Symbols memories of the past - notebook, pen and ink

While there are lots of verses about love, poems about being single can be hard to find. However, if you are single poetry can be a vehicle to help fight off loneliness and loss or serve as an anthem of pride.

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Emotional Poems About Being Single

Whether you're single and happy or single and lonely, poetry about your dating status captures real emotions in real time. A little sarcastic humor in a poem can also lighten the mood around this sometimes too serious topic.

Living the Single Life

By Michele Meleen

I'm single because

I won't let you capture me.

I'm wild and untethered

Choosing to be free.

I go where I want and do as I please alone and with others no commitment to appease.

I'm living the single life enjoying every moment until the day comes when I'm ready to quit.

One Day

By Michele Meleen

Yesterday I woke up single and fell asleep the same.

No lover came to take my hand or call me a special name.

Today I'll wake alone again and hope to find my person.

Maybe I'll find options or maybe I'll find none

But, one day I know I'll find

Someone for whom I'm designed.

Happy to be With Me

By Michele Meleen

Some say I must be lonely, but they'd be quite wrong.

I'm happy to be with me even if my single stretch is long.

This Empty Life

woman looking at camera and ignoring one happy couple

By Michele Meleen

This empty life should be full but there's no one here to share it.

Each place I go and thing I see less meaningful than it could be.

This empty life should be full but I'm single and alone.

Single Women of the World

By Michele Meleen

Single women of the world unite, for you are not alone.

We're not all married, hitched, or in like, and waiting by the phone.

Some say there's something wrong with you to be without a partner.

Wouldn't they be shocked to know being single doesn't make you an amateur?

Single Man Status

By Michele Meleen

The single man status can be hated or revered.

Take this chance to look inside or live it up, the choice is only yours.

Singles Storm

By Michele Meleen

Single and ready to mingle

Is what my ad might say.

Saving all my real love for a rainy day.

Well, get your umbrellas ready single people that day is coming and when I let loose on the dating scene even the Red Cross won't get that place clean,

I'll be crushing hearts and killing dreams until I find the one for me.

Writing Tips for the Solitary Poet

Understandably, the majority of poems about being single are going to be about either the breakup or how much the poet wishes he or she wasn't single. Writing out your feelings about loneliness, fears of never finding anyone else, or what went wrong with past loves can be very cathartic and help you through the dark times. There's no need to be embarrassed about poetry; no one ever has to see it besides you and there aren't any rules about how to create it.

Poems About Being Single: Does It Have to Rhyme?

There are many other forms of poetry to choose from, and there is no need to even make it rhyme. The reason poetry can be powerful is not because it is filled with flowery prose, but because poets find ways to make words express feelings more purely and directly.

Personalized Poem Techniques

Fridge Magnets

A lot of poems come out of simply doodling words over a piece of blank paper. Another technique for writing poems about being is single is to print out words and glue them to magnetic sheets which are available at many office supply stores. Cut out the individual words and put them on your fridge for some instant magnetic poems about being single. As the words no longer seem necessary, as your heart heals and you move on, perhaps the words will slowly disappear or at least take on new meaning when you re-arrange the feelings of being single.

Writing a Breakup Poem

These may be melodramatic, but that's alright. They are meant to be only for you, and only for the honest emotions, you are feeling. Once you have this raw material down, you are ready to go on and write the poem itself. For example, if you've recently broken up, your words may include:

  • Sorrow
  • Grief
  • Loneliness
  • Miss her
  • Failed
  • Love
  • No more
  • Touch
  • Kiss
  • Smile
  • Crying
  • Breathe
  • Struggle

Writing With Rhyming Couplets

One of the easiest and most common forms of poetry (as done by poet laureates such as Alfred Lord Tennyson) are rhyming couplets. These include verses that come in pairs and the last word of every pair rhymes. For example:

Thoughts are filled with sorrow, of the many things I miss,

The way her mouth would shape her breath, the way her lips would kiss.

Writing Single Life Haiku

This Japanese form of poetry doesn't rhyme but is ruled by a couple of guidelines. It consists of three line with five syllables in the first, seven in the second, and five in the third. A haiku typically includes at least one evocative image or mention of nature. Haikus are sometimes cryptic, but almost always cause thoughtful reflection. For example:

Crying seems endless,

Aching with love lost again,

Thunder sounds alone.

Writing With Limericks

A more lighthearted way to write poems is through limericks which are often funny but don't have to be. Limericks have a particular scansion, or rhythmic nature to the word, as well as a rhyming scheme for the five lines that go A-A-B-B-A (with each letter representing a rhyming word at the end of the phrase). A limerick about being single could be:

The single man breathes in again,

With ranks of the singular men,

"My heart has felt worse,"

He said with a curse,

And vainly swore off all women.

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Portraying the Single Life

Different styles of poetry portray the various perspectives you might have on being single. Whether you read or write poems about your dating status, look for words and phrases that capture how you feel in the moment.