Inspirational Friendship Poems

These inspirational friendship poems express universal sentiments about friendship and the joys, and sorrows, we find in these intimate relationships. Most of the famous poets of the world have penned inspirational friendship poetry.

Share our inspirational friendship poems with a friend who needs a bit of encouragement, or just to remind them how much you care.

The Arrow and the Song
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.

I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For who has sight so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?

Long, long afterward, in an oak
I found the arrow, still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend.

The joy of familiarity is a touching theme of many
inspirational friendship poems:

The Old Familiar Faces
~Charles Lamb

I have had playmates, I have had companions,
In my days of childhood, in my joyful school-days,
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

I have been laughing, I have been carousing,
Drinking late, sitting late, with my bosom cronies,
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

I loved a love once, fairest among women;
Closed are her doors on me, I must not see her —
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

I have a friend, a kinder friend has no man;
Like an ingrate, I left my friend abruptly;
Left him, to muse on the old familiar faces.

Ghost-like, I paced round the haunts of my childhood.
Earth seemed a desart I was bound to traverse,
Seeking to find the old familiar faces.

Friend of my bosom, thou more than a brother,
Why wert not thou born in my father's dwelling?
So might we talk of the old familiar faces —

How some they have died, and some they have left me,
And some are taken from me; all are departed;
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.

One of many inspirational friendship poems that
reminds us of the fine line between friendship and love.

Love and Friendship
~Emily Brontë

Love is like the wild rose-briar;
Friendship like the holly-tree.
The holly is dark when the rose-briar blooms,
But which will bloom most constantly?

The wild rose-briar is sweet in spring,
Its summer blossoms scent the air;
Yet wait till winter comes again,
And who will call the wild-briar fair?

Then, scorn the silly rose-wreath now,
And deck thee with holly's sheen,
That, when December blights thy brow,
He still may leave thy garland green.

Share an inspirational friendship poem in a card or an email. This is a good one to pass on to your friend.

I Thank You
~Henry Timrod

I thank you, kind and best beloved friend,
With the same thanks one murmurs to a sister,
When, for some gentle favor, he hath kissed her,
Less for the gifts than for the love you send,
Less for the flowers, than what the flowers convey;
If I, indeed, divine their meaning truly,
And not unto myself ascribe, unduly,
Things which you neither meant nor wished to say,
Oh! tell me, is the hope then all misplaced?
And am I flattered by my own affection?
But in your beauteous gift, methought I traced
Something above a short-lived predilection,
And which, for that I know no dearer name,
I designate as love, without love’s flame.

One of the best loved writers of inspirational friendship poems:

Friendship's Flower
~Helen Steiner Rice

Life is like a garden
And friendship like a flower,
That blooms and grows in beauty
With the sunshine and the shower.

And lovely are the blossoms
That are tended with great care,
By those who work unselfishly
To make the place more fair.

And, like the garden blossoms,
Friendship's flower grows more sweet
When watched and tended carefully
By those we know and meet.

And, if the seed of friendship
Is planted deep and true
And watched with understanding,
Friendship's flower will bloom for you.

I Saw in Louisiana A Live-Oak Growing
~ Walt Whitman

I saw in Louisiana a live-oak growing,
All alone stood it and the moss hung down from the branches,
Without any companion it grew there uttering joyous leaves of dark green,
And its look, rude, unbending, lusty, made me think of myself,
But I wonder’d how it could utter joyous leaves standing alone
there without its friend near, for I knew I could not,
And I broke off a twig with a certain number of leaves upon it,
and twined around it a little moss,
And brought it away, and I have placed it in sight in my room,
It is not needed to remind me as of my own dear friends,
(For I believe lately I think of little else than of them,)
Yet it remains to me a curious token, it makes me think of manly love;
For all that, and though the live-oak glistens there in
Louisiana solitary in a wide flat space,
Uttering joyous leaves all its life without a friend a lover near,
I know very well I could not.

Inspirational friendship poems often
remind us of the good we see in our friend:

The Good, Great Man
~Samuel Taylor Coleridge

How seldom, friend! a good great man inherits
Honour or wealth with all his worth and pains!
It sounds like stories from the land of spirits
If any man obtain that which he merits
Or any merit that which he obtains.

An inspirational friendship poem about best friends:

The Best of Friends
~Jill Wolf

When friendships undergo a test
It's often found old friends are best;
The sampler on the parlour wall
Has these few lines which say it all;
The best of friends can change a frown
Into a smile when you feel down.
The best of friends will understand
Your little trials and lend a hand.
The best of friends will always share
Your secret dreams because they care.
The best of friends, worth more than gold,
Give all the love a heart can hold.

Fragment 10: The Three Sorts of Friends
~Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Though friendships differ endless in degree,
The sorts , methinks, may be reduced to three.
Ac quaintance many, and Con quaintance few;
But for In quaintance I know only two—
The friend I've mourned with, and the maid I woo!

To a Friend
~Amy Lowell

I ask but one thing of you, only one,
That always you will be my dream of you;
That never shall I wake to find untrue
All this I have believed and rested on,
Forever vanished, like a vision gone
Out into the night. Alas, how few
There are who strike in us a chord we knew
Existed, but so seldom heard its tone
We tremble at the half-forgotten sound.
The world is full of rude awakenings
And heaven-born castles shattered to the ground,
Yet still our human longing vainly clings
To a belief in beauty through all wrongs.
O stay your hand, and leave my heart its songs!

If you enjoyed these inspirational friendship poems, you might also enjoy these pages of quotes, poems and essays about friendship and love:

Steps to Lasting Friendship

Levels of Friendship

An Intimate Friendship

Ending a Friendship

Friendship Survival Kit

Quotes About Friendship

Romantic Love Poems

More Romantic Love Poems

Funny Friendship Quotes

More Funny Friendship Quotes

True Friendship Quotes

Cute Friendship Quotes

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