DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
When The Fox Dies, His Skin Counts.*
by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

WE young people in the shade
Sat one sultry day;
Cupid came, and "Dies the Fox"
With us sought to play.
Each one of my friends then sat
By his mistress dear;
Cupid, blowing out the torch,
Said: "The taper's here!"
Then we quickly sent around
The expiring brand;
Each one put it hastily
ln his neighbour's hand.
Dorilis then gave it me,
With a scoffing jest;
Sudden into flame it broke,
By my fingers press'd.
And it singed my eyes and face,
Set my breast on fire;
Then above my head the blaze
Mounted ever higher.
Vain I sought to put it out;
Ever burned the flame;
Stead of dying, soon the Fox
Livelier still became.
It Might Have Been.
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

We will be what we could be. Do not say,
"It might have been, had not or that, or this."
No fate can keep us from the chosen way;
He only might, who is.
We will do what we could do. Do not dream
Chance leaves a hero, all uncrowned to grieve.
I hold, all men are greatly what they seem;
He does, who could achieve.
We will climb where we could climb. Tell me not
Of adverse storms that kept thee from the height.
What eagle ever missed the peak he sought?
He always climbs who might.
I do not like the phrase, "It might have been!"
It lacks all force, and life's best truths perverts:
For I believe we have, and reach, and win,
Whatever our deserts.
At The Banquet To The Japanese Embassy
by Oliver Wendell Holmes

We welcome you, Lords of the Land of the Sun!
The voice of the many sounds feebly through one;
Ah! would 't were a voice of more musical tone,
But the dog-star is here, and the song-birds have flown.
And what shall I sing that can cheat you of smiles,
Ye heralds of peace from the Orient isles?
If only the Jubilee - Why did you wait?
You are welcome, but oh! you're a little too late!
We have greeted our brothers of Ireland and France,
Round the fiddle of Strauss we have joined in the dance,
We have lagered Herr Saro, that fine-looking man,
And glorified Godfrey, whose name it is Dan.
What a pity! we've missed it and you've missed it too,
We had a day ready and waiting for you;
We'd have shown you - provided, of course, you had come - 
You 'd have heard - no, you would n't, because it was dumb.
And then the great organ! The chorus's shout
Like the mixture teetotalers call "Cold without" - 
A mingling of elements, strong, but not sweet;
And the drum, just referred to, that "couldn't be beat."
The shrines of our pilgrims are not like your own,
Where white Fusiyama lifts proudly its cone,
(The snow-mantled mountain we see on the fan
That cools our hot cheeks with a breeze from Japan.)
But ours the wide temple where worship is free
As the wind of the prairie, the wave of the sea;
You may build your own altar wherever you will,
For the roof of that temple is over you still.
One dome overarches the star-bannered shore;
You may enter the Pope's or the Puritan's door,
Or pass with the Buddhist his gateway of bronze,
For a priest is but Man, be he bishop or bonze.
And the lesson we teach with the sword and the pen
Is to all of God's children, "We also are men!
If you wrong us we smart, if you prick us we bleed,
If you love us, no quarrel with color or creed!"
You'll find us a well-meaning, free-spoken crowd,
Good-natured enough, but a little too loud, - 
To be sure, there is always a bit of a row
When we choose our Tycoon, and especially now.
You'll take it all calmly, - we want you to see
What a peaceable fight such a contest can be,
And of one thing be certain, however it ends,
You will find that our voters have chosen your friends.
If the horse that stands saddled is first in the race,
You will greet your old friend with the weed in his face;
And if the white hat and the White House agree,
You'll find H. G. really as loving as he.
But oh, what a pity - once more I must say - 
That we could not have joined in a "Japanese day"!
Such greeting we give you to-night as we can;
Long life to our brothers and friends of Japan!
The Lord of the mountain looks down from his crest
As the banner of morning unfurls in the West;
The Eagle was always the friend of the Sun;
You are welcome! - The song of the cage-bird is done.
The Escape
by Gilbert Keith Chesterton

We watched you building, stone by stone,
The well-washed cells and well-washed graves
We shall inhabit but not own
When Britons ever shall be slaves;
The water's waiting in the trough,
The tame oats sown are portioned free,
There is Enough, and just Enough,
And all is ready now but we.
But you have not caught us yet, my lords,
You have us still to get.
A sorry army you'd have got,
Its flags are rags that float and rot,
Its drums are empty pan and pot,
Its baggage is--an empty cot;
But you have not caught us yet.
A little; and we might have slipped
When came your rumours and your sales
And the foiled rich men, feeble-lipped,
Said and unsaid their sorry tales;
Great God!    It needs a bolder brow
To keep ten sheep inside a pen,
And we are sheep no longer now;
You are but Masters.    We are Men.
We give you all good thanks, my lords,
We buy at easy price;
Thanks for the thousands that you stole,
The bribes by wire, the bets on coal,
The knowledge of that naked whole
That hath delivered our flesh and soul
Out of your Paradise.
We had held safe your parks; but when
Men taunted you with bribe and fee,
We only saw the Lord of Men
Grin like an Ape and climb a tree;
And humbly had we stood without
Your princely barns; did we not see
In pointed faces peering out
What Rats now own the granary.
It is too late, too late, my lords,
We give you back your grace:
You cannot with all cajoling
Make the wet ditch, or winds that sting,
Lost pride, or the pawned wedding rings,
Or drink or Death a blacker thing
Than a smile upon your face.
Holy Communion.
by Harriet Annie Wilkins

We were wearied in the battle,
Tempted, and pained, and tried
By day the din and the carnage,
By night the rain's fierce tide;
But we heard a loving message,
From the Prince's tent it came,
"Each meet in the banqueting house.
In memory of my name."
We gathered; a motley regiment,
Some young in the war of life,
Some chiefs in the Royal Army,
Some old and sick with strife,
Some limped in the sacred pathway,
Some were foot sore and worn,
Some had their lances all shivered,
Some had their banners torn.
And we all looked dim and dusty;
We all were stained with sin;
But we held the Prince's message,
And the porter said "Come in."
We went to the banqueting house;
We sat at the Prince's board,
There we polished each his helmet,
We sharpened each his sword.
Our Prince--we talked of his strife,
The forlorn hope He had led,
How He opened the gates of life,
And rescued from Death the dead;
And with Him we saw a bright host,
Our comrades gone on before,
The right wing of our army
Upon the farther shore.
And the festering wound was healed.
The banners were made whole,
Mists rolled back from the almost blind,
Faith lit each warrior's soul;
We drank of the fruit of the vine,
We ate the living bread,
The holy benediction fell,
With healing on each head.
We entered in poor worn soldiers,
We came out bolder knights,
To march on to the Prince's battle,
And war for His glorious rights,
For had we not each re-taken
The oath of allegiance high,
And sworn round the Royal Standard
To conquer, or to die.
The Declaration Of London
by Rudyard Kipling

On the reassembling of Parliament after the Coronation, the Government have no intention of allowing their followers to vote according to their convictions on the Declaration of London, but insist on a strictly party vote. - Daily Papers
We were all one heart and one race
When the Abbey trumpets blew.
For a moment's breathing-space
We had forgotten you.
Now you return to your honoured place
Panting to shame us anew.
We have walked with the Ages dead,
With our Past alive and ablaze.
And you bid us pawn our honour for bread,
This day of all the days!
And you cannot wait till our guests are sped,
Or last week's wreath decays?
The light is still in our eyes
Of Faith and Gentlehood,
Of Service and Sacrifice;
And it does not match our mood,
To turn so soon to your treacheries
That starve our land of her food.
Our ears still carry the sound
Of our once-Imperial seas,
Exultant after our King was crowned,
Beneath the sun and the breeze.
It is too early to have them bound
Or sold at your decrees.
Wait till the memory goes,
Wait till the visions fade,
We may betray in time, God knows,
But we would not have it said,
When you make report to our scornful foes,
That we kissed as we betrayed!
To Marguerite
by Matthew Arnold

We were apart: yet, day by day,
I bade my heart more constant be;
I bade it keep the world away,
And grow a home for only thee:
Nor fear'd but thy love likewise grew,
Like mine, each day more tried, more true.
The fault was grave: I might have known,
What far too soon, alas, I learn'd
The heart can bind itself alone,
And faith is often unreturn'd.
Self-sway'd our feelings ebb and swell:
Thou lov'est no more: Farewell! Farewell!
Farewell! and thou, thou lonely heart,
Which never yet without remorse
Even for a moment didn't depart
From thy remote and spher'd course
To haunt the place where passions reign,
Back to thy solitude again!
Back, with the conscious thrill of shame
Which Luna felt, that summer night,
Flash through her pure immortal frame,
When she forsook the starry height
To hang over Endymion' sleep
Upon the pine-grown Latmian steep;
Yet she, chaste Queen, had never prov'd
How vain a thing is mortal love,
Wandering in Heaven, far remov'd.
But thou hast long had place to prove
This truth to prove, and make thine own
Thou hast been, shalt be, art, alone.
Or, if not quite alone, yet they
Which touch thee are unmating things
Ocean, and Clouds, and Night, and Day;
Lorn Autumns and triumphant Springs;
And life, and others' joy and pain,
And love, if love, of happier men.
Of happier men for they, at least,
Have dream'd two human hearts might blend
In one, and were through faith releas'd
From isolation without end
Prolong'd, nor knew, although not less
Alone than thou, their loneliness.
Above The Vales.
by Madison Julius Cawein

We went by ways of bygone days,
Up mountain heights of story,
Where lost in vague, historic haze,
Tradition, crowned with battle-bays,
Sat 'mid her ruins hoary.
Where wing to wing the eagles cling
And torrents have their sources,
War rose with bugle voice to sing
Of wild spear thrust, and broadsword swing,
And rush of men and horses.
Then deep below, where orchards show
A home here, here a steeple,
We heard a simple shepherd go,
Singing, beneath the afterglow,
A love-song of the people.
As in the trees the song did cease,
With matron eyes and holy
Peace, from the cornlands of increase.
And rose-beds of love's victories,
Spake, smiling, of the lowly.
By The Fire
by Aldous Leonard Huxley

We who are lovers sit by the fire,
Cradled warm 'twixt thought and will,
Sit and drowse like sleeping dogs
In the equipoise of all desire,
Sit and listen to the still
Small hiss and whisper of green logs
That burn away, that burn away
With the sound of a far-off falling stream
Of threaded water blown to steam,
Grey ghost in the mountain world of grey.
Vapours blue as distance rise
Between the hissing logs that show
A glimpse of rosy heat below;
And candles watch with tireless eyes
While we sit drowsing here. I know,
Dimly, that there exists a world,
That there is time perhaps, and space
Other and wider than this place,
Where at the fireside drowsily curled
We hear the whisper and watch the flame
Burn blinkless and inscrutable.
And then I know those other names
That through my brain from cell to cell
Echo--reverberated shout
Of waiters mournful along corridors:
But nobody carries the orders out,
And the names (dear friends, your name and yours)
Evoke no sign. But here I sit
On the wide hearth, and there are you:
That is enough and only true.
The world and the friends that lived in it
Are shadows: you alone remain
Real in this drowsing room,
Full of the whispers of distant rain
And candles staring into the gloom.
Wars In Queen Victoria's Reign.
by James McIntyre

We will now sing in thoughtful strain
Of wars in Queen Victoria's reign.
The Russian bear did ages lurk,
All ready for to spring on Turk,
For Russian statesmen did divine
That they should conquer Constantine,
But like a greyhound after hare
The Lion did drive back the Bear,
And made it feel the British rule
At gates of strong Sebastopol.
Then insolent was Persia,
Till Lion had to dictate law,
And while engaged in scenes like these
He was attacked by the Chinese,
And for this outrage all so wanton
He then resolved to seize on Canton.
But soon there came a dismal cry
Of slaughter'd Britons from Delhi,
The Bengal Tiger sick with gore
Did tremble at the Lion's roar,
But Britain got a serious shock
By losing of brave Havelock,
But Campbell 'mid a numerous foe
Full quick these armed hosts did o'erthrow,
In Abyssinian dungeons vile
Lay captives of Great Britain's isle,
But soon the tyrant Theodore
Lay sadly weltering in his gore.
The savage tribes of Ashantee
From British troops did quickly flee,
In Afghan and Zulu wars
Many did find their deadly scars;
In the land of the Pharaohs
The Christians suffered cruel woes,
Till in Alexandria Bay
The British iron clads did display,
The mighty power they did wield,
While their steel sides from harm did shield,
And British army on the land
Marched bravely o'er the burning sand,
And Arabi found 'twas useless labor,
His strong trench of Tel-el-Kebir,
Egyptians did not wish to feel
In their breasts cold British steel,
Their great power was soon laid low
And Wolseley entered Grand Cairo.
Egyptians now no more revile
The Christians on the banks of Nile.
We have sung three heroes' names.
Havelock from the land of Thames,
And Campbell from the banks of Clyde,
And Wolseley from Liffy's side,
When rose, thistle, shamrock unite
They do prove victors in the fight,
Now Britain once more does command
Respect alike on sea and land,
But now may wars forever cease
And mankind ever live in peace.
The Happy Flatite
by Edward Dyson

We were living in a flat; it was number eighty-three.
At eighty-four the Barleys lived, a fearsome man was he.
He had a wife and numerous kids. We heard then rip and cuss,
Some three feet and a quarter off, across the hall from us.
And when the Barley boys broke out, and ended up in fight,
Or when the Barley baby read the Riot Act at night,
And on their balcony their cat put up an eerie moan,
The fearful Barley family might as well have been our own.
When Barley after parting with some others of the ilk
Came panting up the narrow stairs, and drank our jug of milk,
Then broke out at his missus, and as fiercely answered she, 
Where was the great advantage of our marked sobriety?
When Barley bedded early he would shake the common floor
And fill the gulf of night with an intolerable snore,
And people in the other wing at us their bluchers threw, 
What good if we slept soft as snow and silent as the dew?
This Barley when unoccupied would fill my study chair,
And utilise much time, and take up space I could not spare,
To tell me of the deeds he'd done, his drinkings deep and vast,
And ladies who had loved him in his sanguinary past.
And Mrs. Barley dropped in, in the morning, as a rule, 
And stayed till lunch and chattered like a ladies' boarding-school.
Then she borrowed bread and onions, and wondered if she might
Leave her little Willie with us. She was going out till night.
Our little flat's forsaken; we have left St. Kilda road;
We knew not where to go to, and we haven't an abode;
But no flat in any building that we'd suffered in was worth
The comfort of a camp-out. So we're flat upon the earth!
Greenock
by William Wordsworth

'We' have not passed into a doleful City,
We who were led to-day down a grim dell,
By some too boldly named "the Jaws of Hell:"
Where be the wretched ones, the sights for pity?
These crowded streets resound no plaintive ditty:
As from the hive where bees in summer dwell,
Sorrow seems here excluded; and that knell,
It neither damps the gay, nor checks the witty.
Alas! too busy Rival of old Tyre,
Whose merchants Princes were, whose decks were thrones;
Soon may the punctual sea in vain respire
To serve thy need, in union with that Clyde
Whose nursling current brawls o'er mossy stones,
The poor, the lonely, herdsman's joy and pride.
Isolation - To Marguerite
by Matthew Arnold

We were apart; yet, day by day,
I bade my heart more constant be.
I bade it keep the world away,
And grow a home for only thee;
Nor fear'd but thy love likewise grew,
Like mine, each day, more tried, more true.
The fault was grave! I might have known,
What far too soon, alas! I learn'd 
The heart can bind itself alone,
And faith may oft be unreturn'd.
Self-sway'd our feelings ebb and swell 
Thou lov'st no more; Farewell! Farewell!
Farewell! and thou, thou lonely heart,
Which never yet without remorse
Even for a moment didst depart
From thy remote and spher'd course
To haunt the place where passions reign 
Back to thy solitude again!
Back! with the conscious thrill of shame
Which Luna felt, that summer-night,
Flash through her pure immortal frame,
When she forsook the starry height
To hang over Endymion's sleep
Upon the pine-grown Latmian steep.
Yet she, chaste queen, had never proved
How vain a thing is mortal love,
Wandering in Heaven, far removed.
But thou hast long had place to prove
This truth to prove, and make thine own:
"Thou hast been, shalt be, art, alone."
Or, if not quite alone, yet they
Which touch thee are unmating things 
Ocean and clouds and night and day;
Lorn autumns and triumphant springs;
And life, and others' joy and pain,
And love, if love, of happier men.
Of happier men for they, at least,
Have dream'd two human hearts might blend
In one, and were through faith released
From isolation without end
Prolong'd; nor knew, although not less
Alone than thou, their loneliness.
The Secret Of The Machines
by Rudyard Kipling

We were taken from the ore-bed and the mine,
We were melted in the furnace and the pit,
We were cast and wrought and hammered to design,
We were cut and filed and tooled and gauged to fit.
Some water, coal, and oil is all we ask,
And a thousandth of an inch to give us play:
And now, if you will set us to our task,
We will serve you four and twenty hours a day!
We can pull and haul and push and lift and drive,
We can print and plough and weave and heat and light,
We can run and race and swim and fly and dive,
We can see and hear and count and read and write!
Would you call a friend from half across the world?
If you'll let us have his name and town and state,
You shall see and hear your cracking question hurled
Across the arch of heaven while you wait.
Has he answered? Does he need you at his side,
You can start this very evening if you choose
And take the Western Ocean in the stride
O seventy thousand horses and some screws!
The boat-express is waiting your command!
You will find the Mauritania at the quay,
Till her captain turns the lever 'neath his hand,
And the monstrouos nine-decked city goes to sea.
Do you wish to make the mountains bare their head
And lay their new-cut forests at your feet?
Do you want to turn a river in its bed,
Or plant a barren wilderness with wheat?
Shall we pipe aloft and bring you water down
From the never-failing cisterns of the snows,
To work the mills and tramways in your town,
And irrigate your orchards as it flows?
It is easy! Give us dynamite and drills!
Watch the iron-shouldered rocks lie down and quake,
As the thirsty desert-level floods and fills,
And the valley we have dammed becomes a lake.
But remember, please, the Law by which we live,
We are not built to comprehend a lie,
We can neither love nor pity nor forgive.
If you make a slip in handling us you die!
We are greater than the Peoples or the Kings,
Be humble, as you crawl beneath our rods!
Our touch can alter all created things,
We are everything on earth, except The Gods!
Though our smoke may hide the Heavens from your eyes,
It will vanish and the stars will shine again,
Because, for all our power and weight and size,
We are nothing more than children of your brain!
Best Times
by Thomas Hardy

We went a day's excursion to the stream,
Basked by the bank, and bent to the ripple-gleam,
And I did not know
That life would show,
However it might flower, no finer glow.
I walked in the Sunday sunshine by the road
That wound towards the wicket of your abode,
And I did not think
That life would shrink
To nothing ere it shed a rosier pink.
Unlooked for I arrived on a rainy night,
And you hailed me at the door by the swaying light,
And I full forgot
That life might not
Again be touching that ecstatic height.
And that calm eve when you walked up the stair,
After a gaiety prolonged and rare,
No thought soever
That you might never
Walk down again, struck me as I stood there.
The Sentry
by Wilfred Edward Salter Owen

We'd found an old Boche dug-out, and he knew,
And gave us hell, for shell on frantic shell
Hammered on top, but never quite burst through.
Rain, guttering down in waterfalls of slime
Kept slush waist high, that rising hour by hour,
Choked up the steps too thick with clay to climb.
What murk of air remained stank old, and sour
With fumes of whizz-bangs, and the smell of men
Who'd lived there years, and left their curse in the den,
If not their corpses. . . .
There we herded from the blast
Of whizz-bangs, but one found our door at last.
Buffeting eyes and breath, snuffing the candles.
And thud! flump! thud! down the steep steps came thumping
And splashing in the flood, deluging muck--
The sentry's body; then his rifle, handles
Of old Boche bombs, and mud in ruck on ruck.
We dredged him up, for killed, until he whined
"O sir, my eyes--I'm blind--I'm blind, I'm blind!"
Coaxing, I held a flame against his lids
And said if he could see the least blurred light
He was not blind; in time he'd get all right.
"I can't," he sobbed. Eyeballs, huge-bulged like squids
Watch my dreams still; but I forgot him there
In posting next for duty, and sending a scout
To beg a stretcher somewhere, and floundering about
To other posts under the shrieking air.
Those other wretches, how they bled and spewed,
And one who would have drowned himself for good,--
I try not to remember these things now.
Let dread hark back for one word only: how
Half-listening to that sentry's moans and jumps,
And the wild chattering of his broken teeth,
Renewed most horribly whenever crumps
Pummelled the roof and slogged the air beneath--
Through the dense din, I say, we heard him shout
"I see your lights!" But ours had long died out.