DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Sweet Birds, I Come
by William Henry Davies

The bird that now
On bush and tree,
Near leaves so green
Looks down to see
Flowers looking up, 
He either sings
In ecstasy
Or claps his wings.
Why should I slave
For finer dress
Or ornaments;
Will flowers smile less
For rags than silk?
Are birds less dumb
For tramp than squire?
Sweet birds, I come.
The Chamber Idyll
by Maurice Henry Hewlett

The blue night falleth, the moon
Is over the hill; make fast,
Fasten the latch, I am tired: come soon,
Come! I would sleep at last
In your bosom, my love, my love!
The airy chamber above
Has the lattice ajar, that night
May breathe upon you and me, my love,
And the moon bless our marriage-rite--
Come, lassy, to bed, to bed!
The roof-thatch overhead
Shall cover the stars' bright eyes;
The fleecy quilt shall be coverlid
For your meek virginities,
And your wedding, my bride, my bride!
See, we are side to side,
Virgin in deed and name--
Come, for love will not be denied,
Tarry not, have no shame:
Are we not man and bride?
1894.
The Bindweed
by Walter De La Mare

The bindweed roots pierce down
Deeper than men do lie,
Laid in their dark-shut graves
Their slumbering kinsmen by.
Yet what frail thin-spun flowers
She casts into the air,
To breathe the sunshine, and
To leave her fragrance there.
But when the sweet moon comes,
Showering her silver down,
Half-wreath'd in faint sleep,
They droop where they have blown.
So all the grass is set,
Beneath her trembling ray,
With buds that have been flowers,
Brimmed with reflected day.
At Queensferry - To W. G. S.
by William Ernest Henley

The blackbird sang, the skies were clear and clean
We bowled along a road that curved a spine
Superbly sinuous and serpentine
Thro' silent symphonies of summer green.
Sudden the Forth came on us - sad of mien,
No cloud to colour it, no breeze to line:
A sheet of dark, dull glass, without a sign
Of life or death, two spits of sand between.
Water and sky merged blank in mist together,
The Fort loomed spectral, and the Guardship's spars
Traced vague, black shadows on the shimmery glaze:
We felt the dim, strange years, the grey, strange weather,
The still, strange land, unvexed of sun or stars,
Where Lancelot rides clanking thro' the haze.
Arms And The Man. - "The Marquis."
by James Barron Hope

The Brave young Marquis, second but to one
For whom he felt the reverence of a son,
Rides at the head of his division proud - 
A ray of Glory painted on the cloud!
Mad Anthony is there, and Knox - but why
Great names like battle flags attempt to fly?
Who sings of skies lit up by Jove and Mars
Thinks not to chant a catalogue of stars!
I bow me low, and bowing low I pass
Unnumbered heroes in unnumbered mass,
While at their head in grave, and sober state,
Rides one whom Time has found completely great
Master of Fortune and the match of Fate!
Then Tilghman mounted on these Plains of York
Swift sped away as speeds the homing hawk,
And soon 'twas his to wake that watchman's cry
That woke all Nations and shall never die!
On His Book.
by Robert Herrick

The bound, almost, now of my book I see,
But yet no end of these therein, or me:
Here we begin new life, while thousands quite
Are lost, and theirs, in everlasting night.
The Bountiful Beetle,
by Edward Lear

The Bountiful Beetle,
who always carried a Green Umbrella when it didn't rain,
and left it at home when it did.
The Shelter.
by Emily Elizabeth Dickinson

The body grows outside, --
The more convenient way, --
That if the spirit like to hide,
Its temple stands alway
Ajar, secure, inviting;
It never did betray
The soul that asked its shelter
In timid honesty.
The French Wars
by Rudyard Kipling

The boats of Newhaven and Folkestone and Dover
To Dieppe and Boulogne and to Calais cross over;
And in each of those runs there is not a square yard
Where the English and French haven't fought and fought hard!
If the ships that were sunk could be floated once more,
They'd stretch like a raft from the shore to the shore,
And we'd see, as we crossed, every pattern and plan
Of ship that was built since sea-fighting began.
There'd be biremes and brigantines, cutters and sloops,
Cogs, carracks and galleons with gay gilded poops,
Hoys, caravels, ketches, corvettes and the rest,
As thick as regattas, from Ramsgate to Brest.
But the galleys of Caesar, the squadrons of Sluys,
And Nelson's crack frigates are hid from our eyes,
Where the high Seventy-fours of Napoleon's days
Lie down with Deal luggers and French chasse-marees.
They'll answer no signal, they rest on the ooze,
With their honey-combed guns and their skeleton crews,
And racing above them, through sunshine or gale,
The Cross-Channel packets come in with the Mail. 
Then the poor sea-sick passengers, English and French,
Must open their trunks on the Custom-house bench,
While the officers rummage for smuggled cigars
And nobody thinks of our blood-thirsty wars!
Fragment, (The body)
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The body,
Eternal Shadow of the finite Soul,
The Soul's self-symbol, its image of itself.
Its own yet not itself
The Brain.
by Emily Elizabeth Dickinson

The brain is wider than the sky,
For, put them side by side,
The one the other will include
With ease, and you beside.
The brain is deeper than the sea,
For, hold them, blue to blue,
The one the other will absorb,
As sponges, buckets do.
The brain is just the weight of God,
For, lift them, pound for pound,
And they will differ, if they do,
As syllable from sound.
Fight To A Finish
by Siegfried Loraine Sassoon

The boys came back. Bands played and flags were flying,
And Yellow-Pressmen thronged the sunlit street
To cheer the soldiers who'd refrained from dying,
And hear the music of returning feet.
"Of all the thrills and ardours War has brought,
This moment is the finest." (So they thought.)
Snapping their bayonets on to charge the mob,
Grim Fusiliers broke ranks with glint of steel.
At last the boys had found a cushy job.
*        *        *        *        *
I heard the Yellow-Pressmen grunt and squeal;
And with my trusty bombers turned and went
To clear those Junkers out of Parliament.
The Bible. Written To ---- With One.
by Nora Pembroke (Margaret Moran Dixon McDougall)

The book of life to thee is given,
To warn of death, to guide to Heaven.
Wanderer on the wild astray,
Here wilt thou find the King's highway.
Has thy soul suffered, hunger, pain,
Trying to feed on husks in vain?
Here thou wilt find the palace fair,
Where there is bread enough to spare
Thou'lt find where living waters roll,
To satisfy the fainting soul.
Thou hast been thirsty, very sore,
Here come and drink and thirst no more,
Thou'lt find the pearl of greatest price
Hid in the Master's promises.
And so this book to thee is given
To warn of hell, to guide to Heaven.
GRACE HILL, 1842.
From East To West.
by Susan Coolidge (Sarah Chauncey Woolsey)

The boat cast loose her moorings;
"Good-by" was all we said.
"Good-by, Old World," we said with a smile,
And never looked back as we sped,
A shining wake of foam behind,
To the heart of the sunset red.
Heavily drove our plunging keel
The warring waves between;
Heavily strove we night and day,
Against the west-wind keen,
Bent, like a foe, to bar our path,--
A foe with an awful mien.
Never a token met our eyes
From the dear land far away;
No storm-swept bird, no drifting branch,
To tell us where it lay.
Wearily searched we, hour by hour,
Through the mist and the driving spray,
Till, all in a flashing moment,
The fog-veils rent and flew,
And a blithesome south-wind caught the sails
And whistled the cordage through,
And the stars swung low their silver lamps
In a dome of airy blue,
And, breathed from unseen distances,
A new and joyous air
Caressed our senses suddenly
With a rapture fresh and rare.
"It is the breath of home!" we cried;
"We feel that we are there."
O Land whose tent-roof is the dome
Of Heaven's, purest sky,
Whose mighty heart inspires the wind
Of glad, strong liberty,
Standing upon thy sunset shore,
Beside the waters high,
Long may thy rosy smile be bright;
Above the ocean din
Thy young, undaunted voice be heard,
Calling the whole world kin;
And ever be thy arms held out
To take the storm-tossed in!
Nocturne: In Provence.
by Bliss Carman (William)

The blue night, like an angel, came into the room,--
Came through the open window from the silent sky
Down trellised stairs of moonlight into the dear room
As if a whisper breathed of some divine one nigh.
The nightingales, like brooks of song in Paradise,
Gurgled their serene rapture to the silent sky--
Like springs of laughter bubbling up in Paradise,
The serene nightingales along the riverside
Purled low in every tree their star-cool melodies
Of joy--in every tree along the riverside.
Did the vain garments melt in music from your side?
Did you rise from them as a lily flowers i' the air?
--But you were there before me like the Night's own bride--
I dared not call you mine. So still and tall you were,
I never dreamed that you were mine--I never dreamed
I loved you--I forgot I loved you. You were air
And music, and the shadows that you stood in, seemed
Like priests that keep their sombre vigil round a shrine--
Like sombre priests that watch about a glorious shrine.
And then you stepped into the moonlight and laid bare
The wonder of your body to the night, and stood
With all the stars of heaven looking at you there,
As simply as a saint might bare her soul to God--
As simply as a saint might bathe in lakes of prayer--
Stood with the holy moonlight falling on you there
Until I thought that in a glory unaware
I had seen a soul stand forth and bare itself to God--
A saintly soul lay bare its innocence to God.
The Sorrow Of Love
by William Butler Yeats

The brawling of a sparrow in the eaves
The brilliant moon and all the milky sky,
And all that famous harmony of leaves,
Had blotted out man's image and his cry.
A girl arose that had red mournful lips
And seemed the greatness of the world in tears,
Doomed like Odysseus and the laboring ships
And proud as Priam murdered with his peers,
Arose, and on the instant clamorous eaves,
A climbing moon upon an empty sky,
And all that lamentation leaves,
Could but compose man's image and his cry.
A Christmas Carol.
by Freeman Edwin Miller

The brazen bells of laughing lands
In swelling echoes wildly ring,
And over seas and hoary strands
This Christmas carol sing.
"Awaken, O, heart of the race,
To bountiful riches from Eden above,
Till roses of beauty and lilies of grace
Shall sweeten the languishing bosom with love;
Till virulent sorrow and venomous hate
Their poisonous curses of misery cease,
And rapturous fortune, felicitous fate,
Have rule in the musical meadows of peace.
"The voices of morning to men,
In passionate whispers of bounteous glee,
Are pulsing the gladness of Christmas again
O'er plains of the prairie and sounds of the sea;
Rejoice and be happy, O, languishing soul,
In limitless treasures of marvelous cheer,
Till ravishing murmurs of lullabies roll
Through all of the sorrows that sadden the year!
"Though summer has gone from the earth,
And silken embraces of velvety snow
Are folding the blossoms of beauty and worth
In wretched surroundings of wearisome woe;
Let innocent joys in their sweetness abound
And silvery cadence in melody start,
Till rapturous fortunes with pleasure surround
The aims of the soul and the hopes of the heart.
"Let youth with its yearning engage
All vigorous passion that lives in the breast,
While tearful remembrance of tottering age
Finds halcyon harbors of comforting rest;
Let silver of years with the ardor of youth
Be going again through the temple of joy,
While palms of amusement and laurels of truth
Encircle the hearts of the maiden and boy.
"Let happiness reign with the race;
There's never a reason for sorrowful tears,
Kriss Kringle has come with his fatherly face
To comfort complaining humanity's fears;
Let music go 'round and the beautiful smile
Bring gladsome delight to the bosom of bliss,
Till gentle enjoyments unbroken beguile
The souls of the sad with their coveted kiss.
"Though crystalline frost on the trees,
Though ice on the river and snow on the plain
Are freezing the breath of the shivering breeze.
The heart has Nepenthe for all of its pain;
For Christmas is king, and his bountiful hand
Is giving its treasures to mountain and lea,
And gentleness rules on the billowy strand,
And reigns in the far-away isles of the sea."
This is the carol that swells
Over the meadows and brakes,
From brazen throats of the pealing bells
When Christmas morning wakes.
"The Brain Within Its Groove"
by Emily Elizabeth Dickinson

The brain within its groove
Runs evenly and true;
But let a splinter swerve,
'T were easier for you
To put the water back
When floods have slit the hills,
And scooped a turnpike for themselves,
And blotted out the mills!
Scots Of The Riverina
by Henry Lawson

The boy cleared out to the city from his home at harvest time,
They were Scots of the Riverina, and to run from home was a crime.
The old man burned his letters, the first and last he burned,
And he scratched his name from the Bible when the old wife's back was turned.
A year went past and another. There were calls from the firing-line;
They heard the boy had enlisted, but the old man made no sign.
His name must never be mentioned on the farm by Gundagai,
They were Scots of the Riverina with ever the kirk hard by.
The boy came home on his "final", and the township's bonfire burned.
His mother's arms were about him; but the old man's back was turned.
The daughters begged for pardon till the old man raised his hand,
A Scot of the Riverina who was hard to understand.
The boy was killed in Flanders, where the best and bravest die.
There were tears at the Grahame homestead and grief in Gundagai;
But the old man ploughed at daybreak and the old man ploughed till the mirk,
There were furrows of pain in the orchard while his housefolk went to the kirk.
The hurricane lamp in the rafters dimly and dimly burned;
And the old man died at the table when the old wife's back was turned.
Face down on his bare arms folded he sank with his wild grey hair
Outspread o'er the open Bible and a name re-written there.
The Breath Of Candles
by Paul Cameron Brown

The breath of candles,
hot and murky,
on the still air.
Giant factories wave wands
in luxury;
contaminate roving commuter bands
brown, from dirt knitted through white bread hair.
Going Back To School
by Stephen Vincent Benet

The boat ploughed on. Now Alcatraz was past
And all the grey waves flamed to red again
At the dead sun's last glimmer. Far and vast
The Sausalito lights burned suddenly
In little dots and clumps, as if a pen
Had scrawled vague lines of gold across the hills;
The sky was like a cup some rare wine fills,
And stars came as he watched
-- and he was free
One splendid instant -- back in the great room,
Curled in a chair with all of them beside
And the whole world a rush of happy voices,
With laughter beating in a clamorous tide....
Saw once again the heat of harvest fume
Up to the empty sky in threads like glass,
And ran, and was a part of what rejoices
In thunderous nights of rain; lay in the grass
Sun-baked and tired, looking through a maze
Of tiny stems into a new green world;
Once more knew eves of perfume, days ablaze
With clear, dry heat on the brown, rolling fields;
Shuddered with fearful ecstasy in bed
Over a book of knights and bloody shields...
The ship slowed, jarred and stopped. There, straight ahead,
Were dock and fellows. Stumbling, he was whirled
Out and away to meet them -- and his back
Slumped to the old half-cringe, his hands fell slack;
A big boy's arm went round him -- and a twist
Sent shattering pain along his tortured wrist,
As a voice cried, a bloated voice and fat,
"Why it's Miss Nancy! Come along, you rat!"
Burial Stones
by Frank James Prewett

The blue sky arches wide
From hill to hill;
The little grasses stand
Upright and still.
Only these stones to tell
The deadly strife,
The all-important schemes,
The greed for life.
For they are gone, who fought;
But still the skies
Stretch blue, aloof, unchanged,
From rise to rise.
The Big Top
by Alfred Joyce Kilmer (Joyce)

The boom and blare of the big brass band is cheering to my heart
And I like the smell of the trampled grass and elephants and hay.
I take off my hat to the acrobat with his delicate, strong art,
And the motley mirth of the chalk-faced clown drives all my care away.
I wish I could feel as they must feel, these players brave and fair,
Who nonchalantly juggle death before a staring throng.
It must be fine to walk a line of silver in the air
And to cleave a hundred feet of space with a gesture like a song.
Sir Henry Irving never knew a keener, sweeter thrill
Than that which stirs the breast of him who turns his painted face
To the circling crowd who laugh aloud and clap hands with a will
As a tribute to the clown who won the great wheel-barrow race.
Now, one shall work in the living rock with a mallet and a knife,
And another shall dance on a big white horse that canters round a ring,
By another's hand shall colours stand in similitude of life;
And the hearts of the three shall be moved by one mysterious high thing.
For the sculptor and the acrobat and the painter are the same.
They know one hope, one fear, one pride, one sorrow and one mirth,
And they take delight in the endless fight for the fickle world's acclaim;
For they worship art above the clouds and serve her on the earth.
But you, who can build of the stubborn rock no form of loveliness,
Who can never mingle the radiant hues to make a wonder live,
Who can only show your little woe to the world in a rhythmic dress --
What kind of a counterpart of you does the three-ring circus give?
Well -- here in the little side-show tent to-day some people stand,
One is a giant, one a dwarf, and one has a figured skin,
And each is scarred and seared and marred by Fate's relentless hand,
And each one shows his grief for pay, with a sort of pride therein.
You put your sorrow into rhyme and want the world to look;
You sing the news of your ruined hope and want the world to hear;
Their woe is pent in a canvas tent and yours in a printed book.
O, poet of the broken heart, salute your brothers here!
Why The Jackass Laughs
by Banjo Paterson (Andrew Barton)

The Boastful Crow and the Laughing Jack
Were telling tales of the outer back:
"I've just been travelling far and wide,
At the back of Bourke and the Queensland side;
There isn't a bird in the bush can go
As far as me," said the old black crow.
"There isn't a bird in the bush can fly
A course as straight or a course as high.
Higher than human eyesight goes
There's sometimes clouds, but there's always crows,
Drifting along for a scent of blood
Or a smell of smoke or a sign of flood.
For never a bird or a beast has been
With a sight as strong or a scent as keen.
At fires and floods I'm the first about,
For then the lizards and mice run out:
And I make my swoop, and that's all they know,
I'm a whale on mice," said the Boastful Crow.
The Bee-birds over the homestead flew
And told each other the long day through
"The cold has come, we must take the track."
"Now, I'll make you a bet," said the Laughing Jack,
"Of a hundred mice, that you dare not go
With the little Bee-birds, by Boastful Crow."
Said the Boastful Crow, "I could take my ease
And fly with little green birds like these.
If they went flat out and they did their best
I could have a smoke and could take a rest."
And he asked of the Bee-birds circling round:
"Now, where do you spike-tails think you're bound?"
"We leave tonight, and out present plan
is to go straight on till we reach Japan.
"Every year, on the self-same day,
We call our children and start away,
Twittering, travelling day and night,
Over the ocean we take our flight;
And we rest a day on some lonely isles
Or we beg a ride for a hundred miles
On a steamer's deck,* and away we go:
We hope you'll come with us, Mister Crow."
But the old black crow was extremely sad.
Said he: "I reckon you're raving mad
To talk of travelling night and day,
And how in the world do you find your way?"
And the Bee-birds answered him, "If you please,
That's one of our own great mysteries".
Now these things chanced in the long ago
And explain the fact, which no doubt you know,
That every jackass high and low
Will always laugh when he sees a crow.
The Run Upon The Bankers[1]
by Jonathan Swift

The bold encroachers on the deep
Gain by degrees huge tracts of land,
Till Neptune, with one general sweep,
Turns all again to barren strand.
The multitude's capricious pranks
Are said to represent the seas,
Breaking the bankers and the banks,
Resume their own whene'er they please.
Money, the life-blood of the nation,
Corrupts and stagnates in the veins,
Unless a proper circulation
Its motion and its heat maintains.
Because 'tis lordly not to pay,
Quakers and aldermen in state,
Like peers, have levees every day
Of duns attending at their gate.
We want our money on the nail;
The banker's ruin'd if he pays:
They seem to act an ancient tale;
The birds are met to strip the jays.
"Riches," the wisest monarch sings,
"Make pinions for themselves to fly;"[2]
They fly like bats on parchment wings,
And geese their silver plumes supply.
No money left for squandering heirs!
Bills turn the lenders into debtors:
The wish of Nero[3] now is theirs,
"That they had never known their letters."
Conceive the works of midnight hags,
Tormenting fools behind their backs:
Thus bankers, o'er their bills and bags,
Sit squeezing images of wax.
Conceive the whole enchantment broke;
The witches left in open air,
With power no more than other folk,
Exposed with all their magic ware.
So powerful are a banker's bills,
Where creditors demand their due;
They break up counters, doors, and tills,
And leave the empty chests in view.
Thus when an earthquake lets in light
Upon the god of gold and hell,
Unable to endure the sight,
He hides within his darkest cell.
As when a conjurer takes a lease
From Satan for a term of years,
The tenant's in a dismal case,
Whene'er the bloody bond appears.
A baited banker thus desponds,
From his own hand foresees his fall,
They have his soul, who have his bonds;
'Tis like the writing on the wall.[4]
How will the caitiff wretch be scared,
When first he finds himself awake
At the last trumpet, unprepared,
And all his grand account to make!
For in that universal call,
Few bankers will to heaven be mounters;
They'll cry, "Ye shops, upon us fall!
Conceal and cover us, ye counters!"
When other hands the scales shall hold,
And they, in men's and angels' sight
Produced with all their bills and gold,
"Weigh'd in the balance and found light!"
To -- (IV)
by Edgar Allan Poe

The bowers whereat, in dreams, I see
The wantonest singing birds,
Are lips, and all thy melody
Of lip-begotten words,
Thine eyes, in Heaven of heart enshrined,
Then desolately fall,
O God! on my funereal mind
Like starlight on a pall,
Thy heart, thy heart!, I wake and sigh,
And sleep to dream till day
Of the truth that gold can never buy,
Of the baubles that it may.
The Boy
by William Allingham

The Boy from his bedroom-window 
Look'd over the little town, 
And away to the bleak black upland 
Under a clouded moon. 
The moon came forth from her cavern, 
He saw the sudden gleam 
Of a tarn in the swarthy moorland; 
Or perhaps the whole was a dream. 
For I never could find that water 
In all my walks and rides: 
Far-off, in the Land of Memory, 
That midnight pool abides. 
Many fine things had I glimpse of, 
And said, "I shall.find them one day."
Whether within or without me 
They were, I cannot say.
Sonnet XCVI.
by Anna Seward

The breathing freshness of the shining Morn,
Whose beams glance yellow on the distant fields,
A sweet, unutterable pleasure yields
To my dejected sense, that turns with scorn
From the light joys of Dissipation born.
Sacred Remembrance all my bosom shields
Against each glittering lance she gaily wields,
Warring with fond Regrets, that silent mourn
The Heart's dear comforts lost. - But, NATURE, thou,
Thou art resistless still; - and yet I ween
Thy present balmy gales, and vernal blow,
To MEMORY owe the magic of their scene;
For with such fragrant breath, such orient rays,
Shone the soft mornings of my youthful days.