. Note that if you go this route, there is no comma in between the author's last name and the page number.

Coveted her and me. (Poe, lines 1-4)

As with APA style, for poetry quotes that are a single line, this should be treated like any other quote. For example:

In his poem Annabel Lee, Poe writes "But we loved with a love that was more than love--," (line 1).

Notice that the in-text citation is placed before the final punctuation and the citation only includes the line number since the author (Poe) has already been mentioned.

The author writes, "But we loved with a love that was more than love--/I and my Annabel Lee--,"(Poe, lines 3-4).

For the reference page or works cited page, include the poet's name, the name of the poem in quotation marks, anthology name, names of editors, publishing company, date of publication, and page number where the poem is found. Here's an example:

Poe, Edgar Allan. "Annabelle Lee." The Norton Anthology of Poetry, edited by A. Allison and H. Barrows, W.W. Norton & Company, 1970, p. 697.

If you found the poem on a website, include the author's last name, author's first name, name of the poem in quotation marks, the name of the website, the website's URL, and the date it was accessed. Here's an example:

Poe, Edgar Allan. "Annabel Lee." Poe Stories, https://poestories.com/read/annabellee. Accessed November 30, 2019.

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How to Cite a Poem

“  See revolving the globe, The ancestor-continents away group’d together, The present and future continents north and south, with the isthmus between.

See, vast trackless spaces, As in a dream they change, they swiftly fill, Countless masses debouch upon them, They are now cover’d with the foremost people, arts, institutions, known.

See, projected through time, For me an audience interminable. ”

Excerpt From: Walt Whitman. “Leaves of Grass.” Apple Books.

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Roses are red, violets are blue, trying to cite a poem someone gave to you? If so, you’re in luck, because we’re here to explain how to cite a poem!

While it may seem tricky to cite a poem, it’s pretty much the same as citing any type of writing. Many poems are found in anthologies or published collections of works. We’ll provide instructions for citing your poem found in an anthology, not only in MLA format but also in APA and Chicago formats too!

For this example, we’re using a poem found in an anthology called Love Poems , which is available on Google Books . To access the source yourself, use the information found in the citation examples below.

To cite a poem from an anthology, you’ll need to locate the following pieces of information:

• Name of the individual who wrote the poem
• Title of the poem
• Title of the book or anthology
• Name of the individual who edited or compiled the anthology
• Version of the anthology (for example, the edition)
• Publisher of the anthology
• Location of the publisher
• Date the anthology was published
• Page or page range the poem is on (for print sources)
• Name of the website the anthology is on (for online sources)
• URL or DOI (for online sources)

Use the following structure to cite a poem in an anthology in MLA citation style:

Print source:

Last name, First name (of the individual who wrote the poem). “Title of the Poem.” Title of the Anthology , First name Last name of Editor, editor’s title (if applicable), version (only include if it’s clearly labeled as a specific edition or version), Publisher, Date the anthology was published, page or page range (if applicable).

Online source:

Last name, First name (of the individual who wrote the poem). “Title of the Poem.” Title of the Anthology , First name Last name of Editor, editor’s title (if applicable), version (only include if it’s clearly labeled as a specific edition or version), Publisher, Date the anthology was published, Name of the Website or Database the anthology is on , URL or DOI.

Here’s how the above example would be cited in MLA 9 :

Graves, Robert. “Symptoms of Love.” Love Poems , Peter Washington, general editor, Everyman’s Library, 1993, p. 18.

Graves, Robert. “Symptoms of Love.” Love Poems , Peter Washington, general editor, Everyman’s Library, 1993, Google Books , https://books.google.com/books?id=kE-c58Jubj4C&lpg=PP1&dq=love%20poems&pg=PA5#v=onepage&q=love%20poems&f=false.

If you need help with in-text and parenthetical citations, CitationMachine.net, can help. Our MLA citation generator is simple and easy to use!

Use the following structure to cite a poem in an anthology in APA style:

Last name, First initial. Middle initial. of the individual who wrote the poem. (Year the anthology was published). Title of the poem. In First initial. Middle initial. Last name of Editor (Ed.), Title of anthology (p. for page or pp. for page range). URL

Here’s how the above example would be cited in APA:

Graves, R. (1993). Symptoms of love. In P. Washington (Ed.), Love poems (p. 18). https://books.google.com/books?id=kE-c58Jubj4C&lpg=PP1&dq=love%20poems&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q=love%20poems&f=false

For more information, visit our APA reference page .

Use the following structure to cite a poem in an anthology in Chicago style:

Last name, First name, Middle initial. of the individual who wrote the poem. “Title of the Poem.” In Title of the Anthology , edited by First name Middle initial. Last name, page or page range. Location of the publisher: Publisher, Year published. URL.

Here’s how the above example would be cited in Chicago:

Graves, Robert. “Symptoms of Love.” In Love Poems , edited by Peter Washington, 18. New York: Everyman’s Library, 1993. https://books.google.com/books?id=kE-c58Jubj4C&lpg=PP1&dq=love%20poems&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q=love%20poems&f=false.

A completed citation is a good start. If you need to go beyond this and create a Chicago style in text citation (footnotes and endnotes), a parenthetical citation example in MLA or APA, a citation for another source type, or need basic citing help, try Citation Machine.

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To cite a poem found in an anthology on an APA-style reference list, include the name of the poet, the anthology publication date, the name of the poem, the name of the compiler (e.g., editor), the name of the anthology, the page number(s), the publisher’s name, a DOI/URL (if applicable), and for poems that have been published elsewhere before appearing in the anthology, also include an original publication date. To write an APA-style in-text citation for a poem, include the surname of the poet, the poem’s original publication date (if applicable), and the anthology’s publication date.

In-text citation

Following are the templates and examples for writing an APA-style in-text citation for a poem in an anthology, both with and without an original publication date.

(Surname of the poet, Publication Year)

Republished and original dates:

(Surname of the poet, Original Publication Year/Anthology Publication Year)

(Kim, 2016)

(Kim, 1965/2016)

Reference-list entry

Following are the templates and examples for citing a poem found in an anthology in APA style.

Surname, F. M. (Publication Year). Title of the poem. In F. Editor (Ed.)., Title of the anthology (pp. #–#). Publisher.

Surname, F. M. (Publication Year). Title of the poem. In F. Editor (Ed.)., Title of the anthology (pp. #–#). Publisher. DOI/URL (Original work published Year)

Kim, S. J. (2016). The beggar in America. In W. A. Kibbedi (Ed.), Love, love alone: A poetry collection (pp. 7-8). Uganda Christian University.

Kim, S.J. (2016). The beggar in America. In W.A. Kibbedi (Ed.), Love, love alone: A poetry collection (pp. 7-8). Uganda Christian University. (Original work published 1965)

Single line of poetry

Cite the quote as you would cite a normal quotation. In the footnote, be sure to indicate the quotation’s location in the source.

Aside from page number, classic poetry can sometimes be organized by book (bk.), canto, stanza (st.), lines, fragment (frag.), etc. Include these location numbers if it makes sense. The example below has a page number (page 26). Other examples in this FAQ use books and lines.

Note and footnote template:

Example sentence, “Quotation goes here.” 1

• Author First M. Surname, Title of the Book (Publisher location: Publisher Name, year of publication), quotation location .

Note and footnote example:

Gorman instills both sadness and hope: “We will raise this wounded world into a wonderous one.” 1

• Amanda Gorman, The Hill We Climb (New York: Viking Books, 2021), 26.

Bibliography entry template and example:

Author Surname, First M. Title of the Book . Location: Publisher Name, year of Publication.

Gorman, Amanda. The Hill We Climb . New York: Viking Books, 2021.

Two or more lines, of poetry

If quoting two or more lines of poetry, you may format the quote as a block quote OR as a run-in quotation.

BLOCK QUOTE

Here’s how to format a block quote:

• No quotation marks are needed
• Left-aligned text indented 0.5 inches from the left
• A single line before and after the quotation

Quotation line one goes here.

Line 2 goes here. (Each line goes on its own line.)

Last line goes here. 1

*NOTE: If a line of the poem is too long to fit on a single line, the text that runs to the second line should have a hanging indent.

Thus high uplifted beyond hope, aspires Beyond thus high, insatiate to pursue Vain Warr with Heav’n, and by success untaught His proud imaginations thus displaid.  1

• John Milton, Paradise Lost (Salt Lake City: Project Gutenberg, 2017), bk. 2, lines 7-10.

Author Surname, First M. Title of the Book . Location: Publisher Name, year of publication.

Milton, John. Paradise Lost . Salt Lake City: Project Gutenberg, 2017. Epub.

RUN-IN QUOTATION

If you are writing in a narrative form and want to save line space, then use the poet’s name in the sentence and explain the lines, followed by the quoted lines from the poem. Add the note number at the end of the sentence.

Use forward slashes with one space on either side ( / ) to show line breaks in the original poem. In case there is a break between stanzas, use a double slash with a single space on either side ( // ) instead of a single slash.

Milton uses light to express his sight in, “When I consider how my light is spent / Ere half my days in this dark world and wide.” 1

Two or more stanzas of poetry

• Left-aligned text
• Add a line before and after each stanza

Quotation stanza one. (Each line goes on its own line.)

Quotation stanza two.

Last stanza. 1

• Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (Salt Lake City: Project Gutenberg, 1998), bk. 2, lines 23-31.

Whitman, Walt. Leaves of Grass . Salt Lake City: Project Gutenberg, 1998. Epub.

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Anthologies have an editor or editors for the entire work and separate authors for each story, essay or poem. You must cite and reference every story, essay or poem that you use in your paper separately , unless you are referring generally to the entire work.

Formatting Examples

• Reference Format
• In-text Citation Format
• Author, A. A. = Author's surname followed by first and middle initials, when available.
• Start the reference with the author of the story, essay, or poem.
• Follow the title with the editor(s) first initial and last name and "Ed." for one editor or "Eds." for multiple.
• Always include the original publication date of the story, essay, or poem.

Examples of formatting an in-text citation for this item are outlined below:

Remember, in-text citation formatting changes depending on a number of factors .

See  Number of Authors , Publication Date , and  Page/Paragraph Number or Heading  for more information.   

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How to Cite a Poem: A Comprehensive Guide with Examples

• Introduction

In-Text Citations

Works cited entry, reference list entry, bibliography entry,  introduction.

Citing a poem correctly is crucial for any academic or literary work. Whether you are writing an essay, research paper, or simply analyzing a poem, providing accurate citations is essential to give credit to the original author and to support your arguments. In this guide, we will explore the various citation styles and provide examples to help you cite poems effectively.

Citing a Poem in MLA Style

In MLA style, in-text citations are used to acknowledge the source of a direct quote or paraphrase within the body of your text. When citing a poem, include the author’s last name and the line numbers in parentheses. If the poem does not have line numbers, use the page number instead. Here are a few examples:

– Quoting a line from a poem with line numbers: “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood” (Frost 1).

– Quoting multiple lines from a poem with line numbers: As Robert Frost wrote in his famous poem: “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both” (1-2).

– Quoting a poem without line numbers: According to Robert Frost, “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood” (23).

In the Works Cited page, you will provide a full reference for the poem. The format for citing a poem in MLA style is as follows:

Author’s Last Name, First Name. “Title of Poem.” Title of Book or Anthology, edited by Editor’s First Name Last Name, Edition (if applicable), Publisher, Year, Page Range.

For example:

Frost, Robert. “The Road Not Taken.” The Norton Anthology of American Literature, edited by Nina Baym, 8th ed., W. W. Norton & Company, 2012, pp. 123-124.

Citing a Poem in APA Style

In APA style, in-text citations include the author’s last name and the year of publication. When citing a poem, include the line numbers for direct quotes. If the poem does not have line numbers, use the page number instead. Here are a few examples:

– Quoting a line from a poem with line numbers: “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood” (Frost, 1916, p. 1, line 1).

– Quoting multiple lines from a poem with line numbers: As Robert Frost wrote in his famous poem: “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both” (Frost, 1916, p. 1, lines 1-2).

– Quoting a poem without line numbers: According to Robert Frost, “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood” (Frost, 1916, p. 23).

In the reference list, you will provide a full reference for the poem. The format for citing a poem in APA style is as follows:

Author’s Last Name, First Initial. (Year). Title of Poem. In Title of Book or Anthology (pp. Page Range). Publisher.

Frost, R. (1916). The Road Not Taken. In The Norton Anthology of American Literature (pp. 123-124). W. W. Norton & Company.

Citing a Poem in Chicago Style

In Chicago style, footnotes are used to cite sources. When citing a poem for the first time, use a footnote to provide the full reference. For subsequent citations, you can use a shortened version. Here are a few examples:

– First footnote citation: ^1 Robert Frost, “The Road Not Taken,” in The Norton Anthology of American Literature, ed. Nina Baym, 8th ed. (W. W. Norton & Company, 2012), 123.

– Subsequent footnote citation: ^2 Frost, “The Road Not Taken,” 124.

In the bibliography, you will provide a full reference for the poem. The format for citing a poem in Chicago style is as follows:

Author’s Last Name, First Name. “Title of Poem.” In Title of Book or Anthology, edited by Editor’s First Name Last Name, Page Range. Publisher, Year.

Frost, Robert. “The Road Not Taken.” In The Norton Anthology of American Literature, edited by Nina Baym, 123-124. W. W. Norton & Company, 2012.

Citing a poem correctly is essential for maintaining academic integrity and giving credit to the original author. By following the guidelines and examples provided in this guide, you can ensure that your citations are accurate and in accordance with the required citation style. Remember to always consult the specific guidelines provided by your instructor or the style manual for any additional requirements or variations.

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How to Cite a Poem in APA, MLA, and Chicago Citation Styles

If you're like me, a good quote on writing from your choice writer at the end of a bad day can brighten your mood. I enjoy learning from these experiences, writing their words on sticky notes and putting them all around my writing space. The greats who came before us can teach us so much about the craft of poetry writing. We're lucky to live in a free information age that means many of us can benefit from writers currently creating works and filling our bookshelves with their collections.

I may not get banished from work because I wrote an inspirational line to cheer me up on my desk, but you could. Students must learn how to cite a poem to avoid plagiarizing poets and ensuring they get high grades.

Learn a few ti ps on  how to cite a poem in this perfectl y crafted guide.

Citing a Poem in APA

Learning to cite a poem that has a proper works cited entry in APA style is an important skill. The basic guidelines appear similar to those used for other papers. However, a poem has a unique design that requires specialized citation. You must carefully discern how to begin referencing the poem. Note these items as you cite your poem. Some may be irrelevant to your specific assignment.

• Title of poem
• Publication year
• Publisher name
• Page numbers

How Do You Cite a Poem from a Book in APA?

For this section, we'll use the APA 6th and 7th editions. APA guidelines state that a writer should create a reference based on where they found the poem, that is, its publisher (e.g., book, web page).

A writer must provide the author's last name, the publication year, and stanza in the in-text citation (e.g., Neruda, 1914, stanza 2).

How Do I Cite in APA Format?

APA guidelines dictate that you must use the author-date method for in-text citation. This means that a poet's last name and year published for your source must appear in the text, like, for instance, (Frost, 1968).

A complete reference for each source should appear in your "Works Cited" page(s) at the end of the paper.

Citing a Poem from a Book

If you take your poem citation from a book, you must use the following format.

Poet's Last Name, First Name. "Title of the Poem." Title of the Book: Subtitle (if any), edited by Editor's First Name Last Name, Edition (if provided and is not the first), Publisher's Name (frequently shortened), Year of Publication, pp. xx-xx.

MLA In-text Citations for Poems

The main rules for citing a poem line are similar to those for quoting other sources. You must place the quoted text within quotation marks and cite the author's surname as well as the year published in brackets.

If provided, include the page number for your quoted passage.

Your Works Cited entry should begin with the poet's name with the title of the poem following in quotation marks. You should then include details about your source, where the poem was published.

The most commonly followed citation format is Modern Language Association (MLA) style.

How do You Cite a Stanza in a Poem?

In brief verse quotations, you must quote all or part of a line of verse and put it in quotation marks within the text.

Quoting Up to Three Lines of Poetry

You could also utilize two or three lines in a similar way. Using a slash with a space on each side to separate the lines (/).

A writer should also use two slashes to show a stanza break in a quote.

Should You Italicize Poem Titles?

Poem titles and those for short stories should go in quotation marks. You should italicize the title of a short story or poem collection. For instance, we'd cite Andre Dubus' "The Intruder," a short story appearing in his collection "Dancing After Hours" as,  Dancing After Hours .

How to Quote Poetry in MLA Style

Let's briefly review the rules for quoting poetry using the MLA citation guidelines. If you are quoting two or three lines of poetry, you can show where the line breaks are by adding a slash between the lines as in the following example.

The poem opens with an allusion to Chaucer: "April is the cruellest month, breeding / Lilacs out of the dead land” (1-2).

So this tells us that the line ends with "breeding" and then we add the slash (surrounded by spaces) to indicate that there's a break there. If there's a stanza break (if you're jumping from one stanza to the next), you can add an extra slash to show that that's happening.

Use a slash to separate lines in a poetry quotation while making sure to mention the artist’s last name either in parentheses after quote or in your text. Show your reader the quote’s location, line numbers and all, or page number if the poem spans multiple pages. If you must quote poetry, make sure that you properly format the quotation –both in your works cited page in the in-text citation-to direct your audience to the correct source entry in the final reference list.

Whether you are  citing two or three lines , remember to use the same capitalization, styling, and punctuation as in the original document.

Line Numbers and Page Numbers in In-text Citations

Do remember that if you are skipping words to jump from one place to the next, you have to add ellipses. We add the line numbers to our citation to make sure it meets the MLA style.

If you're going back and forth between , let's say, pages and line numbers in your essay, then you may indicate that your in text citation refers to lines. You could put the word ""lines or line" in front of the numbers. The latter applies if your citation is one long quotation derived from one line. This is something you should watch out for. Many students lose marks because of a simple mistake using this citation format.

But if you are constantly quoting from the same source and it's clear that these are line numbers, then you can simply omit the word "line(s)."

If you're quoting more than three lines of poetry, then you should use a block quote. A block quote in poetry is very similar to a regular block quote.

Remember to use an introductory sentence that ends with a colon before starting your quotation on a new line that’s indented half an inch from the left margin and has no quotation marks.

Citing four lines or more, that is, using block quotes means including every line break present in the quotation and maintaining the formatting as similar to the original as possible. For instance, include any unusual spaces if they are present in your block quote.

In-text Citation for More than One Poem

When you cite more than one poem from the same author, make sure you mention the poem’s title.

You will often name the title and poet in your main text when you introduce a quote. Contrary to this, when an ambiguity exists about the poem you are referring to, introduce the author name and/or title using a parenthetical citation. This appears after your quote.

MLA Works Cited Entry for a Poem

You must remember that every in-text citation must have a bibliography entry. It is a good practice to create a cited list of your references as you input the in-text citation. This leaves less room for error if you forget about a citation and fail to note it as you go through your work, leaving it out of your works cited page.

Let's look at the MLA format to use for a works cited entry according to the MLA handbook.

Author of Poem's Last Name, First Name. "Title of Poem." Title of Book: Subtitle if Any, edited by Editor's First Name Last Name, Edition if given and is not first, Publisher Name often shortened, Year of Publication, pp. Page Numbers of the Poem.

                   Jonathan Meyer/pexels

Citing a Poem in Chicago Citation Guide

We'll use the 17th edition to help you learn about citing a poem using the Chicago Style Guide. Check out the framework for the footnote and bibliography entries respectively.

• Bibliography entry

Let's use  The Road Not Taken , a poem by Robert Frost that has a famous line involving "yellow wood" to demonstrate these entries.

1. Author's First Name Last Name, "Title of Poem,"   in  Title of Book: Subtitle if Any ,   Edition if given and is not first edition, ed. Editor's First Name Last Name (Place of publication: Publisher, Year), Page Number.

Robert Frost, "The Road Not Taken," in The Road Not Taken and Other Poems, Anniversary edition. (Penguin books: Penguin classics, 2015), 1.

• Bibliography Entry

Author's Last Name, First Name. "Title of Poem."   In  Title of Book: Subtitle if Any.  Edition if given and is not first edition, edited by Editor's First Name Last Name, Page Range of Chapter or Part. Place of publication: Publisher, Year.

Frost, Robert. "The Road Not Taken." In  The Road Not Taken and Other Poems . Anniversary edition, 1-3. Penguin books: Penguin classics, 2015.

You must cite page numbers in each footnote. Add the page range for the chapter used in your bibliography entry.

                                         Karina Zhukovskaya/pexels

Citing a Poem Found Online in Chicago Style Guide

We'll follow the same framework and Robert Frost's poem to show you how to cite a poem you found online.

• Bibliography

1. Footnote

Author's First Name Last Name, "Title of Poem," Title of Website, Name of Owner or Sponsor    of the Website [if different from Title of Website], Date of copyright or modification or access, URL. 

Robert Frost, “The Road Not Taken,” Poetry Foundation, accessed March 30, 2023, https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44272/the-road-not-taken .

2. Bibliography

Author's Last Name, First Name. "Title of Poem." Title of Website. Name of Owner or Sponsor of the Website [if different from Title of Website]. Date of copyright or modification or access. URL.

Frost, Robert. “The Road Not Taken.” Poetry Foundation. Accessed March 30, 2023.  https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44272/the-road-not-taken .

                                     Luana Freitas/pexels

Poetry Foundation

The Poetry Foundation is a birth child of American literary society. It seeks to boost lyricism and poetry across the country. You could find a poem online from this source that meets your taste. Whether your favorite poet focuses on long poems with four or more lines in each stanza, they'll definitely have some sweet poems that may pique your interest.

The Foundation was created from Poetry magazine that runs to date. It saw a major boost in 2003 when philanthropist Ruth Lilly gifted them with a $200 million cheque!

Remember that a citation format will change with time as experts make adjustments. Note the citation style and edition in your assignment before you start writing your paper. Keeping yourself updated on the novel citation edition, whether in the MLA format or another, could make all the difference when a poem appears as your assignment.

Here's a parting shot to help you on your journey to learn how to cite a poem.

“ Poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquility. ”

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Purdue Online Writing Lab Purdue OWL® College of Liberal Arts

Writing About Poetry

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This section covers the basics of how to write about poetry, including why it is done, what you should know, and what you can write about.

Writing about poetry can be one of the most demanding tasks that many students face in a literature class. Poetry, by its very nature, makes demands on a writer who attempts to analyze it that other forms of literature do not. So how can you write a clear, confident, well-supported essay about poetry? This handout offers answers to some common questions about writing about poetry.

What's the Point?

In order to write effectively about poetry, one needs a clear idea of what the point of writing about poetry is. When you are assigned an analytical essay about a poem in an English class, the goal of the assignment is usually to argue a specific thesis about the poem, using your analysis of specific elements in the poem and how those elements relate to each other to support your thesis.

So why would your teacher give you such an assignment? What are the benefits of learning to write analytic essays about poetry? Several important reasons suggest themselves:

• To help you learn to make a text-based argument. That is, to help you to defend ideas based on a text that is available to you and other readers. This sharpens your reasoning skills by forcing you to formulate an interpretation of something someone else has written and to support that interpretation by providing logically valid reasons why someone else who has read the poem should agree with your argument. This isn't a skill that is just important in academics, by the way. Lawyers, politicians, and journalists often find that they need to make use of similar skills.
• To help you to understand what you are reading more fully. Nothing causes a person to make an extra effort to understand difficult material like the task of writing about it. Also, writing has a way of helping you to see things that you may have otherwise missed simply by causing you to think about how to frame your own analysis.
• To help you enjoy poetry more! This may sound unlikely, but one of the real pleasures of poetry is the opportunity to wrestle with the text and co-create meaning with the author. When you put together a well-constructed analysis of the poem, you are not only showing that you understand what is there, you are also contributing to an ongoing conversation about the poem. If your reading is convincing enough, everyone who has read your essay will get a little more out of the poem because of your analysis.

What Should I Know about Writing about Poetry?

Most importantly, you should realize that a paper that you write about a poem or poems is an argument. Make sure that you have something specific that you want to say about the poem that you are discussing. This specific argument that you want to make about the poem will be your thesis. You will support this thesis by drawing examples and evidence from the poem itself. In order to make a credible argument about the poem, you will want to analyze how the poem works—what genre the poem fits into, what its themes are, and what poetic techniques and figures of speech are used.

What Can I Write About?

Theme: One place to start when writing about poetry is to look at any significant themes that emerge in the poetry. Does the poetry deal with themes related to love, death, war, or peace? What other themes show up in the poem? Are there particular historical events that are mentioned in the poem? What are the most important concepts that are addressed in the poem?

Genre: What kind of poem are you looking at? Is it an epic (a long poem on a heroic subject)? Is it a sonnet (a brief poem, usually consisting of fourteen lines)? Is it an ode? A satire? An elegy? A lyric? Does it fit into a specific literary movement such as Modernism, Romanticism, Neoclassicism, or Renaissance poetry? This is another place where you may need to do some research in an introductory poetry text or encyclopedia to find out what distinguishes specific genres and movements.

Versification: Look closely at the poem's rhyme and meter. Is there an identifiable rhyme scheme? Is there a set number of syllables in each line? The most common meter for poetry in English is iambic pentameter, which has five feet of two syllables each (thus the name "pentameter") in each of which the strongly stressed syllable follows the unstressed syllable. You can learn more about rhyme and meter by consulting our handout on sound and meter in poetry or the introduction to a standard textbook for poetry such as the Norton Anthology of Poetry . Also relevant to this category of concerns are techniques such as caesura (a pause in the middle of a line) and enjambment (continuing a grammatical sentence or clause from one line to the next). Is there anything that you can tell about the poem from the choices that the author has made in this area? For more information about important literary terms, see our handout on the subject.

Figures of speech: Are there literary devices being used that affect how you read the poem? Here are some examples of commonly discussed figures of speech:

• metaphor: comparison between two unlike things
• simile: comparison between two unlike things using "like" or "as"
• metonymy: one thing stands for something else that is closely related to it (For example, using the phrase "the crown" to refer to the king would be an example of metonymy.)
• synecdoche: a part stands in for a whole (For example, in the phrase "all hands on deck," "hands" stands in for the people in the ship's crew.)
• personification: a non-human thing is endowed with human characteristics
• litotes: a double negative is used for poetic effect (example: not unlike, not displeased)
• irony: a difference between the surface meaning of the words and the implications that may be drawn from them

Cultural Context: How does the poem you are looking at relate to the historical context in which it was written? For example, what's the cultural significance of Walt Whitman's famous elegy for Lincoln "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed" in light of post-Civil War cultural trends in the U.S.A? How does John Donne's devotional poetry relate to the contentious religious climate in seventeenth-century England? These questions may take you out of the literature section of your library altogether and involve finding out about philosophy, history, religion, economics, music, or the visual arts.

What Style Should I Use?

It is useful to follow some standard conventions when writing about poetry. First, when you analyze a poem, it is best to use present tense rather than past tense for your verbs. Second, you will want to make use of numerous quotations from the poem and explain their meaning and their significance to your argument. After all, if you do not quote the poem itself when you are making an argument about it, you damage your credibility. If your teacher asks for outside criticism of the poem as well, you should also cite points made by other critics that are relevant to your argument. A third point to remember is that there are various citation formats for citing both the material you get from the poems themselves and the information you get from other critical sources. The most common citation format for writing about poetry is the Modern Language Association (MLA) format .

Citing a Poem

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Poetry is one of the most artistic and beautiful forms of writing, and can be a valuable resource to consider as a paper topic or as a piece of evidence for a research paper. Let’s take a look at how to cite a poem in some of the most popular citation styles available on Cite This For Me.

Here are some of the pieces of information you may want to locate prior to making your reference for a poem:

• Poet’s first and last name
• Title of the poem
• Title of the book where you located or read the poem (if applicable)
• Book editor’s first and last name (if applicable)
• Publisher name
• Year published
• Page numbers

How to cite a poem in Harvard referencing style (Cite Them Right 10 th edition)

Poet Last Name, First Initial. (Year) ‘Poem title’, in Last Name, Initial (ed.) Book title. Location: Publisher, pp. xx-xx.

Frost, R. (2015) ‘The road not taken’, in Swank, L. (ed.) An introduction to American poetry. New York: Viking Press, pp. 48-49.

*For help creating citations of different sources in this format, try the Cite This For Me Harvard reference generator .

How to cite a poem in MLA format

Poet Last Name, First Name. “Title of Poem.” Title of Book: Subtitle if Any , edited by Editor’s First Name Last Name, Edition if given and is not first, Publisher Name often shortened, Year of Publication, pp. xx-xx.

Frost, Robert. “The Road Not Taken.” An Introduction to American Poetry , edited by Lisa Swank, Viking Press, 2015, pp. 48-49.

*If you’re doing an annotated bibliography, be sure to check out this MLA annotated bibliography example .

How to cite a poem in APA format

Poet Last Name, First Initial. (Year). Poem title. In Editor Initial Last Name (Ed.), Book title (pp. xx-xx). Publisher.

Frost, R. (2015). The road not taken. In L. Swank (Ed.), An introduction to American poetry (pp. 48-49). Viking Press.

*Creating an in-text citation? The following link has an APA in-text citation example.

To create an in-text citation for a poem in the MLA style, the author’s full name and the title of the poem should be mentioned in prose the first time. Thereafter, either the in prose or parenthetical citation format can be used.

Citation in Prose format and example:

Author’s First and Last Name . . . “Title of Poem” . . . .  OR  “ Title of Poem” . . . Author’s First and Last Name . . . .

In “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” Robert Frost uses repetition to present . . . .

Parenthetical Citation format and example:

(Author’s Last Name)

Use this format if discussing more than one of the author’s poems:

(Author’s Last Name Title of Work)

(Frost “Stopping”)

Citing Poem Lines

If referring to specific lines within a poem, like when using a quote, line numbers are used. Use the poet’s last name and the line numbers in the in-text citation.

If it is a short poem (less than a page), line numbers are optional. If it is a very long poem and has named divisions (e.g., canto or book), include these divisions. If no lines numbers are provided for a poem, use the page number if available.

Citation in Prose format:

Author’s First and Last Name and “Title of Poem” . . .

Author’s First and Last Name and Title of Poem and Division and line #.

Citation in Prose examples:

In Robert Hayden’s “Those Winter Sundays,” “blueblack cold” is an example of synesthesia.

In John Milton’s Paradise Lost , Book 1, line 263, Satan says, “Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heav’n.”

Parenthetical Citation format:

(Last Name, line #) [if your source has line numbers]

(Last Name, division #. line #)

(Last Name) [If your source does not have line numbers]

Parenthetical Citation examples:

The second stanza employs hyperbole. “Ten thousand saw I at a glance, / Tossing their heads in sprightly dance” (Wordsworth, lines 11-12).

In Canto VI, Virgil states that “the more a thing is perfect / The more it feels of pleasure and of pain” (Alighieri 6.105).

The poet juxtaposes two opposite concepts in the lines, “Once upon an eternity within a second” (Hammock).

When using a short quote from a poem, use the same punctuation and spellings that are found in the poem. A single forward slash is used to indicate the spacing between individual lines and a double slash is used to indicate a stanza break.

To format an MLA works-cited list entry for a poem include the poem’s author, the poem’s title, the title of the work in which the poem appears (anthology title, book title, etc.), the editor or author of the work in which the poem appears, the publisher, the year, and the page number. If applicable, also include the anthology’s details, such as edition number and volume number.

Author Last Name, First Name. “Poem Title.” Book Title , Editor’s First and Last Name, general editor, # ed., vol. #, Publisher Name, Publication, Year, p. #.

Frost, Robert. “Home Burial.” Poetry: A Pocket Anthology , R.S. Gwynn, general editor, 3rd ed., Penguin Academics, 2002, pp. 213-15.

Home / Guides / Citation Guides / How to Cite Sources / How to Cite a Poem in MLA

How to Cite a Poem in MLA

When writing a research essay, you may want to include poetry. It can be difficult to know how to cite a poem properly since it’s a particular type of resource that can be found online, in a book, or in an anthology.

This page contains everything you need to know to cite a poem in MLA style within your paper and on your reference page, as well as how to properly quote poems of different lengths within your paper. This page also contains information on creating your citations, formatting examples, and what details you need to compile before you can begin.

This guide follows rules established in the MLA Handbook , 9th edition, but is not officially associated with the Modern Language Association.

What You Need

Before you can create your poem citation, you will need to gather information on your source. If available, find:

• Poet’s first and last name
• Line, page number, or page range
• Title of the poem
• Year of the original and/or source publication
• Title of the book of poetry it’s in
• Title of the website it’s on
• Title of the anthology it’s in
• Name of the publishing company or website publisher
• URL (if applicable – online sources only)
• Editor(s) first and last name(s) (if applicable – anthologies only)

Citing a Poem Found Online 

Since poems can come from multiple sources, there are a few basic formats you can follow to create a citation. The formatting guidelines are different depending on where you found the poem. This section contains the basic format for any poetry you found online, including if it’s a PDF from another source.

Basic format:

Poet’s Last Name, First Name. “Title of the Poem.” Year of poem’s original publication (if available). Title of the Website, Name of Website Publisher, URL. Accessed day month year.

Frost, Robert. “Birches.” 1969. Poetry Foundation, Poetry Foundation, www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44260/birches. Accessed 1 Mar. 2020.

Step-by-Step Instructions:

• Begin the citation with the poet’s last name, with the first letter capitalized. Follow the last name with a comma and then the poet’s first name, also with a capitalized first letter. Follow the first name with a period.
• Put the title of the poem in quotation marks. Place a period after the title of the poem within the quotation marks. The title of the poem should be capitalized in title case (using capital letters only at the beginning of principal words).
• Put the numerical year of the poem’s original publication. You may have to do research beyond your online source for the poem to find this information. Follow the numerical year with a period.
• Put the title of the website in italics. Be sure to use title case capitalization here again. Follow the website title with a comma.
• Put the name of the website publisher in normal text (not italicized), using title case capitalization. Follow with a comma.
• Put the URL for your web source, without including https:// at the beginning. Follow the URL with a period.
• Write the word “Accessed” (with a capital A, without the quotation marks) followed by the date you looked up the web resource. The format for the date should be: the numerical day, capitalized and spelled-out month, and full numerical year. Be sure to place a period after the year to end your citation. The date should not include commas. So, for example, if the date you accessed your web source was March 12, 2020, you would finish your citation with “Accessed 12 Mar. 2020.” The access date is supplemental and may not always need to be included.

Citing a Poem from a Book

The formatting guidelines for citing a poem from a book are different from the guidelines for citing a poem found online. Note that anthologies have their own citation format. An anthology is a collection of works from different authors. This section contains the basic guidelines for citing a poem from a book. The format for anthologies is provided in the next section.

Basic Format: 

Poet’s Last Name, First Name. “Title of the Poem.” Title of the Book, Name of Publishing Company, Year of publication, page number or page range.

Frost, Robert. “The Road Not Taken.” Robert Frost Selected Poems, Fall River Press, 2011, p. 25.

• Put the title of the book where you read the poem in italics and title case, followed by a comma.
• Put the name of the publishing company in normal text (not italicized) as it is capitalized in the book, followed by a comma. This should be in title case since it is a proper noun. You do not need to include the location of the publisher.
• Put the numerical year of the book’s publication (which may be different from the year of the poem’s original publication), followed by a comma.
• Provide the page number(s) for the poem you are citing using “p.” or “pp.” and the page number or page range. For example, if the poem is on page 26, put p. 26. If the poem spreads across two or more pages, use “pp.” For example, if the poem is from page 26-29, put pp. 26-29. Follow the page number with a period to end your citation.

Citing a Poem from an Anthology

The guidelines for citing a poem from an anthology are different from the guidelines for citing a poem found online or even in a poetry book. An anthology is a compilation of different works from different authors or artists. The following format is for poems from an anthology.

Basic Format for a poem in an anthology: 

Poet’s Last Name, First Name. “Title of the Poem.” Title of Anthology, edited by Editor’s First and Last Name, edition (if applicable), volume (if applicable), Publisher, year of anthology publication, page number or page range.

Drummond, William. “Life.” The Giant Book of Poetry , edited by William Roetzheim, Level4Press Inc, 2006, p. 55.

• Put the title of the anthology where you found the poem in italics and title case, followed by a comma.
• For two editors, separate the names with the word “and” rather than an ampersand.
• For three or more editors, use commas to separate each editor’s name, using “and” only between the last two editors.
• If applicable to the anthology, include the book’s edition (e.g., 4th ed.) followed by a comma.
• If applicable to the anthology, include the book’s volume number (e.g., vol. 2) followed by a comma.
• Put the name of the publishing company in normal text (not italicized) as it is capitalized in the anthology, followed by a comma. You do not need to include the location of the publisher.

In-Text Citations

Unlike the reference page citations, MLA in-text citations for poems are generally the same regardless of the source. The examples below follow Sections 6.22 and 6.36 from the Handbook.

For in an-text citation, all you need to provide is:

• The poet’s last name
• The line number(s) or page number of the poem you are referencing

(Poet’s Last Name, line(s) #-#)

(Chaucer, lines 6-10)

If you state the author’s name within the sentence, you may just include the line numbers in parentheses instead of repeating the author’s name in the in-text citation. If no line numbers for the poem exist, do not count the lines yourself. Instead, include a page number.

As stated by Chaucer, “Thoght ye to me ne do no daliance” (line 8).

Quoting Up to Three Lines of Poetry

Using a direct quote from a poem is different from making a reference to a poem within your paper. To use a direct quote, you must put it in quotation marks.

To quote anything from a partial line of poetry up to three lines of poetry, you can simply use quotations and a “/” symbol to separate the lines, with a space on either side of the slash. Following the in-text citation guidelines in the section above, place your in-text citation at the end of your quote in parentheses, after the closing quotation marks and before the period.

“Two roads diverged in a wood, and I – / I took the one less traveled by / And that has made all the difference” (Frost, lines 18-20).

In Robert Frost’s poem, he states, “Two roads diverged in a wood, and I – / I took the one less traveled by / And that has made all the difference” (lines 18-20).

Quoting Four or More Lines of Poetry

If you’d like to directly quote four or more lines of poetry within your paper, you will need to follow different guidelines than the ones above for three or fewer lines of poetry. When quoting four or more lines of poetry, you will not use quotation marks. Here are more formatting guidelines:

• In most cases, you will use a colon (:) at the end of the sentence before you begin your direct quote from the poem.
• After the sentence introducing the quote, leave an empty line before beginning the quote.
• You must separate a long quote from the rest of your paper by using a half-inch indent from the left throughout the quote.
• Instead of using a “ / ” to separate the lines of poetry, try to follow the original format of the poem as closely as possible.
• If a line is too long to fit across the page, use a hanging indent, so that the remainder of the line is more indented than the rest of the block quote.
• Place your in-text citation in parentheses at the end of the quote, following the last period (or other punctuation) of the quote and without punctuation after the closing parentheses. If the citation will not fit on the line, add it to the following line on the right-hand side of the page.

The poem describes choices in life by using the metaphor of a fork in the road:

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth; (Frost, lines 1-5)

MLA Handbook . 9th ed., Modern Language Association of America, 2021.

Published October 21, 2013. Updated May 18, 2021.

Written by Grace Turney. Grace is a former librarian and has a Master’s degree in Library Science and Information Technology. She is a freelance author and artist.

Citation Guides

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In-text citation for a poem can be in the following format:

• If you are quoting two or three lines of a poem, the quote should be placed within double quotation marks with a slash as a line separator, with one space on either side. (Stanzas should be separated with a double slash.) The quote should be followed by the author’s last name and the line numbers within parentheses.
• If the author’s name is already mentioned in text, only the line number should be inserted within parentheses next to the quotation.
• If there is no line number available for the poem, page numbers can be used.

William Wordsworth wrote, “The storm came on before its time: / She wandered up and down” (lines 11-12).

• If you are quoting four or more lines of a poem, your quote should be an indented block quote rather than enclosed within quotation marks.
• A colon should be placed at the end of the introductory text with a blank line following it.
• The full block quote should be indented a half inch throughout and match its original formatting as closely as possible.
• The author’s last name and line numbers should be placed at the end of the quotation within parentheses. The end period should be placed before the source.

The author was inspired by the lines of a poem: Not blither is the mountain roe: With many a wanton stroke Her feet disperse the powdery snow, That rises up like smoke. (Wordsworth, lines 13–16)

To cite a poem or short story, include the following details: the author’s name, year published, title of the poem/story, title of the book where you located or read the poem (if applicable), book editor’s first and last name (if applicable), publisher name, and page numbers.

Citation Basics

Harvard Referencing

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