--- title: World Poetry Day: Portraits of Poets From the LIFE Archives description: In honor of the March 21 observance, here are 30 timeless portraits of the men and women who made the 20th century sing. canonical: https://time.com/4700914/poets-portraits-life-magazine/ author: Lily Rothman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-03-21T12:30:59.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:50:22.357Z og:title: World Poetry Day: Portraits of Poets From the LIFE Archives og:description: World Poetry Day is March 21 og:url: https://time.com/4700914/poets-portraits-life-magazine/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc446d1ec027978d3/6988be4afb4eac07258911ba/05-ezra-pound.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2560 og:image:height: 1440 og:image:alt: Ezra Pound og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: World Poetry Day: Portraits of Poets From the LIFE Archives twitter:description: World Poetry Day is March 21 twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltc446d1ec027978d3/6988be4afb4eac07258911ba/05-ezra-pound.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # 'To Praise a Poet': 30 Portraits of Poets From the LIFE Archives > Sponsored content. 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Worth Your Time is TIME's culture recommendation newsletter, edited by culture editor Eliza Berman. Each week it surfaces the books, shows, films and ideas TIME's editors think are worth your attention, and explains why. It is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Does TIME have a culture newsletter? Yes. Worth Your Time is TIME's culture newsletter, published weekly. #### Who writes TIME's culture recommendations? Culture editor Eliza Berman writes Worth Your Time, drawing on TIME's critics and culture desk. #### Is Worth Your Time free? Yes. It is a free newsletter available at time.com/newsletters. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-worth-2026q3/newsletters?i=8737a656-ae5f-4ed4-b2ed-6b2b5aee1301&cr=time-nl-worth-2026q3-v1) by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/) and [Liz Ronk](https://time.com/author/liz-ronk/) Mar 21, 2017 12:30 PM UTC  Ezra Pound, 1970. Ezra Pound, 1970. David Lees—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images by [Lily Rothman](https://time.com/author/lily-rothman/) and [Liz Ronk](https://time.com/author/liz-ronk/) Mar 21, 2017 12:30 PM UTC For nearly 20 years, the United Nations has [designated](http://portal.unesco.org/culture/en/files/19160/10793708893PROCLAMATION1.pdf/PROCLAMATION1.pdf) March 21 as World Poetry Day, as part of UNESCO’s effort to “give poetry its rightful place in society” despite a “tendency in the media and among the general public to refuse to take the poet seriously.” But that feeling is much older than a few decades. LIFE Magazine [noted](https://books.google.com/books?id=21QEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA61&dq=robert%20frost&pg=PA60#v=onepage&q=robert%20frost&f=false) a similar sentiment in 1962, that it was easy to believe that Americans have a tendency to feel “somehow that [poetry](http://time.com/3695332/sylvia-plath-blame/) is high-flown talk and poets no real students of the world we know.” And yet, the magazine added, thanks largely to the poets whose [words](http://time.com/collection-post/3584689/poetry-voice-back-of-the-mind/) set the 20th century to new rhythms and who crafted the ideas that helped their readers see the modern world in a new way, that belief has often been proved false. No matter what people may think about poetry as a concept, it’s hard not to react when confronted with a great poem. One piece of evidence of that appreciation of poetry can be found in the pages of LIFE Magazine, where — though the magazine only occasionally ran actual poetry, usually [in the course of](https://books.google.com/books?id=tFIEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PA102#v=twopage&q&f=false) news about poets and the poetry business — readers came face to face with some of the modern world’s most well-regarded poets. In one such instance, for a story about Robert Frost, the magazine [quoted](https://books.google.com/books?id=F0oEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA65&dq=poet&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjn6NmjzNbSAhXE7CYKHcutCJ8Q6AEIIjAC#v=onepage&q=poet&f=false) the poet Paul Engle’s statement that the best way to “praise a poet” was to write a poem. LIFE, however, was better known for photography than for poetry, and so the magazine gave credit in its own way to the men and women who crafted the century’s best-loved verses. In honor of World Poetry Day, here’s a look back at 30 of those timeless portraits of poets.  Dorothy Parker, 1940. Bob Landry—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  Robert Frost, 1943. Eric Schaal—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  T.S. Eliot, 1951. Alfred Eisenstaedt—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Edna St. Vincent Millay, 1941. Alfred Eisenstaedt—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Ezra Pound, 1970. David Lees—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Carl Sandburg, 1953. Allan Grant—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  William Carlos Williams, 1954. Lisa Larsen—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  W.H. Auden, 1969. Harry Redl—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Allen Ginsberg, 1966. John Loengard—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Langston Hughes, 1958. Robert W. Kelley—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Marianne Moore, 1953. Esther Bubley—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  John Berryman, 1967. Terence Spencer—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Jorge Luis Borges and his wife, 1968. Charles H. Phillips—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Pablo Neruda, 1949. Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Leonard Cohen, 1960. James Burke—The LIFE Collection/Getty Images  Robinson Jeffers, 1948. Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Rod McKuen, 1967. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Gregory Corso, 1959. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Robert Lowell, 1956. Alfred Eisenstaedt—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Edith Sitwell, 1953. George Silk—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Ogden Nash holding his daughter Jill, 1951. Mark Kauffman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Paul Valery, 1945. David E. Scherman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Sarojini Naidu, 1946. Margaret Bourke-White—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Robert Penn Warren, 1956. Leonard McCombe—The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images  Lawrence Ferlinghetti, 1957. Nat Farbman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Archibald MacLeish, 1960. Alfred Eisenstaedt—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Evgeny Evtushenko, 1968. Stan Wayman—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Wallace Stevens, 1950. Walter Sanders—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Louis Aragon, 1946. Ralph Morse—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Kenneth Rexroth, 1957. 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