Famous Promised Land Poems by Famous Poets
These are examples of famous Promised Land poems written by some of the greatest and most-well-known modern and classical poets. PoetrySoup is a great educational poetry resource of famous promised land poems. These examples illustrate what a famous promised land poem looks like and its form, scheme, or style (where appropriate).
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by
Laurence Dunbar, Paul
...come, spite storm and shock,
A Moses who shall smite the rock,
Call manna from the Giver's hand,
And lead us to the promised land!
The way is dark and cold and steep,
And shapes of horror murder sleep,
And hard the unrelenting years;
But 'twixt our sighs and moans and tears,
We still can smile, we still can sing,
Despite the arduous journeying.
For faith and hope their courage lend,
And rest and light are at the end.
...Read more of this...
by
Hugo, Victor
...d Goshen shall behold thy people go
Despite the power of Egypt's law and brand,
From their sad thrall to Canaan's promised land.
"The King of Plagues, the Chosen of Sinai,
Is he that, o'er the rushing waters driven,
A vigorous hand hath rescued for the sky;
Ye whose proud hearts disown the ways of heaven!
Attend, be humble! for its power is nigh
Israel! a cradle shall redeem thy worth—
A Cradle yet shall save the widespread earth!"
Dubli...Read more of this...
by
Dyke, Henry Van
...e the red deer roam;
And wild-bees gathered into busy hives,
To store the silver comb with golden sweet;
And all the promised land begins to flow
With milk and honey. Stately manors rise
Along the banks, and castles top the hills,
And little villages grow populous with trade,
Until the river runs as proudly as the Rhine, --
The thread that links a hundred towns and towers!
And looking deeper in my dream, I see
A mighty city covering the isle
They call Manhattan, e...Read more of this...
by
Watts, Isaac
...r'el went,
With manna they were fed:
Our Lord invites us to his flesh,
And calls it living bread.
Moses beheld the promised land,
Yet never reached the place;
But Christ shall bring his followers home,
To see his Father's face.
Then shall our love and joy be full,
And feel a warmer flame;
And sweeter voices tune the song
Of Moses and the Lamb....Read more of this...
by
Cowper, William
...and love.
With these to Pisgah's top I fly
And there delighted stand,
To view, beneath a shining sky,
The spacious promised land.
The Lord of all the vast domain
Has promised it to me,
The length and breadth of all the plain
As far as faith can see.
How glorious is my privilege!
To Thee for help I call;
I stand upon a mountain's edge,
O save me, lest I fall!
Though much exalted in the Lord,
My strength is not my own;
Then let me tremble at His word,
And none s...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...Earth, a passage wide,
Wider by far than that of after-times
Over mount Sion, and, though that were large,
Over the Promised Land to God so dear;
By which, to visit oft those happy tribes,
On high behests his angels to and fro
Passed frequent, and his eye with choice regard
From Paneas, the fount of Jordan's flood,
To Beersaba, where the Holy Land
Borders on Egypt and the Arabian shore;
So wide the opening seemed, where bounds were set
To darkness, such as bound t...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...Moses and Aaron) sent from God to claim
His people from enthralment, they return,
With glory and spoil, back to their promised land.
But first, the lawless tyrant, who denies
To know their God, or message to regard,
Must be compelled by signs and judgements dire;
To blood unshed the rivers must be turned;
Frogs, lice, and flies, must all his palace fill
With loathed intrusion, and fill all the land;
His cattle must of rot and murren die;
Botches and blains must ...Read more of this...
by
Milton, John
...thy right
Be now in powerful hands, that will not part
Easily from possession won with arms.
Judaea now and all the Promised Land,
Reduced a province under Roman yoke,
Obeys Tiberius, nor is always ruled
With temperate sway: oft have they violated
The Temple, oft the Law, with foul affronts,
Abominations rather, as did once
Antiochus. And think'st thou to regain
Thy right by sitting still, or thus retiring?
So did not Machabeus. He indeed
Retired unto the Desert,...Read more of this...
by
Paterson, Andrew Barton
...ted out, and forced their way ahead
By tangled scrub and forests grim towards the unknown west,
And spied the far off promised land from off the ranges’ crest.
Oh! Ye, that sleep in lonely graves by far-off ridge and plain,
We drink to you in silence now as Christmas comes again,
The men who fought the wilderness through rough unsettled years –
The founders of our nation’s life, the brave old pioneers....Read more of this...
by
Watts, Isaac
...
Through all this wilderness.
Thus guarded by th' Almighty hand,
The chosen tribes possessed
Canaan, the rich, the promised land,
And there enjoyed their rest.
Then let the world forbear its rage,
The church renounce her fear;
Isr'el must live through every age,
And be th' Almighty's care....Read more of this...
by
Watts, Isaac
...rt ground;
Eternal be his praise!
Great monarchs fell beneath his hand;
Victorious is his sword;
While Isr'el took the promised land;
And faithful is his word.]
He saw the nations dead in sin;
He felt his pity move:
How sad the state the world was in!
How boundless was his love!
He sent to save us from our woe;
His goodness never fails;
From death, and hell, and every foe;
And still his grace prevails.
Give thanks to God the heav'nly King;
His mercies still endure...Read more of this...
by
Watts, Isaac
...ll endure,
When suns and moons shall shine no more.
The Jews he freed from Pharaoh's hand,
And brought them to the promised land
Wonders of grace to God belong,
Repeat his mercies in your song.
He saw the Gentiles dead in sin,
And felt his pity work within
His mercies ever shall endure,
When death and sin shall reign no more.
He sent his Son with power to save
From guilt, and darkness, and the grave
Wonders of grace to God belong,
Repeat his mercies in your son...Read more of this...
by
Watts, Isaac
...feet shall never slide.
When sinners fall, the righteous stand,
Preserved from every snare;
They shall possess the promised land,
And dwell for ever there....Read more of this...
by
Watts, Isaac
...adored.
He gave them water from the rock,
And safe, by Moses' hand,
Through a dry desert led his flock
Home to the promised land.]...Read more of this...
by
Watts, Isaac
...ears.
Oft he chastised and still forgave,
Till, by his gracious hand,
The nation he resolved to save
Possessed the promised land....Read more of this...
by
Stojanovic, Dejan
...re, only as many words,
Only as many pages, only as much ink
To accept all of us at light-speed
Hurrying into the Promised Land
Of oblivion that is waiting for us sooner or later.
No reason for a feverish rush
For we will all arrive in the same place
At the right time. Justice will be served.
There will be no better or worse,
No big and small, no rewards, no punishment,
No guilt, no judges, no hierarchies;
Only silent equality.
...Read more of this...
by
Sexton, Anne
...ay of my divorce:
the courtroom a cement box,
a gas chamber for the infectious Jew in me
and a perhaps land, a possibly promised land
for the Jew in me,
but still a betrayal room for the till-death-do-us—
and yet a death, as in the unlocking of scissors
that makes the now separate parts useless,
even to cut each other up as we did yearly
under the crayoned-in sun.
The courtroom keeps squashing our lives as they break
into two cans ready for recycling,
flattened tin humans...Read more of this...
by
Robinson, Edwin Arlington
...des, and found,
As always, underneath him solid ground
Whereon to be sufficient and to stand
Possessed already of the promised land,
Far stretched and fair to see:
A good sight, verily,
And one to make the eyes of her who bore him
Shine glad with hidden tears.
Why question of his ease of who before him,
In one place or another where they left
Their names as far behind them as their bones,
And yet by dint of slaughter toil and theft,
And shrewdly sharpened stones...Read more of this...
by
Petrarch, Francesco
...>The father next, who erst by Heaven's commandForsook his home, and sought the promised land;The hallow'd scene of wide-redeeming grace:And to the care of Heaven consign'd his race.Then Jacob, cheated in his amorous vows,Who led in either hand a Syrian spouse;And youthful Joseph, famed for self-command,<...Read more of this...
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