DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
To My Misery
by Morris Rosenfeld

O Misery of mine, no other
In faithfulness can match with thee,
Thou more than friend, and more than brother,
The only thing that cares for me!
Where'er I turn, are unkind faces,
And hate and treachery and guile,
Thou, Mis'ry, in all times and places,
Dost greet me with thy pallid smile.
At birth I found thee waiting for me,
I knew thee in my cradle first,
The same small eyes and dim watched o'er me,
The same dry, bony fingers nursed.
And day by day when morning lightened,
To school thou led'st me--home did'st bring,
And thine were all the blooms that brightened
The chilly landscape of my spring.
And, thou my match and marriage monger,
The marriage deed by thee was read;
The hands foretelling need and hunger
Were laid in blessing on my head.
Thy love for me shall last unshaken,
No further proof I ask, for when
My hopes for aye were from me taken,
My Mis'ry, thou wert with me then;
And still, while sorrow's storm is breaking
Above me, and my head I bow--
The kindly and the unforsaking,
Oh Mis'ry, thou art with me now.
Ay, still from out Fate's gloomy towers
I see thee come to me again,
With wreaths of everlasting flowers,
And songs funereal in thy train.
And when life's curses rock me nightly,
And hushed I lie in slumber's hold,
Thy sable form comes treading lightly
To wrap me in its garments fold.
Thy brother let me be, and wholly
Repay thee all I owe, tho' late:
My aching heart, my melancholy,
My songs to thee I dedicate.
Meikle Thinks My Luve.
by Robert Burns

Tune - "My tocher's the jewel."
I.
O Meikle thinks my luve o' my beauty,
And meikle thinks my luve o' my kin;
But little thinks my luve I ken brawlie
My tocher's the jewel has charms for him.
It's a' for the apple he'll nourish the tree;
It's a' for the hiney he'll cherish the bee;
My laddie's sae meikle in luve wi' the siller,
He canna hae lure to spare for me.
II.
Your proffer o' luve's an airl-penny,
My tocher's the bargain ye wad buy;
But an ye be crafty, I am cunnin',
Sae ye wi' anither your fortune maun try.
Ye're like to the timmer o' yon rotten tree,
Ye'll slip frae me like a knotless thread,
And ye'll crack your credit wi' mae nor me.
Music
by William Lisle Bowles

O Music! if thou hast a charm
That may the sense of pain disarm,
Be all thy tender tones addressed
To soothe to peace my Harriet's breast;
And bid the magic of thy strain
So still the wakeful throb of pain,
That, rapt in the delightful measure,
Sweet Hope again may whisper pleasure,
And seem the notes of Spring to hear,
Prelusive to a happier year!
And if thy magic can restore
The shade of days that smile no more,
And softer, sweeter colours give
To scenes that in remembrance live;
Be to her pensive heart a friend,
And, whilst the tender shadows blend,
Recall, ere the brief trace be lost,
Each moment that she prized the most.
Perhaps, when many a cheerful day
Hereafter shall have stolen away,
If then some old and favourite strain
Should bring back to her thoughts again
The hours when, silent by her side,
I listened to her song and sighed;
Perhaps a long-forgotten name,
A thought, if not a tear may claim;
And when in distant plains away,
Alone I count each lingering day,
She may a silent prayer prefer
For him whose heart once bled for her.
The Monkey.
by H. P. Nichols

"O Mother! here's the organ-man,
And here's the monkey, too!
Just see his funny gown of red,
And little cap of blue!
"O look! he's on the window there!
His cap is in his paw;
And now he bows and makes a face;
What can it all be for?
"O, now they've dropped some money in,
While, quickly as he can,
See! he puts on his cap, and gives
The pennies to the man.
"Mamma! why don't you look at him!
You have not seen at all;
Just see him climbing up and down,
With paws so brown and small!
"He's gone away! O, dear mamma,
Why did you not come here?
You never saw, in all your life,
A thing one half as queer."
"I'll tell you why, my little son,
I do not like to see
That monkey bow and jump about;
'Tis no delight to me.
"They've had to treat him cruelly
To teach him how to play;
They've had to whip and punish him
And take his food away.
"And that is why I do not love
To see him dancing so;
And if you thought of it, my boy,
You'd feel with me, I know."
A Smoke.
by George W. Doneghy

I.
O others may boast of their pleasures galore--
The miser with rapture may count o'er his store,
And some may imagine great happiness there
In the gay shining beam of Society's glare;
But best of all comforts a feller can know,
While wintry winds whistle and fast flies the snow,
Is a pipe after supper, by a bright blazing fire,
Encircled with ringlets that curl high and higher!
II.
O doctors may tell you and others declare
It'll shorten your days and your heart will impair--
That nicotine poison will flow through your veins
And nervous distraction will rack with its pains;
But what cares a feller in slippers and gown,
When wintry winds whistle and snow's pouring down,
With papers and books, and his feet near the fire,
Encircled with ringlets that curl high and higher?
III.
O rare are the fancies, contentment and bliss,
That drive away care in an hour such as this!
When the ills of this life and the things that provoke
Are lost for the while in the blue curling smoke
Of a pipe and tobacco that's yellow as gold,
And raptures supernal the senses unfold.
O give me a chair by a bright blazing fire,
And sweet-smelling ringlets that curl high and higher!
To a Pansy-Violet
by Madison Julius Cawein

Found Solitary Among the Hills.
I.
O pansy-violet,
With early April wet,
How frail and pure you look
Lost in this glow-worm nook
Of heaven-holding hills:
Down which the hurrying rills
Fling scrolls of melodies:
O'er which the birds and bees
Weave gossamers of song,
Invisible, but strong:
Sweet music webs they spin
To snare the spirit in.
II.
O pansy-violet,
Unto your face I set
My lips, and - do you speak?
Or is it but some freak
Of fancy, love imparts
Through you unto the heart's
Desire? whispering low
A secret none may know,
But such as sit and dream
By forest-side and stream.
III.
O pansy-violet,
O darling floweret,
Hued like the timid gem
That stars the diadem
Of Fay or Sylvan Sprite,
Who, in the woods, all night
Is busy with the blooms,
Young leaves and wild perfumes,
Through you I seem t' have seen
All that such dreams may mean.
IV.
O pansy-violet,
Long, long ago we met - 
'T was in a Fairy-tale:
Two children in a vale
Sat underneath glad stars,
Far from the world of wars;
Each loved the other well:
Her eyes were like the spell
Of dusk and dawning skies - 
The purple dark that dyes
The midnight: his were blue
As heaven the day shines through.
V.
O pansy-violet,
What is this vague regret,
This yearning, so like tears,
That touches through the years
Long past, when Myth and Fable
In all strange things were able
To beautify the Earth,
Things of immortal worth? - 
This longing, that to me
Is like a memory
Lived long ago, of those
Fair children who, it knows,
Loved with no mortal love;
Whom smiling heaven above
Fostered, and when they died
Laid side by loving side.
VI.
O pansy-violet,
I dream, remembering yet
A wood-god-guarded tomb,
Out of whose moss a bloom
Sprang, with three petals wan
As are the eyes of dawn;
And two as darkly deep
As are the eyes of sleep. - 
O flower, - that seems to hold
Some memory of old,
A hope, a happiness,
At which I can but guess, - 
You are a sign to me
Of immortality:
Through you my spirit sees
The deathless purposes
Of death, that still evolves
The beauty it resolves;
The change that aye fulfills
Life's meaning as God wills.
The Descent into Hell
by Algernon Charles Swinburne

1
O Night and death, to whom we grudged him then,
When in man's sight he stood not yet undone,
Your king, your priest, your saviour, and your son,
We grudge not now, who know that not again
Shall this curse come upon the sins of men,
Nor this face look upon the living sun
That shall behold not so abhorred an one
In all the days whereof his eye takes ken.
The bond is cancelled, and the prayer is heard
That seemed so long but weak and wasted breath;
Take him, for he is yours, O night and death.
Hell yawns on him whose life was as a word
Uttered by death in hate of heaven and light,
A curse now dumb upon the lips of night.
2
What shapes are these and shadows without end
That fill the night full as a storm of rain
With myriads of dead men and women slain,
Old with young, child with mother, friend with friend,
That on the deep mid wintering air impend,
Pale yet with mortal wrath and human pain,
Who died that this man dead now too might reign,
Toward whom their hands point and their faces bend?
The ruining flood would redden earth and air
If for each soul whose guiltless blood was shed
There fell but one drop on this one man's head
Whose soul to-night stands bodiless and bare,
For whom our hearts give thanks who put up prayer,
That we have lived to say, The dog is dead.
Musa
by Oliver Wendell Holmes

O my lost beauty! - hast thou folded quite
Thy wings of morning light
Beyond those iron gates
Where Life crowds hurrying to the haggard Fates,
And Age upon his mound of ashes waits
To chill our fiery dreams,
Hot from the heart of youth plunged in his icy streams?
Leave me not fading in these weeds of care,
Whose flowers are silvered hair!
Have I not loved thee long,
Though my young lips have often done thee wrong,
And vexed thy heaven-tuned ear with careless song?
Ah, wilt thou yet return,
Bearing thy rose-hued torch, and bid thine altar burn?
Come to me! - I will flood thy silent shrine
With my soul's sacred wine,
And heap thy marble floors
As the wild spice-trees waste their fragrant stores,
In leafy islands walled with madrepores
And lapped in Orient seas,
When all their feathery palms toss, plume-like, in the breeze.
Come to me! - thou shalt feed on honeyed words,
Sweeter than song of birds; - 
No wailing bulbul's throat,
No melting dulcimer's melodious note
When o'er the midnight wave its murmurs float,
Thy ravished sense might soothe
With flow so liquid-soft, with strain so velvet-smooth.
Thou shalt be decked with jewels, like a queen,
Sought in those bowers of green
Where loop the clustered vines
And the close-clinging dulcamara twines, - 
Pure pearls of Maydew where the moonlight shines,
And Summer's fruited gems,
And coral pendants shorn from Autumn's berried stems.
Sit by me drifting on the sleepy waves, - 
Or stretched by grass-grown graves,
Whose gray, high-shouldered stones,
Carved with old names Life's time-worn roll disowns,
Lean, lichen-spotted, o'er the crumbled bones
Still slumbering where they lay
While the sad Pilgrim watched to scare the wolf away.
Spread o'er my couch thy visionary wing!
Still let me dream and sing, - 
Dream of that winding shore
Where scarlet cardinals bloom-for me no more, - 
The stream with heaven beneath its liquid floor,
And clustering nenuphars
Sprinkling its mirrored blue like golden-chaliced stars!
Come while their balms the linden-blossoms shed! - 
Come while the rose is red, - 
While blue-eyed Summer smiles
On the green ripples round yon sunken piles
Washed by the moon-wave warm from Indian isles,
And on the sultry air
The chestnuts spread their palms like holy men in prayer!
Oh for thy burning lips to fire my brain
With thrills of wild, sweet pain! - 
On life's autumnal blast,
Like shrivelled leaves, youth's passion-flowers are cast, - 
Once loving thee, we love thee to the last! - 
Behold thy new-decked shrine,
And hear once more the voice that breathed "Forever thine!"
The Defence Of Night.
by Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni

O nott' o dolce tempo.
O night, O sweet though sombre span of time!--
All things find rest upon their journey's end--
Whoso hath praised thee, well doth apprehend;
And whoso honours thee, hath wisdom's prime.
Our cares thou canst to quietude sublime;
For dews and darkness are of peace the friend:
Often by thee in dreams upborne, I wend
From earth to heaven, where yet I hope to climb.
Thou shade of Death, through whom the soul at length
Shuns pain and sadness hostile to the heart,
Whom mourners find their last and sure relief!
Thou dost restore our suffering flesh to strength,
Driest our tears, assuagest every smart,
Purging the spirits of the pure from grief.
The Stranger's Song
by Thomas Hardy

O my trade it is the rarest one,
Simple shepherds all -
My trade is a sight to see;
For my customers I tie, and take 'em up on high,
And waft 'em to a far countree!
My tools are but common ones,
Simple shepherds all -
My tools are no sight to see:
A little hempen string, and a post whereon to swing,
Are implements enough for me!
To-morrow is my working day,
Simple shepherds all -
To-morrow is a working day for me:
For the farmer's sheep is slain, and the lad who did it ta'en,
And on his soul may God ha' mer-cy!
Printed in "The Three Strangers," 1883.
Maiden Knickerbocker And The Gallant Captain Pickwick.
by A. H. Laidlaw

MAIDEN.
O my gallant Captain, whither and away?
Know'st thou Jersey Pirates smuggle in the bay?
Won't you take me with you for a little fly?
If the Pirates catch you, I'll shoot 'em with my eye.
CAPTAIN.
Come, Manhattan Maiden, share the sailor's pains.
If the Pirates catch me, save me from their chains.
Meantime mark the sailor mount the topmast high,
Till his trim tarpaulin almost scrapes the sky,
Luffing to the starboard, tacking o'er the bay,
Thus Manhattan Captains sail their lives away.
MAIDEN.
Who's the girl out yonder reaching up so high,
With her jack-o'-lantern darkening up the sky?
Do you think she's pretty? Do you think it pays
Standing up so bare like, with no polonaise?
CAPTAIN.
Now, Manhattan Maiden, 'tis the Law Marine
No form but that of Captain must on this Bay be seen;
So look at me, my maiden, mark my windward eye,
Neptune his sweet Venus loves no more than I.
Luffing to the starboard, tacking o'er the bay
Thus the loving Captain sails his life away.
MAIDEN.
What are those far Highlands, blue as Beauty's eye
Looking like the islands of an upper sky?
Take me to their summits that I may explore
All the caves and creatures I never saw before.
CAPTAIN.
'Tis a mystic saying: "He who seeks that shore
Fades and then his fate is never heard of more."
Such a distant prospect seek not now to spy,
Let one loving sailor fill your starry eye.
Luffing to the starboard, tacking o'er the Bay,
Thus the gallant Captain sails his life away.
MAIDEN.
Where is the Atlantic? I've heard grandfather say
He sailed on its huge surge from Holland far away,
O take me to the Ocean where the steamer sails,
A wonder to the lubbers and terror to the whales.
CAPTAIN.
Lubbers' yarns! My Maiden, trust you what I say,
There never was an Ocean - nothing but this Bay,
And if you'll be my bride, the whole world we'll explore,
In sight of New York Harbor and Staten Island shore.
Luffing to the starboard, tacking o'er the Bay,
Thus the married Captain sails his life away.
O Night Of Nights! (Hymn)
by Jean Ingelow

"Let us now go even unto Bethlehem."
O Night of nights! O night
Desired of man so long!
The ancient heavens fled forth in light
To sing thee thy new song;
And shooting down the steep,
To shepherd folk of old,
An angel, while they watch'd their sheep,
Set foot beside the fold.
Lo! while as like to die
Of that keen light he shed,
They look'd on his pure majesty,
Amazed, and sore bestead;
Lo! while with words of cheer
He bade their trembling cease,
The flocks of God swept sweetly near,
And sang to them of peace.
All on the hillside grass
That fulgent radiance fell,
So close those innocents did pass,
Their words were heard right well;
Among the sheep, their wings
Some folding, walk'd the sod
An order'd throng of shining things,
White, with the smile of God.
The waits of heaven to hear,
Oh! what it must have been!
Think, Christian people, think, and fear
For cold hearts, for unclean;
Think how the times go by,
How love and longing fail,
Think how we live and how we die,
As this were but a tale.
O tender tale of old,
Live in thy dear renown;
God's smile was in the dark, behold
That way His hosts came down;
Light up, great God, Thy Word,
Make the blest meaning strong,
As if our ears, indeed, had heard
The glory of their song.
It was so far away,
But Thou could'st make it near,
And all its living might display
And cry to it, "Be here,"
Here, in th' unresting town,
As once remote to them,
Who heard it when the heavens came down,
On pastoral Bethlehem.
It was so long ago,
But God can make it now,
And as with that sweet overflow,
Our empty hearts endow;
Take, Lord, those words outworn,
O! make them new for aye,
Speak - "Unto you a child is born,"
To-day - to-day - to-day.
Garden
by John Greenleaf Whittier

O painter of the fruits and flowers,
We own wise design,
Where these human hands of ours
May share work of Thine!
Apart from Thee we plant in vain
The root and sow the seed;
Thy early and Thy later rain,
Thy sun and dew we need.
Our toil is sweet with thankfulness,
Our burden is our boon;
The curse of Earth's gray morning is
The blessing of its noon.
Why search the wide world everywhere
For Eden's unknown ground?
That garden of the primal pair
May nevermore be found.
But, blest by Thee, our patient toil
May right the ancient wrong,
And give to every clime and soil
The beauty lost so long.
Our homestead flowers and fruited trees
May Eden's orchard shame;
We taste the tempting sweets of these
Like Eve, without her blame.
And, North and South and East and West,
The pride of every zone,
The fairest, rarest, and the best
May all be made our own.
Its earliest shrines the young world sought
In hill-groves and in bowers,
The fittest offerings thither brought
Were Thy own fruits and flowers.
And still with reverent hands we cull
Thy gifts each year renewed;
The good is always beautiful,
The beautiful is good
The End Of Laughter
by Richard Le Gallienne

O never laugh again!
Laughter is dead,
Deep hiding in her grave,
A sacred thing.
O never laugh again,
Never take hands and run
Through the wild streets,
Or sing,
Glad in the sun:
For she, the immortal sweetness of all sweets,
Took laughter with her
When she went away
With sleep.
O never laugh again!
Ours but to weep,
Ours but to pray.
The Open Door
by Alfred Noyes

O Mystery of life,
That, after all our strife,
Defeats, mistakes,
Just as, at last, we see
The road to victory,
The tired heart breaks.
Just as the long years give
Knowledge of how to live,
Life's end draws near;
As if, that gift being ours,
God needed our new powers
In worlds elsewhere.
There, if the soul whose wings
Were won in suffering, springs
To life anew,
Justice would have some room
For hope beyond the tomb,
And mercy, too.
And since, without this dream
No light, no faintest gleam
Answers our "why";
But earth and all its race
Must pass and leave no trace
On that blind sky;
Shall reason close that door
On all we struggled for,
Seal the soul's doom;
Make of this universe
One wild answering curse,
One lampless tomb?
Mine be the dream, the creed
That leaves for God, indeed,
For God, and man,
One open door whereby
To prove His world no lie
And crown His plan.
Native Scenes.
by John Clare

O Native scenes, nought to my heart clings nearer
Than you, ye Edens of my youthful hours;
Nought in this world warms my affections dearer
Than you, ye plains of white and yellow flowers;
Ye hawthorn hedge-rows, and ye woodbine bowers,
Where youth has rov'd, and still where manhood roves
The pasture-pathway 'neath the willow groves.
Ah, as my eye looks o'er those lovely scenes,
All the delights of former life beholding;
Spite of the pain, the care that intervenes,--
When lov'd remembrance is her bliss unfolding,
Picking her childish posies on your greens,--
My soul can pause o'er its distress awhile,
And Sorrow's cheek find leisure for a smile.
Who's Dot Pulleteen?
by Henry Lawson

O my prow vas plack mit curses,
Ven I dries to write dose verses;
Ven I dries to write dot boem,
Dot de best was effer been.
All in vain my peer I guzzles,
But I gannod solve dot broblem,
'Who's dot Western Pulleteen?'
Und I swear mit pleets and dvonder,
Und I ferry often wonder,
Would dot paber's cirgulation
Shusta little pigger been,
If dey toog deir seissor-pinchers,
Shust to cut some leetle inches
From that smarty-smarty writer
Of dot Western Pulleeteen.
'Let dose mountains fall and hide us'
Gry benighded odersiders,
Shame come round and woe betide us,
Und our fellow men deride us
If we effer yet can find oud
'Who's dot Western Pull-it-in?'
HENRICH HERTZBERG LAWSON
I remain, Yours etc.,
JOE SWALLOW
A Blessing On Patrick Sarsfield
by Isabella Augusta, Lady Gregory

O Patrick Sarsfield, health be to you, since you went to France and your camps were loosened; making your sighs along with the king, and you left poor Ireland and the Gael defeated--Och ochone! O Patrick Sarsfield, it is a man with God you are; and blessed is the earth you ever walked on. The blessing of the bright sun and the moon upon you, since you took the day from the hands of King William--Och ochone!
O Patrick Sarsfield, the prayer of every person with you; my own prayer and the prayer of the Son of Mary with you, since you took the narrow ford going through Biorra, and since at Cuilenn O'Cuanac you won Limerick--Och ochone!
I will go up on the mountain alone; and I will come hither from it again. It is there I saw the camp of the Gael, the poor troop thinned, not keeping with one another--Och ochone!
My five hundred healths to you, halls of Limerick, and to the beautiful troop was in our company; it is bonefires we used to have and playing- cards, and the word of God was often with us--Och ochone!
There were many soldiers glad and happy, that were going the way through seven weeks; but now they are stretched down in Aughrim--Och ochone!
They put the first breaking on us at the bridge of the Boyne; the second breaking on the bridge of Slaine; the third breaking in Aughrim of O'Kelly; and O sweet Ireland, my five hundred healths to you--Och ochone!
O'Kelly has manuring for his land, that is not sand or dung, but ready soldiers doing bravery with pikes, that were left in Aughrim stretched in ridges--Och ochone!
Who is that beyond on the hill, Ben Edair? I a poor soldier with King James. I was last year in arms and in dress, but this year I am asking alms--Och ochone!
Mortality.
by Eugene Field

O Nicias, not for us alone
Was laughing Eros born,
Nor shines alone for us the moon,
Nor burns the ruddy morn;
Alas! to-morrow lies not in the ken
Of us who are, O Nicias, mortal men!