As I reflect on my own journey, I realize how profoundly teachers shape our lives.
Their dedication and passion often go unnoticed, yet they inspire us to reach our fullest potential.
Here are 10 inspiring poems that brilliantly capture their essence, celebrating the moments of joy, challenge, and growth they provide.
Let’s dive right in!
My favorite poem about teachers
#1 “The Teacher” by Leslie Pinckney Hill
Lord, who am I to teach the way
To little children day by day,
So prone myself to go astray?
I teach them KNOWLEDGE, but I know
How faint they flicker and how low
The candles of my knowledge glow.
I teach them POWER to will and do,
But only now to learn anew
My own great weakness through and through.
I teach them LOVE for all mankind
And all God’s creatures, but I find
My love comes lagging far behind.
Lord, if their guide I still must be,
Oh let the little children see
The teacher leaning hard on Thee.
This poem deeply moved me when I first read it, making it my favorite.
The teacher’s honest struggle with their own weaknesses resonates with anyone in education.
It shows how teachers are also learners, navigating their own challenges while guiding their students.
9 more poems about teachers
#2 “The Teacher’s Monologue” by Charlotte Bronte
The room is quiet, thoughts alone
People its mute tranquillity;
The yoke put off, the long task done,
I am, as it is bliss to be,
Still and untroubled. Now, I see,
For the first time, how soft the day
O’er waveless water, stirless tree,
Silent and sunny, wings its way.
Now, as I watch that distant hill,
So faint, so blue, so far removed,
Sweet dreams of home my heart may fill,
That home where I am known and loved:
It lies beyond; yon azure brow
Parts me from all Earth holds for me;
And, morn and eve, my yearnings flow
Thitherward tending, changelessly.
My happiest hours, aye! all the time,
I love to keep in memory,
Lapsed among moors, ere life’s first prime
Decayed to dark anxiety.
Sometimes, I think a narrow heart
Makes me thus mourn those far away,
And keeps my love so far apart
From friends and friendships of to-day;
Sometimes, I think ’tis but a dream
I treasure up so jealously,
All the sweet thoughts I live on seem
To vanish into vacancy:
And then, this strange, coarse world around
Seems all that’s palpable and true;
And every sight, and every sound,
Combines my spirit to subdue
To aching grief, so void and lone
Is Life and Earth, so worse than vain,
The hopes that, in my own heart sown,
And cherished by such sun and rain
As Joy and transient Sorrow shed,
Have ripened to a harvest there:
Alas! methinks I hear it said,
“Thy golden sheaves are empty air.”
All fades away; my very home
I think will soon be desolate;
I hear, at times, a warning come
Of bitter partings at its gate;
And, if I should return and see
The hearth-fire quenched, the vacant chair;
And hear it whispered mournfully,
That farewells have been spoken there,
What shall I do, and whither turn?
Where look for peace? When cease to mourn?
‘Tis not the air I wished to play,
The strain I wished to sing;
My wilful spirit slipped away
And struck another string.
I neither wanted smile nor tear,
Bright joy nor bitter woe,
But just a song that sweet and clear,
Though haply sad, might flow.
A quiet song, to solace me
When sleep refused to come;
A strain to chase despondency,
When sorrowful for home.
In vain I try; I cannot sing;
All feels so cold and dead;
No wild distress, no gushing spring
Of tears in anguish shed;
But all the impatient gloom of one
Who waits a distant day,
When, some great task of suffering done,
Repose shall toil repay.
For youth departs, and pleasure flies,
And life consumes away,
And youth’s rejoicing ardour dies
Beneath this drear delay;
And Patience, weary with her yoke,
Is yielding to despair,
And Health’s elastic spring is broke
Beneath the strain of care.
Life will be gone ere I have lived;
Where now is Life’s first prime?
I’ve worked and studied, longed and grieved,
Through all that rosy time.
To toil, to think, to long, to grieve,
Is such my future fate?
The morn was dreary, must the eve
Be also desolate?
Well, such a life at least makes Death
A welcome, wished-for friend;
Then, aid me, Reason, Patience, Faith,
To suffer to the end!
#3 “The Teacher” by Thomas Frederick Young
Say, sadden’d mortal, thou who goest along
With look so weary, and with step so slow,
Why trillest thou no blithe and cheerful song,
Why whistlest thou that tune, so sad and low?
What trouble weighs thee down, what sorrow sore
Lies heavy on thy yet so youthful breast?
Sure fortune yet holds wide for thee her door;
Sure fame and joy yet wait thy earnest quest.
Why, know’st thou not the birds for thee do sing,
The flow’rs for thee with perfum’d beauty grow,
With melody for thee the wild birds sing,
With rippling laugh, the cheerful streamlets flow?
Then why, my friend, once more I ask of thee,
Why shows thy face so much unrest and pain?
What painful phase of life dost thou still see?
What sad, sad woe, doth in thy heart remain?
Bright flash’d the teacher’s languid eye,
Flushed his pale cheek, with bright, tho’ fleeting flame;
Leap’d forth his voice with energetic cry,
And thus, to me express’d, his thoughts they came.
“Inquirer, cease, thy words stir up the fire,
That erst did fill my live and vig’rous brain;
Thy words stir up the seeds of healthy ire,
That still, with latent pow’r and force, remain.
“‘Tis strange, thou think’st, that darkly on my brow
The shadow of a careworn spirit stays;
My youth, with springless step, doth make thee bow
Thy head, in kindly wonder, and amaze.
“Thou would’st not look with such a puzzl’d air,
Upon my weary pace, and heavy eye,
If thou didst know the cause of my despair,
The stem, substantial, solid reason why.
“Didst ever know, my friend, what I endure,
In slavish, plodding work, from day to day,
Which work should be in its own nature pure,
And lifted high, from gross and heavy clay.
“Examinations, cram and pressure high,
Are daily kept before my anxious mind;
What tho’ for higher aims I daily sigh,
This is my work, and this my daily grind.
“I work, you say, on minds, and hearts, and souls,
Alas, ’tis true, but what can e’er atone
For dry, mechanic thought, and lifeless coals,
Which light not up, but turn the intellect to stone?
“Work on! ye faithful, grinding and hair-splitting band,
Work on, in slavish fear, and penitential pain,
But daily pray, that thro’ this young and prosp’rous land,
A system, higher, purer, freer, yet shall reign.
“Yours shall not be the blame, the people must it bear,
For, while they look for quick results, for hot-bed flow’rs,
Amongst them, they the various ills must surely share,
Of hasty fev’rish work, compell’d by outside pow’rs.”
Thus spoke the man, and closed his lips became,
The fire forsook his lately flashing eye,
His nerves relax’d, and o’er his brow, the same
Dark cloud of bitter woe, could I descry.
#4 “To The Rev. Christopher Wordsworth, D.D., Master Of Harrow School” by William Wordsworth
Enlightened Teacher, gladly from thy hand
Have I received this proof of pains bestowed
By Thee to guide thy Pupils on the road
That, in our native isle, and every land,
The Church, when trusting in divine command
And in her Catholic attributes, hath trod:
O may these lessons be with profit scanned
To thy heart’s wish, thy labour blest by God!
So the bright faces of the young and gay
Shall look more bright, the happy, happier still;
Catch, in the pauses of their keenest play,
Motions of thought which elevate the will
And, like the Spire that from your classic Hill
Points heavenward, indicate the end and way.
#5 “To The Teachers Of The Young” by Ella Wheeler Wilcox
How large thy task, O teacher of the young,
To take the ravelled threads by parents flung
With careless hands, and through consummate care
To weave a fabric, fine and firm and fair.
God’s uncompleted work is thine to do –
Be brave and true!
#6 “When the Teacher Gets Cross” by Anonymous
When the teacher gets cross, and her blue eyes gets black,
And the pencil comes down on the desk with a whack,
We chillen all sit up straight in a line,
As if we had rulers instead of a spine,
And it’s scary to cough, and it a’n’t safe to grin,
When the teacher gets cross, and the dimples goes in.
When the teacher gets cross, the tables get mixed,
The ones and the twos begins to play tricks.
The pluses and minuses is just little smears,
When the cry babies cry their slates full of tears,
And the figgers won’t add,—but just act up like sin,
When the teacher gets cross, and the dimples goes in.
When the teacher gets cross, the reading gets bad.
The lines jingle round till the’ chillen is sad.
And Billy boy puffs and gets red in the face,
As if he and the lesson were running a race,
Until she hollers out, “Next!” as sharp as a pin,
When the teacher gets cross, and the dimples goes in.
When the teacher gets good, her smile is so bright,
That the tables gets straight, and the reading gets right.
The pluses and minuses comes trooping along,
And the figgers add up and stop being wrong,
And we chillen would like, but we dassent, to shout,
When the teacher gets good, and the dimples comes out.
#7 “On Teaching” by Kahlil Gibran
Then said a teacher, Speak to us of Teaching.
And he said:
No man can reveal to you aught but that which already lies half asleep in the dawning of your knowledge.
The teacher who walks in the shadow of the temple, among his followers, gives not of his wisdom but rather of his faith and his lovingness.
If he is indeed wise he does not bid you enter the house of his wisdom, but rather leads you to the threshold of your own mind.
The astronomer may speak to you of his understanding of space, but he cannot give you his understanding.
The musician may sing to you of the rhythm which is in all space, but he cannot give you the ear which arrests the rhythm nor the voice that echoes it.
And he who is versed in the science of numbers can tell of the regions of weight and measure, but he cannot conduct you thither.
For the vision of one man lends not its wings to another man.
And even as each one of you stands alone in God’s knowledge, so must each one of you be alone in his knowledge of God and in his understanding of the earth.
#8 “Professor Minto” by Richard Le Gallienne
Nature, that makes Professors all day long,
And, filling idle souls with idle song,
Turns out small Poets every other minute,
Made earth for men – but seldom puts men in it.
Ah, Minto, thou of that minority
Wert man of men – we had deep need of thee!
Had Heaven a deeper? Did the heavenly Chair
Of Earthly Love wait empty for thee there?
#9 “Sonnets II” by George MacDonald
Inscribed to S.F.S., about her father.
I went to listen to my teacher friend.
O Friend above, thanks for the friend below!
Who having been made wise, deep things to know,
With brooding spirit over them doth bend,
Until they waken words, as wings, to send
Their seeds far forth, seeking a place to grow.
The lesson past, with quiet foot I go,
And towards his silent room, expectant wend,
Seeking a blessing, even leave to dwell
For some eternal minutes in his eyes.
And he smiled on me in his loving wise;
His hand spoke friendship, satisfied me well;
My presence was some pleasure, I could tell.
Then forth we went beneath the smoky skies.
#10 “Emily Sparks” by Edgar Lee Masters
Where is my boy, my boy—
In what far part of the world?
The boy I loved best of all in the school?—
I, the teacher, the old maid, the virgin heart,
Who made them all my children.
Did I know my boy aright,
Thinking of him as spirit aflame,
Active, ever aspiring?
Oh, boy, boy, for whom I prayed and prayed
In many a watchful hour at night,
Do you remember the letter I wrote you
Of the beautiful love of Christ?
And whether you ever took it or not,
My boy, wherever you are,
Work for your soul’s sake,
That all the clay of you, all of the dross of you,
May yield to the fire of you,
Till the fire is nothing but light!…
Nothing but light!