DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Sonnets From The Portuguese XLIV
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Belov'd, thou hast brought me many flowers
Plucked in the garden, all the summer through,
And winter, and it seemed as if they grew
In this close room, nor missed the sun and showers.
So, in the like name of that love of ours,
Take back these thoughts which here unfolded too,
And which on warm and cold days I withdrew
From my heart's ground. Indeed, those beds and bowers
Be overgrown with bitter weeds and rue,
And wait thy weeding; yet here's eglantine,
Here's ivy! take them, as I used to do
Thy flowers, and keep them where they shall not pine.
Instruct thine eyes to keep their colours true,
And tell thy soul, their roots are left in mine.
Flowers And Stars.
by Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

"Beloved! thou'rt gazing with thoughtful look
On those flowers of brilliant hue,
Blushing in spring tide freshness and bloom,
Glittering with diamond dew:
What dost thou read in each chalice fair,
And what does each blossom say?
Do they not tell thee, my peerless one,
Thou'rt lovelier far than they?"
"Not so - not so, but they whisper low
That quickly will fade their bloom;
Soon will they withered lie on the sod,
Ravished of all perfume;
They tell that youth and beauty below
Are doomed, alas! to decay,
And I, like them, in life's flower and prime
May pass from this earth away."
"Too sad thy thoughts! Look up at yon stars,
That gleam in the sapphire skies;
Not clearer their radiance, best beloved,
Than the light of thine own dark eyes!
With no thoughts of death or sad decay,
Can they thy young spirit fill;
Through ages they've shone with changeless light,
And yet they are shining still!"
"Ah! they bring before my spirit's gaze
Dreams of that home so blessed,
Where those who have served the Master well
At length from their labors rest;
And do not chide if, despite all ties,
Of close-clinging earthly love,
There are times when I turn a wistful glance
To that distant home above."
Then And Now
by John McCrae

Beneath her window in the fragrant night
I half forget how truant years have flown
Since I looked up to see her chamber-light,
Or catch, perchance, her slender shadow thrown
Upon the casement; but the nodding leaves
Sweep lazily across the unlit pane,
And to and fro beneath the shadowy eaves,
Like restless birds, the breath of coming rain
Creeps, lilac-laden, up the village street
When all is still, as if the very trees
Were listening for the coming of her feet
That come no more; yet, lest I weep, the breeze
Sings some forgotten song of those old years
Until my heart grows far too glad for tears.
Envoi
by John Collings Squire, Sir

Beloved, when my heart's awake to God
And all the world becomes His testimony,
In you I most do see, in your brave spirit,
Erect and certain, flashing deeds of light,
A pure jet from the fountain of all being,
A scripture clearer than all else to read.
And when belief was dead and God a myth,
And the world seemed a wandering mote of evil,
Endurable only by its impermanence,
And all the planets perishable urns
Of perished ashes, to you alone I clung
Amid the unspeakable loneliness of the universe.
The Angelus
by Bret Harte (Francis)

Bells of the Past, whose long-forgotten music
Still fills the wide expanse,
Tingeing the sober twilight of the Present
With color of romance!
I hear your call, and see the sun descending
On rock and wave and sand,
As down the coast the Mission voices, blending,
Girdle the heathen land.
Within the circle of your incantation
No blight nor mildew falls;
Nor fierce unrest, nor lust, nor low ambition
Passes those airy walls.
Borne on the swell of your long waves receding,
I touch the farther Past;
I see the dying glow of Spanish glory,
The sunset dream and last!
Before me rise the dome-shaped Mission towers,
The white Presidio;
The swart commander in his leathern jerkin,
The priest in stole of snow.
Once more I see Portala's cross uplifting
Above the setting sun;
And past the headland, northward, slowly drifting,
The freighted galleon.
O solemn bells! whose consecrated masses
Recall the faith of old;
O tinkling bells! that lulled with twilight music
The spiritual fold!
Your voices break and falter in the darkness,
Break, falter, and are still;
And veiled and mystic, like the Host descending,
The sun sinks from the hill!
Dithyramb. [23]
by Friedrich Schiller

Believe me, together
The bright gods come ever,
Still as of old;
Scarce see I Bacchus, the giver of joy,
Than comes up fair Eros, the laugh-loving boy,
And Phoebus, the stately, behold!
They come near and nearer,
The heavenly ones all 
The gods with their presence
Fill earth as their hall!
Say, how shall I welcome,
Human and earthborn,
Sons of the sky?
Pour out to me pour the full life that ye live!
What to ye, O ye gods! can the mortal one give?
The joys can dwell only
In Jupiter's palace 
Brimmed bright with your nectar,
Oh, reach me the chalice!
"Hebe, the chalice
Fill full to the brim!
Steep his eyes steep his eyes in the bath of the dew,
Let him dream, while the Styx is concealed from his view,
That the life of the gods is for him!"
It murmurs, it sparkles,
The fount of delight;
The bosom grows tranquil 
The eye becomes bright.
On The Monument Of A Fair Maiden Lady[1], Who Died At Bath, And Is There Interred.
by John Dryden

Below this marble monument is laid
All that heaven wants of this celestial maid.
Preserve, O sacred tomb! thy trust consign'd;
The mould was made on purpose for the mind:
And she would lose, if, at the latter day,
One atom could be mix'd of other clay.
Such were the features of her heavenly face,
Her limbs were form'd with such harmonious grace:
So faultless was the frame, as if the whole
Had been an emanation of the soul:
Which her own inward symmetry reveal'd
And like a picture shone, in glass anneal'd.
Or like the sun eclipsed, with shaded light:
Too piercing, else, to be sustain'd by sight.
Each thought was visible that roll'd within:
As through a crystal case the figured hours are seen.
And Heaven did this transparent veil provide,
Because she had no guilty thought to hide.
All white, a virgin-saint, she sought the skies:
For marriage, though it sullies not, it dyes.
High though her wit, yet humble was her mind:
As if she could not, or she would not find
How much her worth transcended all her kind.
Yet she had learn'd so much of heaven below,
That, when arrived, she scarce had more to know:
But only to refresh the former hint,
And read her Maker in a fairer print.
So pious, as she had no time to spare
For human thoughts, but was confined to prayer.
Yet in such charities she pass'd the day,
'Twas wondrous how she found an hour to pray.
A soul so calm, it knew not ebbs or flows,
Which passion could but curl, not discompose.
A female softness, with a manly mind:
A daughter duteous, and a sister kind:
In sickness patient, and in death resign'd.
Cantata. Set By Mons. Galliard
by Matthew Prior

Recit.
Beneath a verdant laurel's ample shade
His lyre to mournful numbers strung,
Horace, immortal bard supinely laid,
To Venus thus address'd the song;
Ten thousand little loves around,
Listening dwelt on every sound.
Ariet.
Potent Venus, bid thy son
Sound no more his dire alarms:
Youth on silent wings is flown;
Graver years come rolling on,
Spare my age unfit for arms:
Safe and humble let me rest,
From all amorous care released.
Potent Venus, bid thy son
Sound no more his dire alarms.
Recit.
Yet, Venus, why do I each morn prepare
The fragrant wreath for Cloe's hair?
Why, why do I all day lament and sigh,
Unless the beauteous maid be nigh?
And why all night pursue her in my dreams
Through flowery meads and crystal streams?
Recit.
Thus sung the bard, and thus the goddess spoke:
Submissive bow to Love's imperious yoke;
Every state and every age
Shall own my rule and fear my rage:
Compell'd by me, thy Muse shall prove
That all the world was born to love.
Ariet.
Bid thy destined lyre discover
Soft desire and gentle pain:
Often praise, and always love her;
Through her ear her heart obtain.
Verse shall please and sight shall move her,
Cupid does with Phoebus reign.
Twilight
by Theodosia Garrison

Below them in the twilight the quiet village lies,
And warm within its holding, the old folks and the wise,
But here within the open fields the paths of Eden show,
And, hand in hand, across them the little lovers go.
Below them in the village are peaceful folk and still,
They gossip of old yesterdays, of merry times or ill.
But here beyond the twilight stray two who only see
The promise of to-morrow--the dawn that is to be.
Below them in the village the quiet hearth-flames glow,
With friendly word and greeting the neighbours come and go,
But here the silence folds them together, each to each,
And lights within the mating eyes the dream beyond their speech.
Below them in the village stay honest toil and truth,--
They rest there who adventured the road of love and youth.
Smile out, old hearts, when once again two take the path you know,
And, hand in hand, at twilight the little lovers go.
Sonnets From The Portuguese XX
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Belov'd, my Belov'd, when I think
That thou wast in the world a year ago,
What time I sat alone here in the snow
And saw no footprint, heard the silence sink
No moment at thy voice, but, link by link,
Went counting all my chains as if that so
They never could fall off at any blow
Struck by thy possible hand, why, thus I drink
Of life's great cup of wonder! Wonderful,
Never to feel thee thrill the day or night
With personal act or speech, nor ever cull
Some prescience of thee with the blossoms white
Thou sawest growing! Atheists are as dull,
Who cannot guess God's presence out of sight.
Perfect Love.
by Archibald Lampman

Beloved, those who moan of love's brief day
Shall find but little grace with me, I guess,
Who know too well this passion's tenderness
To deem that it shall lightly pass away,
A moment's interlude in life's dull play;
Though many loves have lingered to distress,
So shall not ours, sweet Lady, ne'ertheless,
But deepen with us till both heads be grey.
For perfect love is like a fair green plant,
That fades not with its blossoms, but lives on,
And gentle lovers shall not come to want,
Though fancy with its first mad dream be gone;
Sweet is the flower, whose radiant glory flies,
But sweeter still the green that never dies.
The Breaking.
by Margaret Steele Anderson

(The Lord God speaks to a youth.) 
Bend now thy body to the common weight! 
(But oh, that vine-clad head, those limbs of morn! 
Those proud young shoulders I myself made straight! 
How shall ye wear the yoke that must be worn?) 
Look thou, my son, what wisdom comes to thee! 
(But oh, that singing mouth, those radiant eyes! 
Those dancing feet, that I myself made free! 
How shall I sadden them to make them wise?) 
Nay then, thou shalt! Resist not, have a care! 
(Yea, I must work my plans who sovereign sit! 
Yet do not tremble so! I cannot bear
Though I am God! to see thee so submit!)
To Number 27X.
by Robert Fuller Murray

Beloved Peeler! friend and guide
And guard of many a midnight reeler,
None worthier, though the world is wide,
Beloved Peeler.
Thou from before the swift four-wheeler
Didst pluck me, and didst thrust aside
A strongly built provision-dealer
Who menaced me with blows, and cried
'Come on! come on!'    O Paian, Healer,
Then but for thee I must have died,
Beloved Peeler!
The Kraken
by Alfred Lord Tennyson

Below the thunders of the upper deep,
Far far beneath in the abysmal sea,
His ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep
The Kraken sleepeth: faintest sunlights flee
About his shadowy sides: above him swell
Huge sponges of millennial growth and height;
And far away into the sickly light,
From many a wondrous grot and secret cell
Unnumbered and enormous polypi
Winnow with giant fins the slumbering green.
There hath he lain for ages and will lie
Battering upon huge seaworms in his sleep,
Until the latter fire shall heat the deep;
Then once by men and angels to be seen,
In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die.
When Cora Died.
by John Hartley

Bells ring out a joyful sound,
Old and young alike seem gay;
One more year has gone its round,
Again we greet a New Year's Day.
Whilst to some they tell of cheer,
Other hearts may grief betide,
For 'twas in the glad New Year
When our darling Cora died.
Like a snowdrop, pure and fair,
She had blossomed in our home;
Her we nursed with tender care,
Lest Death's blighting frost should come.
And we prayed to keep her here,
But our pleading was denied; - 
Early in the glad New Year,
Little darling Cora died.
Death had taken some before,
Some from whom 'twas hard to part;
And their voices now no more,
Come to cheer the longing heart.
In that one frail blossom dear,
Centered all our hope and pride;
Alas! Then came the sad New Year,
When our darling Cora died.
Since that time the pealing bells
Wake sad echoes in the heart;
And the grief that in us dwells
Makes the tears unbidden start.
Though they ring so loud and clear,
Flinging gladness far and wide,
They to me recall the year,
When our darling Cora died.
Two Songs by Sitara, of Kashmir
by Laurence Hope (Adela Florence Cory Nicolson)

Beloved! your hair was golden
As tender tints of sunrise,
As corn beside the River
In softly varying hues.
I loved you for your slightness,
Your melancholy sweetness,
Your changeful eyes, that promised
What your lips would still refuse.
You came to me, and loved me,
Were mine upon the River,
The azure water saw us
And the blue transparent sky;
The Lotus flowers knew it,
Our happiness together,
While life was only River,
Only love, and you and I.
Love wakened on the River,
To sounds of running water,
With silver Stars for witness
And reflected Stars for light;
Awakened to existence,
With ripples for first music
And sunlight on the River
For earliest sense of sight.
Love grew upon the River
Among the scented flowers,
The open rosy flowers
Of the Lotus buds in bloom - 
Love, brilliant as the Morning,
More fervent than the Noon-day,
And tender as the Twilight
In its blue transparent gloom.
Love died upon the River!
Cold snow upon the mountains,
The Lotus leaves turned yellow
And the water very grey.
Our kisses faint and falter,
The clinging hands unfasten,
The golden time is over
And our passion dies away.
Away.    To be forgotten,
A ripple on the River,
That flashes in the sunset,
That flashed, - and died away.
Faithless Nelly Gray. - A Pathetic Ballad.
by Thomas Hood

Ben Battle was a soldier bold,
And used to war's alarms;
But a cannon-ball took off his legs,
So he laid down his arms!
Now as they bore him off the field,
Said he, "Let others shoot,
For here I leave my second leg,
And the Forty-second Foot!"
The army-surgeons made him limbs:
Said he, - "They're only pegs:
But there's as wooden members quite,
As represent my legs!"
Now Ben he loved a pretty maid,
Her name was Nelly Gray;
So he went to pay her his devours,
When he'd devour'd his pay!
But when he called on Nelly Gray,
She made him quite a scoff;
And when she saw his wooden legs,
Began to take them off!
"O, Nelly Gray! O, Nelly Gray!
Is this your love so warm?
The love that loves a scarlet coat
Should be more uniform!"
Said she, "I loved a soldier once,
For he was blithe and brave;
But I will never have a man
With both legs in the grave!"
"Before you had those timber toes,
Your love I did allow,
But then, you know, you stand upon
Another footing now!"
"O, Nelly Gray! O, Nelly Gray!
For all your jeering speeches,
At duty's call, I left my legs
In Badajos's breaches!"
"Why, then," said she, "you've lost the feet
Of legs in war's alarms,
And now you cannot wear your shoes
Upon your feats of arms!"
"O, false and fickle Nelly Gray!
I know why you refuse: - 
Though I've no feet - some other man
Is standing in my shoes!"
"I wish I ne'er had seen your face;
But, now, a long farewell!
For you will be my death: - alas!
You will not be my Nell!"
Now when he went from Nelly Gray,
His heart so heavy got - 
And life was such a burthen grown,
It made him take a knot!
So round his melancholy neck
A rope he did entwine,
And, for his second time in life,
Enlisted in the Line!
One end he tied around a beam,
And then removed his pegs,
And, as his legs were off, - of course,
He soon was off his legs!
And there he hung, till he was dead
As any nail in town, - 
For though distress had cut him up,
It could not cut him down!
A dozen men sat on his corpse,
To find out why he died - 
And they buried Ben in four cross-roads,
With a stake in his inside!
A Forest Idyl
by Madison Julius Cawein

I.
Beneath an old beech-tree
They sat together,
Fair as a flower was she
Of summer weather.
They spoke of life and love,
While, through the boughs above,
The sunlight, like a dove,
Dropped many a feather.
II.
And there the violet,
The bluet near it,
Made blurs of azure wet
As if some spirit,
Or woodland dream, had gone
Sprinkling the earth with dawn,
When only Fay and Faun
Could see or hear it.
III.
She with her young, sweet face
And eyes gray-beaming,
Made of that forest place
A spot for dreaming:
A spot for Oreads
To smooth their nut-brown braids,
For Dryads of the glades
To dance in, gleaming.
IV.
So dim the place, so blest,
One had not wondered
Had Dian's moon'd breast
The deep leaves sundered,
And there on them awhile
The goddess deigned to smile,
While down some forest aisle.
The far hunt thundered.
V.
I deem that hour perchance
Was but a mirror
To show them Earth's romance
And draw them nearer:
A mirror where, meseems,
All that this Earth-life dreams,
All loveliness that gleams,
Their souls saw clearer.
VI.
Beneath an old beech-tree
They dreamed of blisses;
Fair as a flower was she
That summer kisses:
They spoke of dreams and days,
Of love that goes and stays,
Of all for which life prays,
Ah me! and misses.
"Belshazzar Had A Letter,"
by Emily Elizabeth Dickinson

Belshazzar had a letter, --
He never had but one;
Belshazzar's correspondent
Concluded and begun
In that immortal copy
The conscience of us all
Can read without its glasses
On revelation's wall.
The Green Linnet
by William Wordsworth

Beneath these fruit-tree boughs that shed
Their snow-white blossoms on my head,
With brightest sunshine round me spread
Of spring's unclouded weather,
In this sequestered nook how sweet
To sit upon my orchard-seat!
And birds and flowers once more to greet,
My last year's friends together.
One have I marked, the happiest guest
In all this covert of the blest:
Hail to Thee, far above the rest
In joy of voice and pinion!
Thou, Linnet! in thy green array,
Presiding Spirit here to-day,
Dost lead the revels of the May;
And this is thy dominion.
While birds, and butterflies, and flowers,
Make all one band of paramours,
Thou, ranging up and down the bowers,
Art sole in thy employment:
A Life, a Presence like the Air,
Scattering thy gladness without care,
Too blest with any one to pair;
Thyself thy own enjoyment.
Amid yon tuft of hazel trees,
That twinkle to the gusty breeze,
Behold him perched in ecstasies,
Yet seeming still to hover;
There! where the flutter of his wings
Upon his back and body flings
Shadows and sunny glimmerings,
That cover him all over.
My dazzled sight he oft deceives,
A brother of the dancing leaves;
Then flits, and from the cottage-eaves
Pours forth his song in gushes;
As if by that exulting strain
He mocked and treated with disdain
The voiceless Form he chose to feign,
While fluttering in the bushes.
Natura naturans
by Arthur Hugh Clough

Beside me, in the car, she sat,
She spake not, no, nor looked to me
From her to me, from me to her,
What passed so subtly, stealthily?
As rose to rose that by it blows
Its interchanged aroma flings;
Or wake to sound of one sweet note
The virtues of disparted strings.
Beside me, nought but this! but this,
That influent as within me dwelt
Her life, mine too within her breast,
Her brain, her every limb she felt
We sat; while o'er and in us, more
And more, a power unknown prevailed,
Inhaling, and inhaled, and still
'Twas one, inhaling or inhaled.
Beside me, nought but this; and passed;
I passed; and know not to this day
If gold or jet her girlish hair,
If black, or brown, or lucid-grey
Her eye's young glance: the fickle chance
That joined us, yet may join again;
But I no face again could greet
As her's, whose life was in me then.
As unsuspecting mere a maid
As, fresh in maidhood's bloomiest bloom,
In casual second-class did e'er
By casual youth her seat assume;
Or vestal, say, of saintliest clay,
For once by balmiest airs betrayed
Unto emotions too, too sweet
To be unlingeringly gainsaid:
Unowning then, confusing soon
With dreamier dreams that o'er the glass
Of shyly ripening woman-sense
Reflected, scarce reflected, pass,
A wife may-be, a mother she
In Hymen's shrine recals not now,
She first in hour, ah, not profane,
With me to Hymen learnt to bow.
Ah no! Yet owned we, fused in one,
The Power which e'en in stones and earths
By blind elections felt, in forms
Organic breeds to myriad births;
By lichen small on granite wall
Approved, its faintest feeblest stir
Slow-spreading, strengthening long, at last
Vibrated full in me and her.
In me and her sensation strange!
The lily grew to pendent head,
To vernal airs the mossy bank
Its sheeny primrose spangles spread,
In roof o'er roof of shade sun-proof
Did cedar strong itself outclimb,
And altitude of aloe proud
Aspire in floreal crown sublime;
Flashed flickering forth fantastic flies,
Big bees their burly bodies swung,
Rooks roused with civic din the elms,
And lark its wild reveillez rung;
In Libyan dell the light gazelle,
The leopard lithe in Indian glade,
And dolphin, brightening tropic seas,
In us were living, leapt and played:
Their shells did slow crustacea build,
Their gilded skins did snakes renew,
While mightier spines for loftier kind
Their types in amplest limbs outgrew;
Yea, close comprest in human breast,
What moss, and tree, and livelier thing,
What Earth, Sun, Star of force possest,
Lay budding, burgeoning forth for Spring.
Such sweet preluding sense of old
Led on in Eden's sinless place
The hour when bodies human first
Combined the primal prime embrace,
Such genial heat the blissful seat
In man and woman owned unblamed,
When, naked both, its garden paths
They walked unconscious, unashamed:
Ere, clouded yet in mistiest dawn,
Above the horizon dusk and dun,
One mountain crest with light had tipped
That Orb that is the Spirit's Sun;
Ere dreamed young flowers in vernal showers
Of fruit to rise the flower above,
Or ever yet to young Desire
Was told the mystic name of Love.