Famous Preached Poems by Famous Poets

These are examples of famous Preached poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous preached poems. These examples illustrate what a famous preached poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).

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Cleon

...writeth, doth he? well, and he may write. 
Oh, the Jew findeth scholars! certain slaves 
Who touched on this same isle, preached him and Christ; 
And (as I gathered from a bystander) 
Their doctrine could be held by no sane man....Read more of this...
by Browning, Robert


Eddis Service

...ey steamed and dripped in the chancel,
 They listened and never stirred,
While, just as though they were Bishops,
 Eddi preached them The World,

Till the gale blew off on the marshes
 And the windows showed the day,
And the Ox and the Ass together
 Wheeled and clattered away.

And when the Saxons mocked him,
 Said Eddi of Manhood End,
"I dare not shut His chapel
 On such as care to attend."...Read more of this...
by Kipling, Rudyard

Father

...; 
He was clean in heart, and body, and in mind.
So he made them heirs to riches without price –
This father.

He never preached or scolded; and the rod –
Well, he used it as a turning pole in play.
But he showed the tender sympathy of God.
To his children in their troubles, and their joys.
He was always chum and comrade with his boys, 
And his daughters – oh, you ought to hear them say
‘Father.’

Now I think of all achievements ‘tis the least
To perpetuate the species; it is...Read more of this...
by Wilcox, Ella Wheeler

Jubilate Agno: Fragment B Part 3

...dners talent. 

For the flowers are great blessings. 

For the Lord made a Nosegay in the meadow with his disciples and preached upon the lily. 

For the angels of God took it out of his hand and carried it to the Height. 

For a man cannot have publick spirit, who is void of private benevolence. 

For there is no Height in which there are not flowers. 

For flowers have great virtues for all the senses. 

For the flower glorifies God and the root parries the adversary. 

For...Read more of this...
by Smart, Christopher

King Arthurs Tomb

...e rode on giddy still, until he reach'd
A place of apple-trees, by the thorn-tree
Wherefrom St. Joseph in the days past preached.

Dazed there he laid his head upon a tomb,
Not knowing it was Arthur's, at which sight
One of her maidens told her, "He is come,"
And she went forth to meet him; yet a blight

Had settled on her, all her robes were black,
With a long white veil only; she went slow,
As one walks to be slain, her eyes did lack
Half her old glory, yea, alas! the glow
...Read more of this...
by Morris, William


Night Funeral In Harlem

...from that poor boy's friends--
They'll want flowers, too,
When they meet their ends.

 Night funeral 
 in Harlem:

 Who preached that
 Black boy to his grave?

Old preacher man
Preached that boy away--
Charged Five Dollars
His girl friend had to pay.

 Night funeral
 In Harlem:

When it was all over
And the lid shut on his head
and the organ had done played 
and the last prayers been said 
and six pallbearers
Carried him out for dead
And off down Lenox Avenue
That long black ...Read more of this...
by Hughes, Langston

Paradise Lost: Book 11

...And testified against their ways; he oft 
Frequented their assemblies, whereso met, 
Triumphs or festivals; and to them preached 
Conversion and repentance, as to souls 
In prison, under judgements imminent: 
But all in vain: which when he saw, he ceased 
Contending, and removed his tents far off; 
Then, from the mountain hewing timber tall, 
Began to build a vessel of huge bulk; 
Measured by cubit, length, and breadth, and highth; 
Smeared round with pitch; and in the side a...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

Paradise Lost: Book 12

...r died. 
All nations they shall teach; for, from that day, 
Not only to the sons of Abraham's loins 
Salvation shall be preached, but to the sons 
Of Abraham's faith wherever through the world; 
So in his seed all nations shall be blest. 
Then to the Heaven of Heavens he shall ascend 
With victory, triumphing through the air 
Over his foes and thine; there shall surprise 
The Serpent, prince of air, and drag in chains 
Through all his realm, and there confounded leave; 
Then ...Read more of this...
by Milton, John

Rev. Lemuel Wiley

...I preached four thousand sermons,
I conducted forty revivals,
And baptized many converts.
Yet no deed of mine
Shines brighter in the memory of the world,
And none is treasured more by me:
Look how I saved the Blisses from divorce,
And kept the children free from that disgrace,
To grow up into moral men and women,
Happy themselves, a credit to the village....Read more of this...
by Masters, Edgar Lee

Sainte-Nitouche

...than he thought:
My fancy did not wholly dig 
The pit where I believed him caught. 

But yet he lived and laughed, and preached, 
And worked—as only players can: 
He scoured the shrine that once was home
And kept himself a clergyman. 

The clockwork of his cold routine 
Put friends far off that once were near; 
The five staccatos in his laugh 
Were too defensive and too clear;

The glacial sermons that he preached 
Were longer than they should have been; 
And, like the man w...Read more of this...
by Robinson, Edwin Arlington

St. Alexis Patron of Beggars

...r's rushing tide.
And he came to land on the Asian strand
Where the heathen people dwell;
As a beggar he strayed and he preached and prayed
And he saved their souls from hell.
Bowed with years and pain he came back again
To his father's dwelling place.
There was none to see who this tramp might be,
For they knew not his bearded face.
But his father said, "Give him drink and bread
And a couch underneath the stair."
So Alexis crept to his hole and slept.
But he might not linger...Read more of this...
by Kilmer, Joyce

The Congo: A Study of the Negro Race

...ION

A good old ***** in the slums of the town
Heavy bass. With a literal imitation of camp-meeting racket, and trance.
Preached at a sister for her velvet gown.
Howled at a brother for his low-down ways,
His prowling, guzzling, sneak-thief days.
Beat on the Bible till he wore it out
Starting the jubilee revival shout.
And some had visions, as they stood on chairs,
And sang of Jacob, and the golden stairs,
And they all repented, a thousand strong
From their stupor and savager...Read more of this...
by Lindsay, Vachel

The Female of the Species

...she camps beside the trail.
For the female of the species is more deadly than the male.

When the early Jesuit fathers preached to Hurons and Choctaws,
They prayed to be delivered from the vengeance of the squaws.
'Twas the women, not the warriors, turned those stark enthusiasts pale.
For the female of the species is more deadly than the male.

Man's timid heart is bursting with the things he must not say,
For the Woman that God gave him isn't his to give away;
But when hunt...Read more of this...
by Kipling, Rudyard

The Princess (prologue)

...set; about it lay the guests, 
And there we joined them: then the maiden Aunt 
Took this fair day for text, and from it preached 
An universal culture for the crowd, 
And all things great; but we, unworthier, told 
Of college: he had climbed across the spikes, 
And he had squeezed himself betwixt the bars, 
And he had breathed the Proctor's dogs; and one 
Discussed his tutor, rough to common men, 
But honeying at the whisper of a lord; 
And one the Master, as a rogue in grain...Read more of this...
by Tennyson, Alfred Lord

The Proud Farmer

...erywhere. 
He read by night, he built his world by day. 
The farm and house of God to him were one. 
For forty years he preached and plowed and wrought — 
A statesman in the fields, who bent to none. 

His plowmen-neighbors were as lords to him. 
His was an ironside, democratic pride. 
He served a rigid Christ, but served him well — 
And, for a lifetime, saved the countryside. 

Here lie the dead, who gave the church their best 
Under his fiery preaching of the word. 
They sl...Read more of this...
by Lindsay, Vachel

The Rivals

...this end put to his search.
I guess I laffed that meetin' through,
An' not a mortal word I knew
Of what the preacher preached er read
Er what the choir sung er said.
Fur every time I 'd turn my head
I could n't skeercely help but see
'At Zekel had his eye on me.
An' he 'ud sort o' turn an' twist
An' grind his teeth an' shake his fist.
I laughed, fur la! the hull church seen us,
An' knowed that suthin' was between us.
Well, meetin' out, we started hum,
I sorter fe...Read more of this...
by Laurence Dunbar, Paul

The Sompnours Tale

...which there went a limitour about
To preach, and eke to beg, it is no doubt.
And so befell that on a day this frere
Had preached at a church in his mannere,
And specially, above every thing,
Excited he the people in his preaching
To trentals,  and to give, for Godde's sake,
Wherewith men mighte holy houses make,
There as divine service is honour'd,
Not there as it is wasted and devour'd,
Nor where it needeth not for to be given,
As to possessioners,  that may liven,
Tha...Read more of this...
by Chaucer, Geoffrey

The Unpromised Land Montgomery Alabama

...out that age
of those blown up in church in Birmingham.

The legendary buses rumble past the church
where Reverend King preached when he lived in town,
a town somehow more his than mine, despite
my memory of standing on Dexter Avenue
and watching, fascinated, a black man fry
six eggs on his Dodge Dart. Because I watched
he gave me one with flecks of dark blue paint
stuck on the yolk. My mother slapped my hand.
I dropped the egg. And when I tried to say
I'm sorry, Mother grabb...Read more of this...
by Hudgins, Andrew

Up At A Villa— Down In The City

...ca, Saint Jerome, and Cicero,
"And moreover," (the sonnet goes rhyming,) "the skirts of Saint Paul has 
reached,
Having preached us those six Lent-lectures more unctuous than ever he preached."
Noon strikes,—here sweeps the procession! our Lady borne smiling and smart
With a pink gauze gown all spangles, and seven swords stuck in her heart!
Bang, whang, whang goes the drum, tootle-te-tootle the fife;
No keeping one's haunches still: it's the greatest pleasure in life.

X

But...Read more of this...
by Browning, Robert

Why?

...s side,
Yet set him where our heroes are.

He taught disdain of fame and wealth;
With courage he inspired our youth;
He preached the purity of health,
And held aloft the torch of truth.

He bade us battle for the Right,
And led us in the carnage grim;
He was to us a living light,
And like a God we worshiped him.

He raised us from the grievous gloom,
And brimmed our hearts with radiant cheer;
And then he climbed up to his room,
And . . . cut his throat from ear to ear.

Let u...Read more of this...
by Service, Robert William

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