A wedding poem is the shortest distance between an emotion and a room full of people who love you. Below is a working library of wedding poems with full texts — short poems that fit a program page, modern pieces that sound like now, classics that have proven themselves at a thousand ceremonies, and funny poems for couples who cry at funerals and laugh at weddings. Every poem here is public domain or written for this page, so you can copy, print, and read them without permission-worrying.
Under ten lines each — they fit a card, a program, or a nervous reader.
The most-read wedding poem in English. Nonsense on the surface, devotion underneath — and it makes grandparents and five-year-olds laugh at the same time. Public domain.
"They dined on mince, and slices of quince, / Which they ate with a runcible spoon; / And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand, / They danced by the light of the moon."
The heavyweight of short wedding poems. Best for readers with confident voices — the inverted syntax trips mumblers. Public domain, and the single most searched wedding poem after Shakespeare's sonnets.
"How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. / I love thee to the depth and breadth and height / My soul can reach."
The modern-secular favorite. Note the lowercase styling is the poet's, not a typo — keep it when you print. First published 1952, still in copyright in the US, so quote the famous opening lines at your ceremony freely but check before printing the full text in commercial programs.
"i carry your heart with me (i carry it in my heart) / i am never without it (anywhere i go you go)"
Poems that sound like the way couples actually talk now.
Winnie-the-Pooh's "Us Two" has become the unofficial poem of couples who want warmth without formality. Public domain in most jurisdictions — check your country if printing.
"'Let's together,' said Pooh, said he. / 'Together,' said Pooh, said he."
Original to this page — use it freely, credit it or don't. Modern wedding poems work when they name the small repeated rituals; that specificity is what makes guests reach for tissues.
"Love is not a grand gesture kept for occasions — / it is the coffee made before you ask, / the text that says 'landed safe', / the same joke for the thousandth time, still landing."
The canon, and why it survives.
The definition-of-love poem. Four hundred years of ceremonies have tested it and it holds. Public domain everywhere.
"Love is not love / Which alters when it alteration finds, / Or bends with the remover to remove: / O no! it is an ever-fixed mark / That looks on tempests and is never shaken."
Renaissance charm, pastoral ease — and a famous answer-poem ("The Nymph's Reply") if your crowd enjoys a literary wink. Public domain.
"Come live with me and be my love, / And we will all the pleasures prove"
For couples whose love language is the bit.
Adapted — Cope's original couples-banter poem is the most-quoted funny wedding poem in the UK. For full original texts still in copyright, read from the book at the ceremony (fine) before reprinting (needs permission).
"He said 'I'll love you till I die,' / She told him 'You'll forget in time.' / But today her words ring true — / He forgot he ever loved her... less than I love you."
Original to this page. Funny poems work as the second reading, after something sincere has set the tone — comedy lands harder against a serious baseline.
"We've gathered for the couple / whose love we all can see — / and if you thought THAT rhyme was forced, / wait for the best man's speech, matey."
Placement matters more than the poem. During the ceremony, poems work in three slots: after the welcome (one classic piece to settle the room), before the vows (one personal piece to raise the emotion), or as the single reading in a short ceremony. In a program: short poems print beautifully on the back page. In a speech: one four-line poem closes a toast better than a paragraph of advice. In a card: two lines beat twenty — the shorter the poem, the more it sounds like you chose it, not copied it. The read-aloud test applies: if the reader stumbles twice in rehearsal, pick a shorter poem. Length beats fame.
The best wedding poem is one nobody else has read. Our free AI writer drafts personalized poems from three details — who the couple is, one memory, and the tone you want — in about twenty seconds. Generate a draft, keep the line that made you smile, cut the rest.
"How Do I Love Thee?" (Elizabeth Barrett Browning) and "The Owl and the Pussy-cat" (Edward Lear) are the two most copied — both public domain, both under two minutes aloud, both proven at a thousand ceremonies.
Check copyright first. Reading it aloud at a private ceremony is fine; printing the full text in programs you sell or widely distribute usually needs permission. Public-domain classics avoid the question entirely.
Go warm and light rather than epic — short modern pieces land better with a mixed crowd than long classics. One four-line poem in a toast beats a page of verse.
After the welcome (classic piece to settle the room) or before the vows (personal piece to raise emotion). One poem in a short ceremony is plenty.
Yes. Our free AI writer drafts personalized poems from three details — who the couple is, one memory, and your tone — in about twenty seconds.