DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Love's Phantom
by Robert Fuller Murray

Whene'er I try to read a book,
Across the page your face will look,
And then I neither know nor care
What sense the printed words may bear.
At night when I would go to sleep,
Thinking of you, awake I keep,
And still repeat the words you said,
Like sick men murmuring prayers in bed.
And when, with weariness oppressed,
I sink in spite of you to rest,
Your image, like a lovely sprite,
Haunts me in dreams through half the night.
I wake upon the autumn morn
To find the sunrise hardly born,
And in the sky a soft pale blue,
And in my heart your image true.
When out I walk to take the air,
Your image is for ever there,
Among the woods that lose their leaves,
Or where the North Sea sadly heaves.
By what enchantment shall be laid
This ghost, which does not make afraid,
But vexes with dim loveliness
And many a shadowy caress?
There is no other way I know
But unto you forthwith to go,
That I may look upon the maid
Whereof that other is the shade.
As the strong sun puts out the moon,
Whose borrowed rays are all his own,
So, in your living presence, dies
The phantom kindled at your eyes.
By this most blessed spell, each day
The vexing ghost awhile I lay.
Yet am I glad to know that when
I leave you it will rise again.
Interlude. Next Door
by Henry Lawson

Whenever I'm moving my furniture in
Or shifting my furniture out,
Which is nearly as often and risky as Sin
In these days of shifting about,
There isn't a stretcher, there isn't a stick,
Nor a mat that belongs to the floor;
There isn't a pot (Oh, my heart groweth sick!)
That escapes from the glare of Next Door!
The Basilisk Glare of Next Door.
Be it morn, noon or night, be it early or late;
Be it summer or winter or spring,
I cannot sneak down just to list at the gate
For the song that the bottle-ohs sing;
With some bottles to sell that shall bring me a beer,
And lead up to one or two more;
But I feel in my backbone the serpentine sneer,
And the Basilisk Glare of Next Door.
The political woman Next Door.
I really can't say, being no one of note,
Why she glares at my odds and my ends,
Excepting, maybe, I'm a frivolous Pote,
With one or two frivolous friends,
Who help me to shift and to warm up the house
For three or four glad hours or more,
In a suburb that hasn't the soul of a louse;
And they've got no respect for Next Door!
They don't give a damn for Next Door.
Interlude - Next Door
by Henry Lawson

Whenever I'm moving my furniture in
Or shifting my furniture out, 
Which is nearly as often and risky as Sin
In these days of shifting about, 
There isn't a stretcher, there isn't a stick,
Nor a mat that belongs to the floor;
There isn't a pot (Oh, my heart groweth sick!)
That escapes from the glare of Next Door!
The Basilisk Glare of Next Door.
Be it morn, noon or night, be it early or late;
Be it summer or winter or spring,
I cannot sneak down just to list at the gate
For the song that the bottle-ohs sing;
With some bottles to sell that shall bring me a beer,
And lead up to one or two more;
But I feel in my backbone the serpentine sneer,
And the Basilisk Glare of Next Door.
The political woman Next Door.
I really can't say, being no one of note,
Why she glares at my odds and my ends,
Excepting, maybe, I'm a frivolous Pote,
With one or two frivolous friends,
Who help me to shift and to warm up the house
For three or four glad hours or more,
In a suburb that hasn't the soul of a louse;
And they've got no respect for Next Door!
They don't give a damn for Next Door.
The Dolls
by Thomas Hardy

"Whenever you dress me dolls, mammy,
Why do you dress them so,
And make them gallant soldiers,
When never a one I know;
And not as gentle ladies
With frills and frocks and curls,
As people dress the dollies
Of other little girls?"
Ah - why did she not answer:-
"Because your mammy's heed
Is always gallant soldiers,
As well may be, indeed.
One of them was your daddy,
His name I must not tell;
He's not the dad who lives here,
But one I love too well."
Fair Jeany.
by Robert Burns

Tune - "Saw ye my father?"
I.
Where are the joys I have met in the morning,
That danc'd to the lark's early song?
Where is the peace that awaited my wand'ring,
At evening the wild woods among?
II.
No more a-winding the course of yon river,
And marking sweet flow'rets so fair:
No more I trace the light footsteps of pleasure,
But sorrow and sad sighing care.
III.
Is it that summer's forsaken our valleys,
And grim, surly winter is near?
No, no, the bees' humming round the gay roses,
Proclaim it the pride of the year.
IV.
Fain would I hide, what I fear to discover,
Yet long, long too well have I known,
All that has caused this wreck in my bosom,
Is Jeany, fair Jeany alone.
V.
Time cannot aid me, my griefs are immortal,
Nor hope dare a comfort bestow:
Come then, enamour'd and fond of my anguish,
Enjoyment I'll seek in my woe.
Where Are The Visions.
by Thomas Moore

"Where are the visions that round me once hovered,
"Forms that shed grace from their shadows alone;
"Looks fresh as light from a star just discovered,
"And voices that Music might take for her own?"
Time, while I spoke, with his wings resting o'er me,
Heard me say, "Where are those visions, oh where?"
And pointing his wand to the sunset before me,
Said, with a voice like the hollow wind, "There."
Fondly I looked, when the wizard had spoken,
And there, mid the dim-shining ruins of day,
Saw, by their light, like a talisman broken,
The last golden fragments of hope melt away.
Stinkomalee Triumphans
by Richard Harris Barham

Whene'er with pitying eye I view
Each operative sot in town.
I smile to think how wondrous few
Get drunk who study at the University we've Got in town,
What precious fools 'The People' grew,
Their alma mater not in town;
The 'useful classes' hardly knew
Four was composed of two and two,
Until they learned it at the University we've Got in town.
But now they're taught by Joseph Hume, by far the cleverest Scot in town,
Their items and their tottles too
Each may dissect his sister Sue,
From his instructions at the University we've Got in town.
Then L'E comes, like him how few
Can caper and can trot in town,
In pirouette or pas de deux
He beats the famed Monsieur Giroux,
And teaches dancing at the University we've Got in town.
And Gilchrist, see, that great Gentoo
Professor, has a lot in town of Cockney boys, who fag Hindoo,
And larn Jem-nasties at the University we've Got in town.
Sam R' corpse of vampire hue,
Comes from its grave, to rot in town;
For Bays the dead bard's crowned with Yew,
And chaunts the Pleasures of the University we've Got in town.
Frank Jeffrey, of the Scotch Review,
Whom Moore had nearly shot in town,
Now, with his pamphlet stitched in blue
And yellow, d'ns the other two,
But lauds the ever-glorious University we've Got in town.
Great Birkbeck, king of chips and glue,
Who paper oft does blot in town,
From the Mechanics' Institution, comes to prate of wedge and screw,
Lever and axle, at the University we've Got in town.
LORD Waithman, who long since withdrew
From Mansion House to cot in town;
Adorn'd with chair of ormolu.
All darkly grand, like Prince Lee Boo,
Lectures on Free Trade at the University we've Got in town.
Fat F', with his coat of blue,
Who speeches makes so hot in town,
In rhetoric, spells his lectures through,
And sounds the V for W,
The vay they speaks it at the University we've Got in town.
Then H'e comes, who late at New-gate-market, sweetest spot in town!
Instead of one clerk popped in two,
To make a place for his nephew,
Seeking another at the University we've Got in town.
There's Captain Ross, a traveller true,
Has just presented. what in town
's an article of great virtu,
(The telescope he once peep'd through,
And 'spied an Esquimaux canoe
On Croker Mountains), to the University we've Got in town.
Since Michael gives no roast nor stew,
Where Whigs might eat and plot in town,
And swill his port, and mischief brew,
Poor Creevy sips his water gruel as the beadle of the University we've Got in town.
There's Jerry Bentham and his crew,
Names ne'er to be forgot in town,
In swarms like Banquo's long is-sue,
Turk, Papist, Infidel, and Jew,
Come trooping on to join the University we've Got in town.
To crown the whole with triple queue
Another such there's not in town,
twitching his restless nose askew,
Behold tremendous Harry Brougham! 
Law Professor at the University we've Got in town.
Grand Chorus:
Huzza! Huzza! for Harry Brougham! 
Law Professor at the University we've Got in town.
Presumption
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Whenever I am prone to doubt or wonder - 
I check myself, and say, "That mighty One
Who made the solar system cannot blunder - 
And for the best all things are being done."
Who set the stars on their eternal courses
Has fashioned this strange earth by some sure plan.
Bow low, bow low to those majestic forces,
Nor dare to doubt their wisdom, puny man.
You cannot put one little star in motion,
You cannot shape one single forest leaf,
Nor fling a mountain up, nor sink an ocean,
Presumptuous pigmy, large with unbelief.
You cannot bring one dawn of regal splendour,
Nor bid the day to shadowy twilight fall,
Nor send the pale moon forth with radiance tender - 
And dare you doubt the One who has done all?
"So much is wrong, there is such pain - such sinning."
Yet look again - behold how much is right!
And He who formed the world from its beginning
Knows how to guide it upward to the light.
Your task, O man, is not to carp and cavil
At God's achievements, but with purpose strong
To cling to good, and turn away from evil.
That is the way to help the world along.
In Church.  1916
by William Arthur Dunkerley (John Oxenham)

Where are all the young men?
There are only grey-heads here.
What has become of the young men?
*            *            *            *            *
This is the young men's year!
They are gone, one and all, at duty's call,
To the camp, to the trench, to the sea.
They have left their homes, they have left their all,
And now, in ways heroical,--
They are making history.
From bank and shop, from bench and mill,
From the schools, from the tail of the plough,
They hurried away at the call of the fray,
They could not linger a day, and now,--
They are making history,
And we miss them sorely, as we look
At the seats where they used to be,
And try to picture them as they are,--
Then hastily drop the vail:--for, you see,--
They are making history.
*            *            *            *            *
And history, in these dread days,
Is sore sore sad in the making;
We are building the future with our dead,
We are binding it sure with the brave blood shed,
Though our hearts are well-nigh breaking.
We can but pray that the coming day
Will reap, of our red sowing,
The harvest meet of a world complete
With the peace of God's bestowing.
So, with quiet heart, we do our part
In the travail of this mystery,
We give of our best, and we leave the rest
To Him Who maketh history.
Some Hymns of Thanksgiving,
Praise, and Petition for use at The
Coming Peace which, please God,
cannot now be long delayed.
Possibilities
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Where are the Poets, unto whom belong
The Olympian heights; whose singing shafts were sent
Straight to the mark, and not from bows half bent,
But with the utmost tension of the thong?
Where are the stately argosies of song,
Whose rushing keels made music as they went
Sailing in search of some new continent,
With all sail set, and steady winds and strong?
Perhaps there lives some dreamy boy, untaught
In schools, some graduate of the field or street,
Who shall become a master of the art,
An admiral sailing the high seas of thought,
Fearless and first and steering with his fleet
For lands not yet laid down in any chart.
To Cruel Ocean.
by Victor-Marie Hugo

Where are the hapless shipmen? - disappeared,
Gone down, where witness none, save Night, hath been,
Ye deep, deep waves, of kneeling mothers feared,
What dismal tales know ye of things unseen?
Tales that ye tell your whispering selves between
The while in clouds to the flood-tide ye pour;
And this it is that gives you, as I ween,
Those mournful voices, mournful evermore,
When ye come in at eve to us who dwell on shore.
Song Of Slaves In The Desert
by John Greenleaf Whittier

Where are we going? where are we going,
Where are we going, Rubee?
Lord of peoples, lord of lands,
Look across these shining sands,
Through the furnace of the noon,
Through the white light of the moon.
Strong the Ghiblee wind is blowing,
Strange and large the world is growing!
Speak and tell us where we are going,
Where are we going, Rubee?
Bornou land was rich and good,
Wells of water, fields of food,
Dourra fields, and bloom of bean,
And the palm-tree cool and green:
Bornou land we see no longer,
Here we thirst and here we hunger,
Here the Moor-man smites in anger:
Where are we going, Rubee?
When we went from Bornou land,
We were like the leaves and sand,
We were many, we are few;
Life has one, and death has two:
Whitened bones our path are showing,
Thou All-seeing, thou All-knowing!
Hear us, tell us, where are we going,
Where are we going, Rubee?
Moons of marches from our eyes
Bornou land behind us lies;
Stranger round us day by day
Bends the desert circle gray;
Wild the waves of sand are flowing,
Hot the winds above them blowing,
Lord of all things! where are we going?
Where are we going, Rubee?
We are weak, but Thou art strong.;
Short our lives, but Thine is long;
We are blind, but Thou hast eyes;
We are fools, but Thou art wise!
Thou, our morrow's pathway knowing
Through the strange world round us growing,
Hear us, tell us where are we going,
Where are we going, Rubee
Sequel To The "Beggars," 1802 - Composed Many Years After
by William Wordsworth

Where are they now, those wanton Boys?
For whose free range the daedal earth
Was filled with animated toys,
And implements of frolic mirth;
With tools for ready wit to guide;
And ornaments of seemlier pride,
More fresh, more bright, than princes wear;
For what one moment flung aside,
Another could repair;
What good or evil have they seen 
Since I their pastime witnessed here,
Their daring wiles, their sportive cheer?
I ask, but all is dark between!
They met me in a genial hour,
When universal nature breathed
As with the breath of one sweet flower,
A time to overrule the power
Of discontent, and check the birth
Of thoughts with better thoughts at strife,
The most familiar bane of life 
Since parting Innocence bequeathed
Mortality to Earth!
Soft clouds, the whitest of the year,
Sailed through the sky, the brooks ran clear;
The lambs from rock to rock were bounding;
With songs the budded groves resounding;
And to my heart are still endeared
The thoughts with which it then was cheered;
The faith which saw that gladsome pair
Walk through the fire with unsinged hair. 
Or, if such faith must needs deceive
Then, Spirits of beauty and of grace,
Associates in that eager chase;
Ye, who within the blameless mind
Your favourite seat of empire find
Kind Spirits! may we not believe
That they, so happy and so fair
Through your sweet influence, and the care
Of pitying Heaven, at least were free
From touch of 'deadly' injury? 
Destined whate'er their earthly doom,
For mercy and immortal bloom!
Quarrel In Old Age
by William Butler Yeats

Where had her sweetness gone?
What fanatics invent
In this blind bitter town,
Fantasy or incident
Not worth thinking of,
put her in a rage.
I had forgiven enough
That had forgiven old age.
All lives that has lived;
So much is certain;
Old sages were not deceived:
Somewhere beyond the curtain
Of distorting days
Lives that lonely thing
That shone before these eyes
Targeted, trod like Spring.
Where Are You Sleeping To-Night, My Lad?
by William Arthur Dunkerley (John Oxenham)

Where are you sleeping to-night, My Lad,
Above-ground--or below?
The last we heard you were up at the front,
Holding a trench and bearing the brunt;--
But--that was a week ago.
Ay!--that was a week ago, Dear Lad,
And a week is a long, long time,
When a second's enough, in the thick of the strife,
To sever the thread of the bravest life,
And end it in its prime.
Oh, a week is long when so little's enough
To send a man below.
It may be that while we named your name
The bullet sped and the quick end came,--
And the rest we shall never know.
But this we know, Dear Lad,--all's well
With the man who has done his best.
And whether he live, or whether he die,
He is sacred high in our memory;--
And to God we can leave the rest.
So--wherever you're sleeping to-night, Dear Lad,
This one thing we do know,--
When "Last Post" sounds, and He makes His rounds,
Not one of you all will be out of bounds,
Above ground or below.
The Affliction Of Margaret
by William Wordsworth

I
Where art thou, my beloved Son,
Where art thou, worse to me than dead?
Oh find me, prosperous or undone!
Or, if the grave be now thy bed,
Why am I ignorant of the same
That I may rest; and neither blame
Nor sorrow may attend thy name?
II
Seven years, alas! to have received
No tidings of an only child;
To have despaired, have hoped, believed,
And been for evermore beguiled;
Sometimes with thoughts of very bliss!
I catch at them, and then I miss;
Was ever darkness like to this?
III
He was among the prime in worth,
An object beauteous to behold;
Well born, well bred; I sent him forth
Ingenuous, innocent, and bold:
If things ensued that wanted grace,
As hath been said, they were not base;
And never blush was on my face.
IV
Ah! little doth the young one dream,
When full of play and childish cares,
What power is in his wildest scream,
Heard by his mother unawares!
He knows it not, he cannot guess:
Years to a mother bring distress;
But do not make her love the less.
V
Neglect me! no, I suffered long
From that ill thought; and, being blind,
Said, "Pride shall help me in my wrong;
Kind mother have I been, as kind
As ever breathed:" and that is true;
I've wet my path with tears like dew,
Weeping for him when no one knew.
VI
My Son, if thou be humbled, poor,
Hopeless of honour and of gain,
Oh! do not dread thy mother's door;
Think not of me with grief and pain:
I now can see with better eyes;
And worldly grandeur I despise,
And fortune with her gifts and lies.
VII
Alas! the fowls of heaven have wings,
And blasts of heaven will aid their flight;
They mount, how short a voyage brings
The wanderers back to their delight!
Chains tie us down by land and sea;
And wishes, vain as mine, may be
All that is left to comfort thee.
VIII
Perhaps some dungeon hears thee groan,
Maimed, mangled by inhuman men;
Or thou upon a desert thrown
Inheritest the lion's den;
Or hast been summoned to the deep,
Thou, thou and all thy mates, to keep
An incommunicable sleep.
IX
I look for ghosts; but none will force
Their way to me: 'tis falsely said
That there was ever intercourse
Between the living and the dead;
For, surely, then I should have sight
Of him I wait for day and night,
With love and longings infinite.
X
My apprehensions come in crowds;
I dread the rustling of the grass;
The very shadows of the clouds
Have power to shake me as they pass:
I question things and do not find
One that will answer to my mind;
And all the world appears unkind.
XI
Beyond participation lie
My troubles, and beyond relief:
If any chance to heave a sigh,
They pity me, and not my grief.
Then come to me, my Son, or send
Some tidings that my woes may end;
I have no other earthly friend!
Wanted -  A Little Girl
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Where have they gone to - the little girls
With natural manners and natural curls;
Who love their dollies and like their toys,
And talk of something besides the boys?
Little old women in plenty I find,
Mature in manners and old of mind;
Little old flirts who talk of their "beaux,"
And vie with each other in stylish clothes.
Little old belles who, at nine and ten,
Are sick of pleasure and tired of men;
Weary of travel, of balls, of fun,
And find no new thing under the sun.
Once, in the beautiful long ago,
Some dear little children I used to know;
Girls who were merry as lambs at play,
And laughed and rollicked the livelong day.
They thought not at all of the "style" of their clothes,
They never imagined that boys were "beaux" - 
"Other girls' brothers" and "mates" were they,
Splendid fellows to help them play.
Where have they gone to?    If you see
One of them anywhere send her to me.
I would give a medal of purest gold
To one of those dear little girls of old,
With an innocent heart and an open smile,
Who knows not the meaning of "flirt" or "style."
Where Every Bird Is Bold To Go,
by Emily Elizabeth Dickinson

Where every bird is bold to go,
And bees abashless play,
The foreigner before he knocks
Must thrust the tears away.
Baby.
by George MacDonald

Where did you come from, baby dear?
Out of the everywhere into here.
Where did you get those eyes so blue?
Out of the sky as I came through.
What makes the light in them sparkle and spin?
Some of the starry twinkles left in.
Where did you get that little tear?
I found it waiting when I got here.
What makes your forehead so smooth and high?
A soft hand stroked it as I went by.
What makes your cheek like a warm white rose?
I saw something better than any one knows.
Whence that three-cornered smile of bliss?
Three angels gave me at once a kiss.
Where did you get this pearly ear?
God spoke, and it came out to hear.
Where did you get those arms and hands?
Love made itself into bonds and bands.
Feet, whence did you come, you darling things?
From the same box as the cherubs' wings.
How did they all just come to be you?
God thought about me, and so I grew.
But how did you come to us, you dear?
God thought about you, and so I am here.
Charles Harpur
by Henry Kendall

Where Harpur lies, the rainy streams,
And wet hill-heads, and hollows weeping,
Are swift with wind, and white with gleams,
And hoarse with sounds of storms unsleeping.
Fit grave it is for one whose song
Was tuned by tones he caught from torrents,
And filled with mountain breaths, and strong,
Wild notes of falling forest currents.
So let him sleep, the rugged hymns
And broken lights of woods above him!
And let me sing how sorrow dims
The eyes of those that used to love him.
As April in the wilted wold
Turns faded eyes on splendours waning,
What time the latter leaves are old,
And ruin strikes the strays remaining;
So we that knew this singer dead,
Whose hands attuned the harp Australian,
May set the face and bow the head,
And mourn his fate and fortunes alien.
The burden of a perished faith
Went sighing through his speech of sweetness,
With human hints of time and death,
And subtle notes of incompleteness.
But when the fiery power of youth
Had passed away and left him nameless,
Serene as light, and strong as truth,
He lived his life, untired and tameless.
And, far and free, this man of men,
With wintry hair and wasted feature,
Had fellowship with gorge and glen,
And learned the loves and runes of Nature.
Strange words of wind, and rhymes of rain,
And whispers from the inland fountains
Are mingled, in his various strain,
With leafy breaths of piny mountains.
But as the undercurrents sigh
Beneath the surface of a river,
The music of humanity
Dwells in his forest-psalms for ever.
No soul was he to sit on heights
And live with rocks apart and scornful:
Delights of men were his delights,
And common troubles made him mournful.
The flying forms of unknown powers
With lofty wonder caught and filled him;
But there were days of gracious hours
When sights and sounds familiar thrilled him.
The pathos worn by wayside things,
The passion found in simple faces,
Struck deeper than the life of springs
Or strength of storms and sea-swept places.
But now he sleeps, the tired bard,
The deepest sleep; and, lo! I proffer
These tender leaves of my regard,
With hands that falter as they offer.