DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Bury Me In A Free Land
by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper

Make me a grave where'er you will,
In a lowly plain, or a lofty hill;
Make it among earth's humblest graves,
But not in a land where men are slaves.
I could not rest if around my grave
I heard the steps of a trembling slave;
His shadow above my silent tomb
Would make it a place of fearful gloom.
I could not rest if I heard the tread
Of a coffle gang to the shambles led,
And the mother's shriek of wild despair
Rise like a curse on the trembling air.
I could not sleep if I saw the lash
Drinking her blood at each fearful gash,
And I saw her babes torn from her breast,
Like trembling doves from their parent nest.
I'd shudder and start if I heard the bay
Of bloodhounds seizing their human prey,
And I heard the captive plead in vain
As they bound afresh his galling chain.
If I saw young girls from their mother's arms
Bartered and sold for their youthful charms,
My eye would flash with a mournful flame,
My death-paled cheek grow red with shame.
I would sleep, dear friends, where bloated might
Can rob no man of his dearest right;
My rest shall be calm in any grave
Where none can call his brother a slave.
I ask no monument, proud and high,
To arrest the gaze of the passers-by;
All that my yearning spirit craves,
Is bury me not in a land of slaves.
On Dr. Rundle, Bishop Of Derry
by Jonathan Swift

1734-5
Make Rundle bishop! fie for shame!
An Arian to usurp the name!
A bishop in the isle of saints!
How will his brethren make complaints!
Dare any of the mitred host
Confer on him the Holy Ghost:
In mother church to breed a variance,
By coupling orthodox with Arians?
Yet, were he Heathen, Turk, or Jew:
What is there in it strange or new?
For, let us hear the weak pretence,
His brethren find to take offence;
Of whom there are but four at most,
Who know there is a Holy Ghost;
The rest, who boast they have conferr'd it,
Like Paul's Ephesians, never-heard it;
And, when they gave it, well 'tis known
They gave what never was their own.
Rundle a bishop! well he may;
He's still a Christian more than they.
We know the subject of their quarrels;
The man has learning, sense, and morals.
There is a reason still more weighty;
'Tis granted he believes a Deity.
Has every circumstance to please us,
Though fools may doubt his faith in Jesus.
But why should he with that be loaded,
Now twenty years from court exploded?
And is not this objection odd
From rogues who ne'er believed a God?
For liberty a champion stout,
Though not so Gospel-ward devout.
While others, hither sent to save us
Come but to plunder and enslave us;
Nor ever own'd a power divine,
But Mammon, and the German line.
Say, how did Rundle undermine 'em?
Who shew'd a better jus divinum?
From ancient canons would not vary,
But thrice refused episcopari.
Our bishop's predecessor, Magus,
Would offer all the sands of Tagus;
Or sell his children, house, and lands,
For that one gift, to lay on hands:
But all his gold could not avail
To have the spirit set to sale.
Said surly Peter, "Magus, prithee,
Be gone: thy money perish with thee."
Were Peter now alive, perhaps,
He might have found a score of chaps,
Could he but make his gift appear
In rents three thousand pounds a-year.
Some fancy this promotion odd,
As not the handiwork of God;
Though e'en the bishops disappointed
Must own it made by God's anointed,
And well we know, the cong' regal
Is more secure as well as legal;
Because our lawyers all agree,
That bishoprics are held in fee.
Dear Baldwin[1] chaste, and witty Crosse,[2]
How sorely I lament your loss!
That such a pair of wealthy ninnies
Should slip your time of dropping guineas;
For, had you made the king your debtor,
Your title had been so much better.
Robinson Crusoe
by William F. Kirk

Maester Robinson Crusoe ban lonely old faller
Who ban on an island gude long time ago;
His friends all ban lost in a yolly big shipwreck;
But Robinson alvays ban lucky, yu know.
He get on dis island, and can't get avay,
"By yiminy," say Crusoe, "ay tenk ay skol stay!"
Von day some cannibals com to dis island,
And brenging some frends just to make little stew.
Dese frends dey ant lak to be made into cooking,
And von faller dodge dis har cannibal crew.
His name it ban Friday. He ban a gude coon,
And Crusoe and he start to eat from same spoon.
Dey have lots of fun on dis har desert island,
Dey play seven up and casino, ay tenk;
And Crusoe put on a nice bar-tender's apron,
And taught Maester Friday to mix a gude drenk.
Dey get kind o' used to dis old desert isle,
And get 'long togedder qvite gude for a vile.
But Friday ban coon, and yu know dese coon fallers
Ban looking for tips yust so sharp sum dey can.
So Friday yust tal Maester Robinson Crusoe,
"Ay tenk, Maester Crusoe, yu ban a cheap man."
Den he yump into ocean, and svim yust lak hal,
And Robinson Crusoe ban losing his pal.
R. S. S., At Deer Island On The Merrimac
by John Greenleaf Whittier

Make, for he loved thee well, our Merrimac,
From wave and shore a low and long lament
For him, whose last look sought thee, as he went
The unknown way from which no step comes back.
And ye, O ancient pine-trees, at whose feet
He watched in life the sunset's reddening glow,
Let the soft south wind through your needles blow
A fitting requiem tenderly and sweet!
No fonder lover of all lovely things
Shall walk where once he walked, no smile more glad
Greet friends than his who friends in all men had,
Whose pleasant memory, to that Island clings,
Where a dear mourner in the home he left
Of love's sweet solace cannot be bereft
The Maid of Jerusalem
by John Clare

Maid of Jerusalem, by the Dead Sea,
I wandered all sorrowing thinking of thee,--
Thy city in ruins, thy kindred deplored,
All fallen and lost by the Ottoman's sword.
I saw thee sit there in disconsolate sighs,
Where the hall of thy fathers a ruined heap lies.
Thy fair finger showed me the place where they trod,
In thy childhood where flourished the city of God.
The place where they fell and the scenes where they lie,
In the tomb of Siloa--the tear in her eye
She stifled: transfixed there it grew like a pearl,
Beneath the dark lash of the sweet Jewish Girl.
Jerusalem is fallen! still thou art in bloom,
As fresh as the ivy around the lone tomb,
And fair as the lily of morning that waves
Its sweet-scented bells over desolate graves.
When I think of Jerusalem in kingdoms yet free,
I shall think of its ruins and think upon thee;
Thou beautiful Jewess, content thou mayest roam;
A bright spot in Eden still blooms as thy home.
The Dreadful Story Of Pauline And The Matches
by Heinrich Hoffmann

Mamma and Nurse went out one day,
And left Pauline alone at play;
Around the room she gayly sprang,
Clapp'd her hands, and danced, and sang.
Now, on the table close at hand,
A box of matches chanced to stand,
And kind Mamma and Nurse had told her,
That if she touched them they would scold her.
But Pauline said, "Oh, what a pity!
For when they burn it is so pretty;
They crackle so, and spit, and flame;
And Mamma often burns the same.
I'll only light a match or two
As I have often seen my mother do."
When Minz and Maunz, the cats, heard this,
They said, "Oh, naughty, naughty Miss.
Me-ow!" they cried, "Me-ow, me-o,
You'll burn to death, if you do so.
Mamma forbids it, don't you know?"
But Pauline would not take advice,
She lit a match, it was so nice!
It crackled so, it burned so clear,--
Exactly like the picture here.
She jumped for joy and ran about,
And was too pleased to put it out.
When Minz and Maunz, the cats, saw this,
They said, "Oh, naughty, naughty Miss!"
And rais'd their paws
And stretch'd their claws;
"'Tis very, very wrong, you know;
Me-ow, me-o, me-ow, me-o!
You will be burnt if you do so.
Mamma forbids it, don't you know?"
Now see! oh, see! a dreadful thing!
The fire has caught her apron string:
Her apron burns, her arms, her hair;
She burns all over, everywhere.
Then how the pussy cats did mew,
What else, poor pussies, could they do?
They screamed for help, 'twas all in vain,
So then they said, "We'll scream again.
Make haste, make haste! Me-ow! me-o!
She'll burn to death--we told her so."
Pauline was burnt with all her clothes,
And arms and hands, and eyes and nose;
Till she had nothing more to lose
Except her little scarlet shoes;
And nothing else but these was found
Among her ashes on the ground.
And when the good cats sat beside
The smoking ashes, how they cried,
"Me-ow, me-o! Me-ow, me-oo!
What will Mamma and Nursey do?"
Their tears ran down their cheeks so fast
They made a little pond at last.
Female Judgment.
by Friedrich Schiller

Man frames his judgment on reason; but woman on love founds her verdict;
If her judgment loves not, woman already has judged.
Frost
by Madison Julius Cawein

Magician he, who, autumn nights,
Down from the starry heavens whirls;
A harlequin in spangled tights,
Whose wand's touch carpets earth with pearls.
Through him each pane presents a scene,
A Lilliputian landscape, where
The world is white instead of green,
And trees and houses hang in air.
Where Elfins gambol and delight,
And haunt the jewelled bells of flowers;
Where upside-down we see the night
With many moons and starry showers.
And surely in his wand or hand
Is Midas magic, for, behold,
Some morn we wake and find the land,
Both field and forest, turned to gold.
Winter.
by Susanna Moodie

Majestic King of storms! around
Thy wan and hoary brow
A spotless diadem is bound
Of everlasting snow:
Time, which dissolves all earthly things,
O'er thee hath vainly waved his wings!
The sun, with his refulgent beams,
Thaws not thy icy zone;
Lord of ten thousand frozen streams,
That sleep around thy throne,
Whose crystal barriers may defy
The genial warmth of summer's sky.
What human foot shall dare intrude
Beyond the howling waste,
Or view the untrodden solitude,
Where thy dark home is placed;
In those far realms of death where light
Shrieks from thy glance and all is night?
The earth has felt thine iron tread,
The streams have ceased to flow,
The leaves beneath thy feet lie dead,
And keen the north winds blow:
Nature lies in her winding sheet
Of dazzling snow, and blinding sleet.
Thy voice has chained the troubled deep;
Within thy mighty hand,
The restless world of waters sleep
On Greenland's barren strand.
Thy stormy heralds, loud and shrill,
Have bid the foaming waves lie still.
Where lately many a gallant prow
Spurned back the whitening spray,
An icy desert glitters now,
Beneath the moon's wan ray:
Full many a fathom deep below
The dark imprisoned waters flow.
How gloriously above thee gleam
The planetary train,
And the pale moon with clearer beam
Chequers the frost-bound plain;
The sparkling diadem of night
Circles thy brow with tenfold light.
I love thee not--yet when I raise
To heaven my wondering eyes,
I feel transported at the blaze
Of beauty in the skies,
And laud the power that, e'en to thee,
Hath given such pomp and majesty!
I turn and shrink before the blast
That sweeps the leafless tree,
Careering on the tempest past,
Thy snowy wreath I see;
But Spring will come in beauty forth
And chase thee to the frozen north!
To The Lord Of Potsdam
by Owen Seaman

[On sending a certain telegram.]
Majestic Monarch! whom the other gods,
For fear of their immediate removal,
Consulting hourly, seek your awful nod's
Approval;
Lift but your little finger up to strike,
And lo! 'the massy earth is riven' (Shelley),
The habitable globe is shaken like
A jelly.
By your express permission for the last
Eight years the sun has regularly risen;
And editors, that questioned this, have passed
To prison.
In Art you simply have to say, "I shall!"
Beethoven's fame is rendered transitory;
And Titian cloys beside your clever all-
-egory.
We hailed you Admiral: your eagle sight
Foresaw Her Majesty's benign intentions;
A uniform was ready of the right
Dimensions.
Your wardrobe shines with all the shapes and shades,
That genius can fix in fancy suitings;
For levees, false alarums, full parades
And shootings.
But save the habit marks the man of gore
Your spurs are yet to win, my callow Kaiser!
Of fighting in the field you know no more
Than I, Sir!
When Grandpapa was thanking God with hymns
For gallant Frenchmen dying in the ditches,
Your nurse had barely braced your little limbs
In breeches.
And doubtless, where he roosts beside his bock,
The Game Old Bird that played the leading fiddle
Smiles grimly as he hears your perky cock-
-a-diddle.
Be well advised, my youthful friend, abjure
These tricks that smack of Cleon and the tanners;
And let the Dutch instruct a German Boor
In manners.
Nor were you meant to solve the nations' knots,
Or be the Earth's Protector, willy-nilly;
You only make yourself and royal Pots-
-dam silly.
Our racing yachts are not at present dressed
In bravery of bunting to amuse you,
Nor can the licence of an honoured guest
Excuse you.
But if your words are more than wanton play
And you would like to meet the old sea-rover,
Name any course from Delagoa Bay
To Dover.
Meanwhile observe a proper reticence;
We ask no more; there never was a rumour
Of asking Hohenzollerns for a sense
Of humour!
The Basalt
by Joseph Victor von Scheffel

Mag der basaltene Mohrenstein
Zum Schreck es erz'hlen im Lande,
Wie er gebrodelt in Flammenschein
Und geschw'rzt entstiegen dem Brande:
Brenn's drunten noch Jahr aus Jahr ein
Beim Wein soll uns nicht bange sein,
Nein, nein!
Soll uns nicht bange sein!
F. v. Kobell. Urzeit der Erde, p. 33.
Es war der Basalt ein j'ngerer Sohn
Aus altvulcanischem Hause,
Er lebte lang verkannt und gedr'ckt
In erdtief verborgener Clause.
Sir basalt was a younger son
Of that oldest race, the Vulcanian,
And he lived for ages oppressed and unknown
In a cavern deep subterranean.
So they goaded and jeered the lover forlorn, - 
'Art thou yearning for rainy weather?
You will get but a mitten, and the scorn
Of all the formations together.
'Uncle Rocksalt said to the Lime and smiled,
And the billows sneer it higher,
"How can the Ocean's third-born child
Be a bride to this scum of Fire?"'
What happened next was never known;
But at once into madness crashing,
In a fiery blaze he was upwards thrown,
His wild veins glaring and flashing.
Loud raving he sprang to the air in haste,
And scorching all, fast hurried;
Bursting the strata's mountain waste
Beneath which he long was buried.
And she whom he once had worshipped, broke,
And was crushed as a mere obstruction;
He laughed in scorn, and whirling in smoke,
Stormed on to fresh destruction.
And blow on blow - a terrible roar
Of thousands of storms wild crashing;
The earth burst open and trembled all o'er.
With a shaking and breaking and dashing.
Till in majesty the fiery flood
Flew up from the rifts in fountains,
And scattered with ruins land and flood
Bowed down to the columned mountains.
There he stood and gazed on the blue air free,
And the sun with its sweet attraction,
Then heavily sighed - it blew cool from the sea - 
And he sank in petrifaction.
Yet still in the rock may be heard in rhyme
A wondrous tuning and ringing,
As though he would from his youthful time
A song of love be singing.
And a gold yellow drop of natrolite
From the dark stone oft comes peeping;
Those are the tears which Sir Bas'lt
For his crushed love ever is weeping.
Translated From The German Of Joseph Victor Scheffel By Charles G. Leland.
Malingering
by Paul Cameron Brown

Malingering,
increase drift
of censure
infrared blotted one.
No noise, just
the splashing of the sea
endless, shrill
birds
gaping a way
into the night's chill.
Oil The Cricket
by Joseph Horatio Chant

"Mamma, what noises do I hear?
They keep me wide awake."
"The chirping crickets, little dear;
What funny noise they make!"
"Yes, ma, but touch their tongues with oil,
To take the squeak away;
For soon it will their voices spoil,
To squeak thus night and day."
Well done, my little girl of three;
'Twould tune our speaking gear
To utter sweeter melody
For your attentive ear,
If it were oiled a little, too,
For harsh too oft its tones;
Though formed to thrill with pleasure true,
It gives forth shrieks and groans,
Which fall discordant on the ear,
And budding pleasures spoil,
And speaking gear, likewise I fear;
So bring along the oil.
Hymn.
by William Hayley

Make us, O God! in whom we breathe, and move,
Worthy to love Thee, and to win thy love!
Thy word informs us how thy love is won,
By grateful trust in thy beloved Son!
Through every season may such trust encrease!
We know it duty, and we feel it peace.
Mammon
by Richard Le Gallienne

(FOR MR, G. F. WATTS'S PICTURE)
Mammon is this, of murder and of gold,
To-day, to-morrow, and ever from of old,
Th' Almighty God, and King of every land.
Man 'neath his foot, and woman 'neath his hand,
Kneel prostrate: he, 'tis meant to symbolise,
Steals our strong men and our sweet women buys.
O! rather grind me down into the dust
Than choose me for the vessel of thy lust.
Maiden May.
by Christina Georgina Rossetti

Maiden May sat in her bower,
In her blush rose bower in flower,
Sweet of scent;
Sat and dreamed away an hour,
Half content, half uncontent.
"Why should rose blossoms be born,
Tender blossoms, on a thorn
Though so sweet?
Never a thorn besets the corn
Scentless in its strength complete.
"Why are roses all so frail,
At the mercy of the gale,
Of a breath?
Yet so sweet and perfect pale,
Still so sweet in life and death."
Maiden May sat in her bower,
In her blush rose bower in flower,
Where a linnet
Made one bristling branch the tower
For her nest and young ones in it.
"Gay and clear the linnet trills;
Yet the skylark only, thrills
Heaven and earth
When he breasts the height, and fills
Height and depth with song and mirth.
"Nightingales which yield to night
Solitary strange delight,
Reign alone:
But the lark for all his height
Fills no solitary throne;
"While he sings, a hundred sing;
Wing their flight below his wing
Yet in flight;
Each a lovely joyful thing
To the measure of its delight.
"Why then should a lark be reckoned
One alone, without a second
Near his throne?
He in skyward flight unslackened,
In his music, not alone."
Maiden May sat in her bower;
Her own face was like a flower
Of the prime,
Half in sunshine, half in shower,
In the year's most tender time.
Her own thoughts in silent song
Musically flowed along,
Wise, unwise,
Wistful, wondering, weak or strong:
As brook shallows sink or rise.
Other thoughts another day,
Maiden May, will surge and sway
Round your heart;
Wake, and plead, and turn at bay,
Wisdom part, and folly part.
Time not far remote will borrow
Other joys, another sorrow,
All for you;
Not to-day, and yet to-morrow
Reasoning false and reasoning true.
Wherefore greatest? Wherefore least?
Hearts that starve and hearts that feast?
You and I?
Stammering Oracles have ceased,
And the whole earth stands at "why?"
Underneath all things that be
Lies an unsolved mystery;
Over all
Spreads a veil impenetrably,
Spreads a dense unlifted pall.
Mystery of mysteries:
This creation hears and sees
High and low -
Vanity of vanities:
This we test and this we know.
Maiden May, the days of flowering
Nurse you now in sweet embowering,
Sunny days;
Bright with rainbows all the showering,
Bright with blossoms all the ways.
Close the inlet of your bower,
Close it close with thorn and flower,
Maiden May;
Lengthen out the shortening hour, -
Morrows are not as to-day.
Stay to-day which wanes too soon,
Stay the sun and stay the moon,
Stay your youth;
Bask you in the actual noon,
Rest you in the present truth.
Let to-day suffice to-day:
For itself to-morrow may
Fetch its loss;
Aim and stumble, say its say,
Watch and pray and bear its cross.
To An Angry Bee.
by John Clare

Malicious insect, little vengeful bee,
With venom-sting thou'rt whirling round and round
A harmless head that ne'er meant wrong to thee,
And friendship's hand it is thou'dst wish to wound:
Cool thy revenge, and judge thy foes aright;
The harden'd neatherd and the sweet-tooth'd boy--
Thy moss-wrapp'd treasures, if but in their sight,
Soon would they all thy honey'd lives destroy:
But delve the cowslip-peep in labour free,
And dread no pilferer of thy hoards in me.--
Thus man to man oft takes a friend for foe,
And spurns a blessing when its in his power,
Mistakes real happiness for worldly woe,
Crops sorrow's weed, and treads on pleasure's flower.
Man's Limitation
by Arthur Conan Doyle

Man says that He is jealous,
Man says that He is wise,
Man says that He is watching
From His throne beyond the skies.
But perchance the arch above us
Is one great mirror's span,
And the Figure seen so dimly
Is a vast reflected man.
If it is love that gave us
A thousand blossoms bright,
Why should that love not save us
From poisoned aconite?
If this man blesses sunshine
Which sets his fields aglow,
Shall that man curse the tempest
That lays his harvest low?
If you may sing His praises
For health He gave to you,
What of this spine-curved cripple,
Shall he sing praises too?
If you may justly thank Him
For strength in mind and limb,
Then what of yonder weakling —
Must he give thanks to Him?
Ah dark, too dark, the riddle!
The tiny brain too small!
We call, and fondly listen,
For answer to that call.
There comes no word to tell us
Why this and that should be,
Why you should live with sorrow,
And joy should live with me.
Love Song--Heine
by Eugene Field

Many a beauteous flower doth spring
From the tears that flood my eyes,
And the nightingale doth sing
In the burthen of my sighs.
If, O child, thou lovest me,
Take these flowerets fair and frail,
And my soul shall waft to thee
Love songs of the nightingale.
The Virtue Of Woman.
by Friedrich Schiller

Man of virtue has need;-into life with boldness he plunges,
Entering with fortune more sure into the hazardous strife;
But to woman one virtue suffices; it is ever shining
Lovingly forth to the heart; so let it shine to the eye!
The Works Of Man And Of Nature.
by W. M. MacKeracher

Man's works grow stale to man: the years destroy
The charm they once possessed; the city tires;
The terraces, the domes, the dazzling spires
Are in the main but an attractive toy -
They please the man not as they pleased the boy;
And he returns to Nature, and requires
To warm his soul at her old altar fires,
To drink from her perpetual fount of joy.
It is that man and all the works of man
Prepare to pass away; he may depend
On naught but what he found her stores among;
But she, she changes not, nor ever can;
He knows she will be faithful to the end,
For ever beautiful, for ever young.
In The Servants' Quarters
by Thomas Hardy

"Man, you too, aren't you, one of these rough followers of the criminal?
All hanging hereabout to gather how he's going to bear
Examination in the hall." She flung disdainful glances on
The shabby figure standing at the fire with others there,
Who warmed them by its flare.
"No indeed, my skipping maiden: I know nothing of the trial here,
Or criminal, if so he be. I chanced to come this way,
And the fire shone out into the dawn, and morning airs are cold now;
I, too, was drawn in part by charms I see before me play,
That I see not every day."
"Ha, ha!" then laughed the constables who also stood to warm themselves,
The while another maiden scrutinized his features hard,
As the blaze threw into contrast every line and knot that wrinkled them,
Exclaiming, "Why, last night when he was brought in by the guard,
You were with him in the yard!"
"Nay, nay, you teasing wench, I say! You know you speak mistakenly.
Cannot a tired pedestrian who has footed it afar
Here on his way from northern parts, engrossed in humble marketings,
Come in and rest awhile, although judicial doings are
Afoot by morning star?"
"O, come, come!" laughed the constables. "Why, man, you speak the dialect
He uses in his answers; you can hear him up the stairs.
So own it. We sha'n't hurt ye. There he's speaking now! His syllables
Are those you sound yourself when you are talking unawares,
As this pretty girl declares."
"And you shudder when his chain clinks!" she rejoined. "O yes, I noticed it.
And you winced, too, when those cuffs they gave him echoed to us here.
They'll soon be coming down, and you may then have to defend yourself
Unless you hold your tongue, or go away and keep you clear
When he's led to judgment near!"
"No! I'll be damned in hell if I know anything about the man!
No single thing about him more than everybody knows!
Must not I even warm my hands but I am charged with blasphemies?" .
. .
- His face convulses as the morning cock that moment crows,
And he stops, and turns, and goes.