As I mentioned in my introductory poetry post on the 1st, John Donne was the first poet I really noticed. He started out writing secular poetry but when he became a clergyman in the Church of England, at the King of England’s suggestion, he began to write religious poetry. His 14th Holy Sonnet is one of his best known poems:
Holy Sonnet 14
Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you
As yet but knock, breathe, shine, and seek to mend;
That I may rise, and stand, o’erthrow me, and bend
Your force, to break, blow, burn, and make me new.
I, like an usurp’d town, to another due,
Labour to admit you, but O, to no end.
Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend,
But is captived, and proves weak or untrue.
Yet dearly I love you, and would be loved fain,
But am betroth’d unto your enemy;
Divorce me, untie, or break that knot again,
Take me to you, imprison me, for I,
Except you enthrall me, never shall be free,
Nor ever chaste, except you ravish me.–John Donne (1572-1631)
Myriads of Thoughts 