John Green Reads Poetry

So many poems to listen to!

Hey, there’s a missing poem!

Hi! This website is an ongoing labor of love inspired by John’s self-proclaimed love of poetry ¹ and the mission of Ours Poetica

We’re working very hard combing through the vast amounts of online content John and Hank have created ³ — and continue to create! — to find every instance of John reading poetry.⁴ Most of these were short poems that used to appear as an opening segment in the Dear Hank & John pod.⁵

Check out our growing list of missing or lost poetry-related John Green media:

We have a long way to go, and are using the posts’ dates as a way to organize everything chronologically with relevant tags to make everything extra useable!

So if you have a suggestion of something we missed or would like to share a piece of poetry-related media you’ve found…

  1. This is also a recurring riff in many of the opening segments of Dear Hank & John
  2. A lovely play on the Latin phrase Ars Poetica (“The Art of Poetry”)
  3. Examples: 1 | 2
  4. And, occasionally, someone else, such as his wife, his brother, or a poem inspired by one of Hank’s rants. Admittedly, some things are qualified as ‘poems’ rather loosely — John has read lyrics, and other nontraditional items as poetry, and that’s a wonderful thing!
    Because poetry is, always, what we make it.
  5. And are still missed by Nerdfighters everywhere!

Related Resources

Dear Hank & John

Or as he likes to call it: “Dear John & Hank”

Transcripts*
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Ears Poetica

A simple listening library of John reading poetry to you!

“Hope Is The Thing With Feathers” (excerpt) by Emily Dickinson
December 3, 2025
“On Poetry: a Rhapsody” (excerpt) by Jonathan Swift
September 3, 2024
“Poetry” (excerpt) by Marianne Moore
August 17, 2021
“A Servant to Servants” (excerpt, paraphrased) by Robert Frost
March 17, 2020
“Mountain Dew Commercial Disguised as a Love Poem” by Matthew Olzmann
February 14, 2020
“Poetry” (excerpts) by Marianne Moore
September 24, 2019
“On the Train, a Man Snatches My Book” (excerpt) by Paige Lewis
September 24, 2019
Poem 340 (excerpt) by Emily Dickinson
September 24, 2019
“Poetry” by Marianne Moore
September 12, 2019
Poem 340 by Emily Dickinson
September 12, 2019
“The House Was Quiet and The World Was Calm” by Wallace Stevens
June 5, 2018
“Spring is like a perhaps hand” (excerpt) by EE Cummings
June 5, 2018
“When They Tell You The Brontosaurus Never Existed” (excerpt) by Clint Smith
August 15, 2017
Sonnet 18 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 130 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 130 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 116 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 116 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 116 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 116 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 116 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 116 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 18 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 18 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 55 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 144 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 130 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 116 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 18 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
“Last Will and Testament of John Keats” by John Keats
July 28, 2016
Sonnet 18 (excerpt) by William Shakespeare
July 28, 2016
“Try to Praise the Mutilated World” by Adam Zagajewski
July 26, 2016
“Not So Far as the Forest” (excerpt) by Edna St. Vincent Millay
July 6, 2016
Prose poem by ‘Leon Muss’
June 30, 2016
“Float Like a Butterfly” by Muhammad Ali
June 21, 2016
“Disturbing moths” by Richard Wright
June 15, 2016
“Now Let No Charitable Hope” by Elinor Wylie
June 7, 2016
“Poem” by Langston Hughes
May 31, 2016
“The Daffodil Knows More of Spring” by an anonymous listener
May 24, 2016
“There is No Frigate Like a Book” by Emily Dickinson
May 17, 2016
“The Guitarist Tunes Up” by Frances Darwin Cornford
May 2, 2016
“Hope Is The Thing With Feathers” by Emily Dickinson
April 26, 2016
“On Rupert Brooke” by Frances Darwin Cornford
April 20, 2016
“To His Coy Mistress” (excerpt) by Andrew Marvell
April 12, 2016
Haiku (647) by Richard Wright
April 5, 2016
Haiku 78 by Richard Wright
March 29, 2016
“There Will Come Soft Rains” by Sara Teasdale
March 21, 2016
“Tourists” by DH Lawrence
March 16, 2016
“Light Is More Important Than The Lantern” by Nizar Qabbani
March 8, 2016
Parable of the Sower (book quote) by Octavia Butler
March 2, 2016
“If You Are Holding This Book” by Mary Oliver
February 23, 2016
Parable of the Sower (book quotes) by Octavia Butler
February 16, 2016
Parable of the Sower (book quotes) by Octavia Butler
February 16, 2016
Parable of the Sower (book quotes) by Octavia Butler
February 16, 2016
“If We Must Die” by Claude McKay
February 16, 2016
“Funeral Blues” by WH Auden
February 9, 2016
“Epitaph on a Friend” by Robert Burns
February 3, 2016
“Eight Line Poem” (lyrics) by David Bowie
January 27, 2016
“Black Magic” by Sonia Sanchez
January 19, 2016
“‘Hope’ Is The Thing With Feathers” by Emily Dickinson
January 11, 2016
“He Tells Her” by Wendy Cope
December 22, 2015
Poem 202 by Emily Dickinson
December 15, 2015
“Virtue” by George Herbert
December 7, 2015
“O Sweet Spontaneous” by EE Cummings
December 1, 2015
“Unfortunate Consequence” by Dorothy Parker
November 23, 2015
“Poetry” (excerpt) by Marianne Moore
November 17, 2015
“The Last Will and Testament of John Keats” by John Keats
November 9, 2015
“The Last Will and Testament of John Keats” by John Keats
November 9, 2015
“I Thank You God for Most This Amazing” by EE Cummings
November 3, 2015
“The Skylight” by Seamus Heaney
October 26, 2015
“Home is so Sad” by Philip Larkin
October 20, 2015
“Discoveries in Arizona” by James Wright
October 11, 2015
“Grief” by Raymond Carver
October 6, 2015
“Reflections on Ice-Breaking” by Ogden Nash
October 6, 2015
“The Return Of Odysseus” by George Bilgere
September 29, 2015
“Variations on a Theme by William Carlos Williams” by Kenneth Koch
September 21, 2015
“This is Just to Say” by William Carlos Williams
September 14, 2015
“Song of Myself” (excerpt) by Walt Whitman
September 9, 2015
“The World Is Too Much With Us” by William Wordsworth
September 9, 2015
“The Road Not Taken” (excerpt) by Robert Frost
September 1, 2015
“You Fit Into Me” by Margaret Atwood
August 31, 2015
“Tell all the truth but tell it slant” by Emily Dickinson
August 25, 2015
[Here dead lie we because we did not choose] by AE Housman
August 17, 2015
“Never Again The Same” by James Tate
August 11, 2015
“When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer” by Walt Whitman
June 29, 2015
“I Go Down To The Shore” by Mary Oliver
June 22, 2015
“Everybody Tells Me Everything” by Ogden Nash
June 15, 2015
“Advice” by Langston Hughes
June 6, 2015
“John Keats” by J. D. Salinger
March 26, 2014
“Advice” (excerpt) by Langston Hughes
March 26, 2014
“The Last Will and Testament of John Keats” by John Keats
March 26, 2014
“The Last Will and Testament of John Keats” by John Keats
March 26, 2014
“This is Just to Say” by William Carlos Williams
March 26, 2014
“Dream Boogie” by Langston Hughes
March 26, 2014
Samaritan Woman in John 4:11
March 26, 2014
Samaritan Woman in John 4:11
March 26, 2014
“If We Must Die” (excerpts) by Claude McKay
October 4, 2013
“In Memory of W. B. Yeats” (excerpts) by W. H. Auden
May 21, 2013
“Spring is like a perhaps hand” by EE Cummings
March 26, 2013
“A Light exists in Spring” (excerpt) by Emily Dickinson
March 26, 2013
“Spring Morning” (excerpt) by A. E. Housman
March 26, 2013
“Three Spring Notations on Bipeds” (excerpt) by Carl Sandburg
March 26, 2013
“To Spring” (excerpt) by William Blake
March 26, 2013
“The Song of Spring” (song excerpt) by William Shakespeare
March 26, 2013
“There’s a certain Slant of light” (excerpt) by Emily Dickinson
November 27, 2012
“Bio Poem” by John Green
November 13, 2012
“Oh Zero” by John Green
April 26, 2012
“Song of Myself, 7” (excerpt) by Walt Whitman
November 5, 2007
“Howl” (excerpt) by Allen Ginsberg
September 14, 2007
“Song of Myself, 2” (excerpt) by Walt Whitman
September 10, 2007