WHEN I WAS GROWING UP, all I wanted to do was be with my friends, be like my friends, and dress the same way as my friends did. We all had the same hairstyle and hair color, and mostly we still do. Growing up in a large extended family also gave me a built-in set of people who still know almost everything about me, and taught me how to be a good friend. If we are lucky, we have close friends who have been part of our lives since childhood or college, and others we have connected with through work or through our children. We share relationship dramas, issues at work, health and mothering questions. Now that my children are mostly grown, friends are the ones I turn to for laughter and comfort. One of my favorite lines is in the poem “Girlfriends” by Ellen Doré Watson, who writes of long-term friendships, “The lifers/who, even seven states away, are the porches/where we land.”

Although female friendships are an important part of our lives, there are not as many poems about female friendship as one might expect. Poets seem to be more concerned with love relationships or their solitary pursuits. However, when they do examine the subject of friendship, they distill its essence. One of the most important qualities in a friendship is that it makes each of us into a better person. “A Poem of Friendship” by Nikki Giovanni and “Love” by Roy Croft explore this aspect of friendship. Other poems, like “My Friend’s Divorce” by Naomi Shihab Nye and “Secret Lives” by Barbara Ras, celebrate the love and support friends give each other during difficult times.

One of my daughters’ favorite poems is the dark and startling “A Poison Tree” by William Blake. Blake was ahead of his time in recognizing how important it is to discuss anger and disappointment with our friends, and the dangerous consequences of withholding our feelings.

Once our children have left home (although they say that never really happens), we look for others to care for. I know quite a few middle-aged women who have fallen in love with their pets—and I am one of them. That is why Elizabeth Barrett Browning, known better for her sonnet “How Do I Love Thee? Let Me Count the Ways,” is represented here with a poem to her dog, Flush.

And when we run out of friends, there is always “Chocolate” by Rita Dove.