DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
The Haunted Woodland
by Madison Julius Cawein

Here in the golden darkness
And green night of the woods,
A flitting form I follow,
A shadow that eludes - 
Or is it but the phantom
Of former forest moods?
The phantom of some fancy
I knew when I was young,
And in my dreaming boyhood,
The wildwood flow'rs among,
Young face to face with Faery
Spoke in no unknown tongue.
Blue were her eyes, and golden
The nimbus of her hair;
And crimson as a flower
Her mouth that kissed me there;
That kissed and bade me follow,
And smiled away my care.
A magic and a marvel
Lived in her word and look,
As down among the blossoms
She sate me by the brook,
And read me wonder-legends
In Nature's Story Book.
Loved fairy-tales forgotten,
She never reads again,
Of beautiful enchantments
That haunt the sun and rain,
And, in the wind and water,
Chant a mysterious strain.
And so I search the forest,
Wherein my spirit feels,
In tree or stream or flower
Herself she still conceals - 
But now she flies who followed,
Whom Earth no more reveals.
To A Friend
by Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

Here in the fairway
Fetching--foul of keel,
Long-stray but fortunate--
Out of the fogs, the vast
Atlantic solitudes.
Shall, by the hawser-pin
Waiting the signal
Leave--go--anchor!
Scent the familiar,
The unforgettable
Fragrance of home;
So in a long breath
Bless us unknowing:
Bless them, the violets,
Bless me, the gardener,
Bless thee, the giver.
Nursery Rhyme. CCCCXCI. Love And Matrimony.
by Unknown

Here comes a lusty wooer,
My a dildin, my a daldin;
Here comes a lusty wooer,
Lily bright and shine a'.
Pray, who do you woo,
My a dildin, my a daldin?
Pray, who do you woo,
Lily bright and shine a'?
For your fairest daughter,
My a dildin, my a daldin;
For your fairest daughter,
Lily bright and shine a'.
Then there she is for you,
My a dildin, my a daldin;
Then there she is for you,
Lily bright and shine a'.
Nursery Rhyme. CCCXLIII. Games.
by Unknown

[The two following are fragments of a game called "The Lady of the Land," a complete version of which has not fallen in my way.]
Here comes a poor woman from baby-land,
With three small children in her hand:
One can brew, the other can bake,
The other can make a pretty round cake.
One can sit in the garden and spin,
Another can make a fine bed for the king;
Pray ma'am will you take one in?
The Line-Gang
by Robert Lee Frost

Here come the line-gang pioneering by,
They throw a forest down less cut than broken.
They plant dead trees for living, and the dead
They string together with a living thread.
They string an instrument against the sky
Wherein words whether beaten out or spoken
Will run as hushed as when they were a thought
But in no hush they string it: they go past
With shouts afar to pull the cable taught,
To hold it hard until they make it fast,
To ease away, they have it. With a laugh,
An oath of towns that set the wild at naught
They bring the telephone and telegraph.
The Birthplace
by Robert Lee Frost

Here further up the mountain slope
Than there was every any hope,
My father built, enclosed a spring,
Strung chains of wall round everything,
Subdued the growth of earth to grass,
And brought our various lives to pass.
A dozen girls and boys we were.
The mountain seemed to like the stir,
And made of us a little while,
With always something in her smile.
Today she wouldn't know our name.
(No girl's, of course, has stayed the same.)
The mountain pushed us off her knees.
And now her lap is full of trees.
Milton Abbey.
by John Clare

Here grandeur triumphs at its topmost pitch
In gardens, groves, and all that life beguiles;
Here want, too, meets a blessing from the rich,
And hospitality for ever smiles:
Soldier or sailor, from his many toils,
Here finds no cause to rail at pomp and pride;
He shows his scars, and talks of battle's broils,
And wails his poverty, and is supplied.
No dogs bark near, the fainting wretch to chide,
That bows to misery his aged head,
And tells how better luck did once betide,
And how he came to beg his crust of bread:
Here he but sighs his sorrows and is fed--
Mansion of wealth, by goodness dignified!
To A Godson (1861)
by Bj'rnstjerne Martinius Bj'rnson

(With an album containing portraits of all those who at the time of his birth were leaders in the intellectual and political world.)
Here hast thou before thee that constellation
Whereunder was born thy light;
These stars in the vault of high thoughts' mutation
Will fashion thy life with might.
Their prophecy, little one, we cannot know,
They light up the way that, unknown, thou shalt go
And kindle the thoughts that within shall glow.
Thou first shalt them gather,
Then choose thine own, - 
So canst thou the rather
Grope on alone.
Egan O'Rahilly
by James Stephens

Here in a distant place I hold my tongue;
I am O'Rahilly:
When I was young,
Who now am young no more,
I did not eat things picked up from the shore.
The periwinkle, and the tough dogfish
At even-time have got into my dish!
The great, where are they now! the great had said, 
This is not seemly, bring to him instead
That which serves his and serves our dignity, 
And that was done.
I am O'Rahilly:
Here in a distant place I hold my tongue,
Who once said all his say, when he was young!
The Seed Shop.
by Muriel Stuart

Here in a quiet and dusty room they lie,
Faded as crumbled stone or shifting sand,
Forlorn as ashes, shrivelled, scentless, dry -
Meadows and gardens running through my hand.
Dead that shall quicken at the call of Spring,
Sleepers to stir beneath June's magic kiss,
Though birds pass over, unremembering,
And no bee seek here roses that were his.
In this brown husk a dale of hawthorn dreams
A cedar in this narrow cell is thrust
That will drink deeply of a century's streams,
These lilies shall make summer on my dust.
Here in their safe and simple house of death,
Sealed in their shells a million roses leap;
Here I can blow a garden with my breath,
And in my hand a forest lies asleep.
Fantasia
by Duncan Campbell Scott

Here in Samarcand they offer emeralds,
Pure as frozen drops of sea-water,
Rubies, pale as dew-ponds stained with slaughter,
Where the fairies fought for a king's daughter
In the elfin upland.
Here they sell you jade and calcedony,
And the matrix of the turquoise,
Spheres of onyx held in eagles' claws,
But they keep the gems as far asunder
From the dull stones as the lightning from the thunder;
They can never come together
On the mats of Turkish leather
In the booths of Samarcand.
Here they sell you balls of nard and honey,
And squat jars of clarid butter,
And the cheese from Kurdistan.
When you offer Frankish money,
Then they scowl and curse and mutter,
Deep in Kurdish or Persan
For they want your heart out and my hand
In the booths of Samarcand.
They would sell your heart's blood separate,
In a jar with a gold brim,
With a text of burning hatred
Coiled around the rim;
They would sell my hand upon a beam of teak wood,
In the other scale a feather curled;
They would sell your heart upon a silver balance
Weighed against the world.
But your heart could never touch my hand,
They could never come together
On the mats of Turkish leather
In the booths of Samarcand.
The Chosen Cliff.
by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Here in silence the lover fondly mused on his loved one;
Gladly he spake to me thus: "Be thou my witness, thou stone!
Yet thou must not be vainglorious, thou hast many companions;
Unto each rock on the plain, where I, the happy one, dwell,
Unto each tree of the wood that I cling to, as onward I ramble,
'Be thou a sign of my bliss!' shout I, and then 'tis ordain'd.
Yet to thee only I lend a voice, as a Muse from the people
Chooseth one for herself, kissing his lips as a friend."
Second Best
by Rupert Brooke

Here in the dark, O heart;
Alone with the enduring Earth, and Night,
And Silence, and the warm strange smell of clover;
Clear-visioned, though it break you; far apart
From the dead best, the dear and old delight;
Throw down your dreams of immortality,
O faithful, O foolish lover!
Here's peace for you, and surety; here the one
Wisdom, the truth! "All day the good glad sun
Showers love and labour on you, wine and song;
The greenwood laughs, the wind blows, all day long
Till night."    And night ends all things.
Then shall be
No lamp relumed in heaven, no voices crying,
Or changing lights, or dreams and forms that hover!
(And, heart, for all your sighing,
That gladness and those tears are over, over. . . .)
And has the truth brought no new hope at all,
Heart, that you're weeping yet for Paradise?
Do they still whisper, the old weary cries?
"'MID YOUTH AND SONG, FEASTING AND CARNIVAL,
THROUGH LAUGHTER, THROUGH THE ROSES, AS OF OLD
COMES DEATH, ON SHADOWY AND RELENTLESS FEET,
DEATH, UNAPPEASABLE BY PRAYER OR GOLD;
DEATH IS THE END, THE END!"
Proud, then, clear-eyed and laughing, go to greet
Death as a friend!
Exile of immortality, strongly wise,
Strain through the dark with undesirous eyes
To what may lie beyond it. Sets your star,
O heart, for ever! Yet, behind the night,
Waits for the great unborn, somewhere afar,
Some white tremendous daybreak. And the light,
Returning, shall give back the golden hours,
Ocean a windless level, Earth a lawn
Spacious and full of sunlit dancing-places,
And laughter, and music, and, among the flowers,
The gay child-hearts of men, and the child-faces
O heart, in the great dawn!
The India Wharf
by Sara Teasdale

Here in the velvet stillness
The wide sown fields fall to the faint horizon,
Sleeping in starlight....
A year ago we walked in the jangling city
Together.... forgetful.
One by one we crossed the avenues,
Rivers of light, roaring in tumult,
And came to the narrow, knotted streets.
Thru the tense crowd
We went aloof, ecstatic, walking in wonder,
Unconscious of our motion.
Forever the foreign people with dark, deep-seeing eyes
Passed us and passed.
Lights and foreign words and foreign faces,
I forgot them all;
I only felt alive, defiant of all death and sorrow,
Sure and elated.
That was the gift you gave me....
The streets grew still more tangled,
And led at last to water black and glossy,
Flecked here and there with lights, faint and far off.
There on a shabby building was a sign
'The India Wharf'... and we turned back.
I always felt we could have taken ship
And crossed the bright green seas
To dreaming cities set on sacred streams
And palaces
Of ivory and scarlet.
Nursery Rhyme. CCCLVIII. Games.
by Unknown

[A Christmas custom in Lancashire. The boys dress themselves up with ribands, and perform various pantomimes, after which one of them, who has a blackened face, a rough skin coat, and a broom in his hand, sings as follows.]
Here come I,
Little David Doubt;
If you don't give me money,
I'll sweep you all out.
Money I want,
And money I crave;
If you don't give me money,
I'll sweep you all to the grave!
Poetry Perpetuates The Poet.
by Robert Herrick

Here I myself might likewise die,
And utterly forgotten lie,
But that eternal poetry
Repullulation gives me here
Unto the thirtieth thousand year,
When all now dead shall reappear.
The Bird Of Paradise
by William Henry Davies

Here comes Kate Summers, who, for gold,
Takes any man to bed:
"You knew my friend, Nell Barnes," she said;
"You knew Nell Barnes - she's dead.
"Nell Barnes was bad on all you men,
Unclean, a thief as well;
Yet all my life I have not found
A better friend than Nell.
"So I sat at her side at last,
For hours, till she was dead;
And yet she had no sense at all
Of any word I said.
"For all her cry but came to this -
'Not for the world! Take care:
Don't touch that bird of paradise,
Perched on the bed-post there!'
"I asked her would she like some grapes,
Some damsons ripe and sweet;
A custard made with new-laid eggs,
Or tender fowl to eat.
"I promised I would follow her,
To see her in her grave;
And buy a wreath with borrowed pence,
If nothing I could save.
"Yet still her cry but came to this -
'Not for the world! Take care:
Don't touch that bird of paradise,
Perched on the bed-post there!'"
A Birthday Trifle
by Henry Kendall

Here in this gold-green evening end,
While air is soft and sky is clear,
What tender message shall I send
To her I hold so dear?
What rose of song with breath like myrrh,
And leaf of dew and fair pure beams
Shall I select and give to her
The lady of my dreams?
Alas! the blossom I would take,
The song as sweet as Persian speech,
And carry for my lady's sake,
Is not within my reach.
I have no perfect gift of words,
Or I would hasten now to send
A ballad full of tunes of birds
To please my lovely friend.
But this pure pleasure is my own,
That I have power to waft away
A hope as bright as heaven's zone
On this her natal day.
May all her life be like the light
That softens down in spheres divine,
'As lovely as a Lapland night,'
All grace and chastened shine!
The London 'Bobby' - A Tribute To The Policemen Of England's Capital
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Here in my cosy corner,
Before a blazing log,
I'm thinking of cold London
Wrapped in its killing fog;
And, like a shining beacon
Above the picture grim,
I see the London 'Bobby,'
And sing my song for him.
I see his stalwart figure,
I see his kindly face,
I hear his helpful answer
At any hour or place.
For, though you seek some by-way
Long miles from his own beat,
He tells you all about it,
And how to find the street.
He looks like some bold Viking,
This king of earth's police - 
Yet in his voice lies feeling,
And in his eye lies peace;
He knows and does his duty - 
(What higher praise is there?)
And London's lords and paupers
Alike receive his care.
He has a regal bearing,
Yet one that breathes repose;
It is the look and manner
Of one who THINKS and KNOWS.
Oh, men who govern nations,
In old worlds or in new,
Turn to the London 'Bobby'
And learn a thing or two.
On Himself.
by Robert Herrick

Here down my wearied limbs I'll lay;
My pilgrim's staff, my weed of gray,
My palmer's hat, my scallop's shell,
My cross, my cord, and all, farewell.
For having now my journey done,
Just at the setting of the sun,
Here I have found a chamber fit,
God and good friends be thanked for it,
Where if I can a lodger be,
A little while from tramplers free,
At my up-rising next I shall,
If not requite, yet thank ye all.
Meanwhile, the holy-rood hence fright
The fouler fiend and evil sprite
From scaring you or yours this night.
Nursery Rhyme. CCCIX. Games.
by Unknown

Here goes my lord
A trot, a trot, a trot, a trot,
Here goes my lady
A canter, a canter, a canter, a canter!
Here goes my young master
Jockey-hitch, Jockey-hitch, Jockey-hitch, Jockey-hitch:
Here goes my young miss,
An amble, an amble, an amble, an amble!
The footman lays behind to tipple ale and wine,
And goes gallop, a gallop, a gallop, to make up his time.
The Flight.
by Marietta Holley

Here in the silent doorway let me linger
One moment, for the porch is still and lonely;
That shadow's but the rose vine in the moonlight;
All are asleep in peace, I waken only,
And he I wait, by my own heart's beating
I know how slow to him the tide creeps by,
Nor life, nor death, could bar our hearts from meeting;
Were worlds between, his soul to mine would fly.
Oh, shame! to think a heap of paltry metal
Should overbalance manhood's noblest graces;
A film of gold had gilt his worth and honor,
Warming to smiles the coldness of their faces;
Gentle to me, they rise in condemnation,
And plead with me than words more powerfully.
Oh! well I love them - but they have wealth and station
To fill their hearts, and he has only me.
But oh, my roses, how their great pure faces
Beseech me as they bend from sculptured column.
So with my wet cheek closely pressed against them,
I listen to their pleadings sweet and solemn.
Oh, Memory, if an hour of gloom and grieving
I here have known, that hour before me set;
But all the peace and joy I am leaving,
In mercy, Memory, let me forget.
Oh, home! if here a frown has ever chilled me,
Let it now rise and darken on my sight.
If a harsh word or look has ever grieved me,
Let me remember that harsh word to-night.
But all the tender words, the fond caressing,
The loving smiles that daily I have met,
The patient mother love, God's crowning blessing,
In mercy, Memory, let me forget.
Here she has kissed me with fond looks of greeting;
Will that smile fade when waiting me no longer?
Oh, true first love, tender and changing never;
But there's a love that nearer is and stronger - 
He comes! I kneel and kiss the stone, oh, mother,
Where you have stood and blessed me with your eyes;
Forgive - forgive me, mother - father - brother - 
For oh, he loves me - and love sanctifies.
Woodstock Park
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Here in a little rustic hermitage
Alfred the Saxon King, Alfred the Great,
Postponed the cares of king-craft to translate
The Consolations of the Roman sage.
Here Geoffrey Chaucer in his ripe old age
Wrote the unrivalled Tales, which soon or late
The venturous hand that strives to imitate
Vanquished must fall on the unfinished page.
Two kings were they, who ruled by right divine,
And both supreme; one in the realm of Truth,
One in the realm of Fiction and of Song.
What prince hereditary of their line,
Uprising in the strength and flush of youth,
Their glory shall inherit and prolong?
The Dog.
by Oliver Herford

HERE is the Dog.    Since time be-gan,
The Dog has been the friend of MAN,
The Dog loves MAN be-cause he shears
His coat and clips his tail and ears.
MAN loves the Dog be-cause he'll stay
And lis-ten to his talk all day,
And wag his tail and show de-light
At all his jokes, how-ev-er trite.
His bark is far worse than his bite,
So peo-ple say.    They may be right;
Yet if to make a choice I had,
I'd choose his bark, how-ev-er bad.
Here Is The Bracelet
by Louisa May Alcott

"Here is the bracelet
For good little May
To wear on her arm
By night and by day.
When it shines like the sun,
All's going well;
But when you are bad,
A sharp prick will tell.
Farewell, little girl,
For now we must part.
Make a fairy-box, dear,
Of your own happy heart;
And take out for all
Sweet gifts every day,
Till all the year round
Is like beautiful May."
My Garret
by Robert William Service

Montparnasse,
April 1914.
All day the sun has shone into my little attic, a bitter sunshine that brightened yet did not warm. And so as I toiled and toiled doggedly enough, many were the looks I cast at the three faggots I had saved to cook my evening meal. Now, however, my supper is over, my pipe alight, and as I stretch my legs before the embers I have at last a glow of comfort, a glimpse of peace.
My Garret
Here is my Garret up five flights of stairs;
Here's where I deal in dreams and ply in fancies,
Here is the wonder-shop of all my wares,
My sounding sonnets and my red romances.
Here's where I challenge Fate and ring my rhymes,
And grope at glory - aye, and starve at times.
Here is my Stronghold: stout of heart am I,
Greeting each dawn as songful as a linnet;
And when at night on yon poor bed I lie
(Blessing the world and every soul that's in it),
Here's where I thank the Lord no shadow bars
My skylight's vision of the valiant stars.
Here is my Palace tapestried with dreams.
Ah! though to-night ten sous are all my treasure,
While in my gaze immortal beauty gleams,
Am I not dowered with wealth beyond all measure?
Though in my ragged coat my songs I sing,
King of my soul, I envy not the king.
Here is my Haven: it's so quiet here;
Only the scratch of pen, the candle's flutter;
Shabby and bare and small, but O how dear!
Mark you - my table with my work a-clutter,
My shelf of tattered books along the wall,
My bed, my broken chair - that's nearly all.
Only four faded walls, yet mine, all mine.
Oh, you fine folks, a pauper scorns your pity.
Look, where above me stars of rapture shine;
See, where below me gleams the siren city . . .
Am I not rich? - a millionaire no less,
If wealth be told in terms of Happiness.
De Rochambeau
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

On The Presentation Of An American Banner To Camp Rochambeau By The Marquise De Rochambeau At Tours, France, June 1, 1918
Here is a picture I carry away
On memory's wall.    A green June day,
A golden sun in an amethyst sky,
And a beautiful banner floating as high
As the lofty spires of the city of Tours,
And a slender Marquise, with a face as pure
As a sculptured saint:    while staunch and true
In new-world khaki and old-world blue,
Wearing their medals with modest pride,
Her stalwart bodyguard stand at her side.
Simple the picture; but much it may mean
To one who reads into and under the scene,
For there, in that opulent hour and weather,
Two great Republics came closer together;
A little nearer came land to land
Through the magical touch of a woman's hand.
And once again as in long ago
The grand old name of de Rochambeau
Shines forth like a star, for our world to see - 
Our Land of the Brave, and our Home of the Free.
The Ox
by Madison Julius Cawein

Here is a tale for farmer and for peasant:
There was an ox, who might have ploughed for Jason,
So strong was he, his huge head like a bason,
A Gothic helmet with enormous crescent.
Stolid of look and slow of hoof and steady,
Meek was the beast and born but to be driven,
Unmindful of the yoke which toil had given,
Toil with his goad and lash for ever ready.
One day a bull, who was the bullock's neighbor,
Proud as a sultan haremed with his women,
Lowed to the ox who had received a beating:
"You are a fool! What have you for your labour?
Blows and bad food! Go to. Why don't you show men?"
The ox was but an ox and went on eating.
Fighting
by George MacDonald

Here is a temple strangely wrought:
Within it I can see
Two spirits of a diverse thought
Contend for mastery.
One is an angel fair and bright,
Adown the aisle comes he,
Adown the aisle in raiment white,
A creature fair to see.
The other wears an evil mien,
And he hath doubtless slipt,
A fearful being dark and lean,
Up from the mouldy crypt.
Is that the roof that grows so black?
Did some one call my name?
Was it the bursting thunder crack
That filled this place with flame?
I move--I wake from out my sleep:
Some one hath victor been!
I see two radiant pinions sweep,
And I am borne between.
Beneath the clouds that under roll
An upturned face I see--
A dead man's face, but, ah, the soul
Was right well known to me!
A man's dead face! Away I haste
Through regions calm and fair:
Go vanquish sin, and thou shall taste
The same celestial air.
The Self-Unseeing
by Thomas Hardy

Here is the ancient floor,
Footworn and hollowed and thin,
Here was the former door
Where the dead feet walked in.
She sat here in her chair,
Smiling into the fire;
He who played stood there,
Bowing it higher and higher.
Childlike, I danced in a dream;
Blessings emblazoned that day
Everything glowed with a gleam;
Yet we were looking away!
The Fool
by Madison Julius Cawein

Here is a tale for children and their grannies:
There was a fool, a man who'd had his chances
But missed them, somehow; lost them, just for fancies,
Tag-ends of things with which he'd crammed crannies
Of his cracked head, as panes are crammed with paper:
Fragments of song and bits of worthless writing,
Which he was never weary of reciting,
Fluttered his mind as night a windy taper.
A witless fool! who lived in some fair Venice
Of his own building where he dreamed of Beauty:
Who swore each weed a flower the sorry pauper!
This would not do. Men said he was a menace
To all mankind; and, as it was their duty,
Clapped him in prison where he died as proper.
Canadian Charms.
by James McIntyre

Here industry is not in vain,
For we have bounteous crops of grain,
And you behold on every field
Of grass and roots abundant yield,
But after all the greatest charm
Is the snug home upon the farm,
And stone walls now keep cattle warm.