Today's offerings take a religious (nay, Christian, even) line, although one might say the last one, Mr Larkin's
An Arundel Tomb, is 'churchy' rather than religious - and so far as I am aware nobody accuses Philip of having been a Christian. In a broad chronology we start with a (Rhyme Royal) stanza extracted from Geoffrey Chaucer's long tale,
Troilus and Criseyde. It's a memorable and (partly) obvious little piece of verse I have long liked. Next, there is Francis Thompson's
The Hound of Heaven, the only poem for which the author is remembered but which still seems to me a most extraordinary piece of writing. I cannot readily bring to mind any comparable verse (outside Shakespeare and possibly a bit of Shelley here and there, and a hymn or two perhaps) which presents such a 'fantastic' cascade of hyperbolic imagery and remains coherent. Jesuit Manley Hopkins tried, I suppose, but to my mind he just 'blew it'.
I'm sure you will recognise the next extract. Its the third of the four verses in the hymn
'O Love that wilt not let me go' by A. L Peace, or it may be 'Pearce' - sung to the tune 'St Margaret' by George Matheson (1842-1906). I believe the hymnals represent an underrated body of English verse, but I didn't know this one until I started going to more funerals than weddings about a decade or ago. When I first heard the hymn - alas at the funeral of a friend who had committed suicide - one could not help but notice the damage this particular verse did to the singing voices in a packed Yatton church.
Auden's not particularly well-known Atlantis comes next. Wystan was, quite often, too clever (and too obscure) for his own good, in my opinion, but in this poem I think he finds a very fine ironic-cum-heartfelt tone. Wystan maintained that he was a sturdy English Prot. throughout his life. Thence to Philip's effort.