DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
My Trust
by John Greenleaf Whittier

A picture memory brings to me
I look across the years and see
Myself beside my mother's knee.
I feel her gentle hand restrain
My selfish moods, and know again
A child's blind sense of wrong and pain.
But wiser now, a man gray grown,
My childhood's needs are better known,
My mother's chastening love I own.
Gray grown, but in our Father's sight
A child still groping for the light
To read His works and ways aright.
I wait, in His good time to see
That as my mother dealt with me
So with His children dealeth He.
I bow myself beneath His hand
That pain itself was wisely planned
I feel, and partly understand.
The joy that comes in sorrow's guise,
The sweet pains of self-sacrifice,
I would not have them otherwise.
And what were life and death if sin
Knew not the dread rebuke within,
The pang of merciful discipline?
Not with thy proud despair of old,
Crowned stoic of Rome's noblest mould!
Pleasure and pain alike I hold.
I suffer with no vain pretence
Of triumph over flesh and sense,
Yet trust the grievous providence,
How dark soe'er it seems, may tend,
By ways I cannot comprehend,
To some unguessed benignant end;
That every loss and lapse may gain
The clear-aired heights by steps of pain,
And never cross is borne in vain.
The Prism
by George MacDonald

I.
A pool of broken sunbeams lay
Upon the passage-floor,
Radiant and rich, profound and gay
As ever diamond bore.
Small, flitting hands a handkerchief
Spread like a cunning trap:
Prone lay the gorgeous jewel-sheaf
In the glory-gleaner's lap!
Deftly she folded up the prize,
With lovely avarice;
Like one whom having had made wise,
She bore it off in bliss.
But ah, when for her prisoned gems
She peeped, to prove them there,
No glories broken from their stems
Lay in the kerchief bare!
For still, outside the nursery door,
The bright persistency,
A molten diadem on the floor,
Lay burning wondrously.
II.
How oft have I laid fold from fold
And peered into my mind--
To see of all the purple and gold
Not one gleam left behind!
The best of gifts will not be stored:
The manna of yesterday
Has filled no sacred miser-hoard
To keep new need away.
Thy grace, O Lord, it is thyself;
Thy presence is thy light;
I cannot lay it on my shelf,
Or take it from thy sight.
For daily bread we daily pray--
The want still breeds the cry;
And so we meet, day after day,
Thou, Father in heaven, and I.
Is my house dreary, wall and floor,
Will not the darkness flit,
I go outside my shadowy door
And in thy rainbow sit.
The Pilgrim's Dream - Or, The Star And The Glow-Worm
by William Wordsworth

A Pilgrim, when the summer day
Had closed upon his weary way,
A lodging begged beneath a castle's roof;
But him the haughty Warder spurned;
And from the gate the Pilgrim turned,
To seek such covert as the field
Or heath-besprinkled copse might yield,
Or lofty wood, shower-proof.
He paced along; and, pensively,
Halting beneath a shady tree,
Whose moss-grown root might serve for couch or seat,
Fixed on a Star his upward eye;
Then, from the tenant of the sky
He turned, and watched with kindred look,
A Glow-worm, in a dusky nook,
Apparent at his feet.
The murmur of a neighbouring stream
Induced a soft and slumbrous dream,
A pregnant dream, within whose shadowy bounds
He recognised the earth-born Star,
And 'That' which glittered from afar;
And (strange to witness!) from the frame
Of the ethereal Orb, there came
Intelligible sounds.
Much did it taunt the humble Light
That now, when day was fled, and night
Hushed the dark earth, fast closing weary eyes,
A very reptile could presume
To show her taper in the gloom,
As if in rivalship with One
Who sate a ruler on his throne
Erected in the skies.
"Exalted Star!" the Worm replied,
"Abate this unbecoming pride,
Or with a less uneasy lustre shine;
Thou shrink'st as momently thy rays
Are mastered by the breathing haze;
While neither mist, nor thickest cloud
That shapes in heaven its murky shroud,
Hath power to injure mine.
But not for this do I aspire
To match the spark of local fire,
That at my will burns on the dewy lawn,
With thy acknowledged glories; No!
Yet, thus upbraided, I may show
What favours do attend me here,
Till, like thyself, I disappear
Before the purple dawn."
When this in modest guise was said,
Across the welkin seemed to spread
A boding sound, for aught but sleep unfit!
Hills quaked, the rivers backward ran;
That Star, so proud of late, looked wan;
And reeled with visionary stir
In the blue depth, like Lucifer
Cast headlong to the pit!
Fire raged: and, when the spangled floor
Of ancient ether was no more,
New heavens succeeded, by the dream brought forth:
And all the happy Souls that rode
Transfigured through that fresh abode,
Had heretofore, in humble trust,
Shone meekly 'mid their native dust,
The Glow-worms of the earth!
This knowledge, from an Angel's voice
Proceeding, made the heart rejoice
Of Him who slept upon the open lea:
Waking at morn he murmured not;
And, till life's journey closed, the spot
Was to the Pilgrim's soul endeared,
Where by that dream he had been cheered
Beneath the shady tree.
Sonnet
by Alice Christiana Thompson Meynell

A poet of one mood in all my lays,
Ranging all life to sing one only love,
Like a west wind across the world I move,
Sweeping my harp of floods mine own wild ways.
The countries change, but not the west-wind days
Which are my songs.    My soft skies shine above,
And on all seas the colours of a dove,
And on all fields a flash of silver greys.
I make the whole world answer to my art
And sweet monotonous meanings.    In your ears
I change not ever, bearing, for my part,
One thought that is the treasure of my years,
A small cloud full of rain upon my heart
And in mine arms, clasped, like a child in tears.
The Jay In The Feathers Of The Peacock.
by Jean de La Fontaine

[1]
A peacock moulted: soon a jay was seen
Bedeck'd with Argus tail of gold and green,[2]
High strutting, with elated crest,
As much a peacock as the rest.
His trick was recognized and bruited,
His person jeer'd at, hiss'd, and hooted.
The peacock gentry flock'd together,
And pluck'd the fool of every feather.
Nay more, when back he sneak'd to join his race,
They shut their portals in his face.
There is another sort of jay,
The number of its legs the same,
Which makes of borrow'd plumes display,
And plagiary is its name.
But hush! the tribe I'll not offend;
'Tis not my work their ways to mend.
Faery Gold
by Richard Le Gallienne

(TO MRS. PERCY DEARMER)
A poet hungered, as well he might -
Not a morsel since yesternight!
And sad he grew - good reason why -
For the poet had nought wherewith to buy.
'Are not two sparrows sold,' he cried,
'Sold for a farthing? and,' he sighed,
As he pushed his morning post away,
'Are not two sonnets more than they?'
Yet store of gold, great store had he, -
Of the gold that is known as 'faery.'
He had the gold of his burning dreams,
He had his golden rhymes - in reams,
He had the strings of his golden lyre,
And his own was that golden west on fire.
But the poet knew his world too well
To dream that such would buy or sell.
He had his poets, 'pure gold,' he said,
But the man at the bookstall shook his head,
And offered a grudging half-a-crown
For the five the poet had brought him down.
Ah, what a world we are in! we sigh,
Where a lunch costs more than a Keats can buy,
And even Shakespeare's hallowed line
Falls short of the requisite sum to dine.
Yet other gold had the poet got,
For see from that grey-blue Gouda pot
Three golden tulips spouting flame -
From his love, from his love, this morn, they came.
His love he loved even more than fame.
Three golden tulips thrice more fair
Than other golden tulips were -
'And yet,' he smiled as he took one up,
And feasted on its yellow cup, -
'I wonder how many eggs you'd buy!
By Bacchus, I've half a mind to try!
'One golden bloom for one golden yolk -
Nay, on my word, sir, I mean no joke -
Gold for gold is fair dealing, sir.'
Think of the grocer gaping there!
Or the baker, if I went and said,
- 'This tulip for a loaf of bread,
God's beauty for your kneaded grain;'
Or the vintner - 'For this flower of mine
A flagon, pray, of yellow wine,
And you shall keep the change for gain.'
Ah me, on what a different earth
I and these fellows had our birth,
Strange that these golden things should be
For them so poor, so rich for me.'
Ended his sigh, the poet searched his shelf -
Seeking another poet to feed himself;
Then sadly went, and, full of shame and grief,
Sold his last Swinburne for a plate of beef.
Thus poets too, to fill the hungry maw,
Must eat each other - 'tis the eternal law.
The Waterfall
by Ralph Waldo Emerson

A patch of meadow upland
Reached by a mile of road,
Soothed by the voice of waters,
With birds and flowers bestowed.
Hither I come for strength
Which well it can supply,
For Love draws might from terrene force
And potencies of sky.
The tremulous battery Earth
Responds to the touch of man;
It thrills to the antipodes,
From Boston to Japan.
The planets' child the planet knows
And to his joy replies;
To the lark's trill unfolds the rose,
Clouds flush their gayest dyes.
When Ali prayed and loved
Where Syrian waters roll,
Upward the ninth heaven thrilled and moved;
At the tread of the jubilant soul.
The Rag-Picker
by Madison Julius Cawein

A pond of filth a sewer flows into,
Around whose edge the evil ragweeds crowd,
Poison in every breath; and, cloud on cloud,
Insects that sing and sting, the pool's fierce spew:
All hideousness, from every street and stew,
And every stench weaves for the place a shroud;
And in its midst a figure, bent and bowed,
A woman who no girlhood ever knew.
Some offal of humanity she seems;
One with the rags she picks and scrapes among;
More soiled, in soul: the veriest rag
Of womankind, whose squalor looks and dreams
Of nothing higher than the cart that flung
Its last load here from which she crams her bag.
The Fable of the Peasant and his Landlord.[1]
by William Cowper

A Peasant to his lord yearly court,
Presenting pippins of so rich a sort
That he, displeased to have a part alone,
Removed the tree, that all might be his own.
The tree, too old to travel, though before
So fruitful, withered, and would yield no more.
The squire, perceiving all his labour void,
Cursed his own pains, so foolishly employed,
And "Oh," he cried, "that I had lived content
With tribute, small indeed, but kindly meant!    
My avarice has expensive proved to me,
Has cost me both my pippins and my tree."
Fighting Mac" A Life Tragedy
by Robert William Service

A pistol-shot rings round and round the world:
In pitiful defeat a warrior lies.
A last defiance to dark Death is hurled,
A last wild challenge shocks the sunlit skies.
Alone he falls with wide, wan, woeful eyes:
Eyes that could smile at death - could not face shame.
Alone, alone he paced his narrow room,
In the bright sunshine of that Paris day;
Saw in his thought the awful hand of doom;
Saw in his dream his glory pass away;
Tried in his heart, his weary heart, to pray:
"O God! who made me, give me strength to face
The spectre of this bitter, black disgrace."
*    *    *    *    *
The burn brawls darkly down the shaggy glen,
The bee-kissed heather blooms around the door;
He sees himself a barefoot boy again,
Bending o'er page of legendary lore.
He hears the pibroch, grips the red claymore,
Runs with the Fiery Cross a clansman true,
Sworn kinsman of Rob Roy and Roderick Dhu.
Eating his heart out with a wild desire,
One day, behind his counter trim and neat,
He hears a sound that sets his brain afire -
The Highlanders are marching down the street.
Oh, how the pipes shrill out, the mad drums beat!
"On to the gates of Hell, my Gordons gay!"
He flings his hated yardstick far away.
He sees the sullen pass, high-crowned with snow,
Where Afghans cower with eyes of gleaming hate.
He hurls himself against the hidden foe.
They try to rally - ah, too late, too late!
Again, defenceless, with fierce eyes that wait
For death, he stands, like baited bull at bay,
And flouts the Boers, that mad Majuba day.
He sees again the murderous Soudan,
Blood-slaked and rapine swept. He seems to stand
Upon the gory plain of Omdurman.
Then Magersfontein, and supreme command
Over his Highlanders. To shake his hand
A King is proud, and princes call him friend,
And glory crowns his life - and now the end.
The awful end. His eyes are dark with doom;
He hears the shrapnel shrieking overhead:
He sees the ravaged ranks, the flame-stabbed gloom.
Oh, to have fallen! the battle-field his bed,
With Wauchope and his glorious brother-dead.
Why was he saved for this, for this? And now
He raises the revolver to his brow.
*    *    *    *    *
In many a Highland home, framed with rude art,
You'll find his portrait, rough-hewn, stern and square:
It's graven in the Fuyam fellah's heart;
The Ghurka reads it at his evening prayer;
The raw lands know it, where the fierce suns glare;
The Dervish fears it. Honour to his name,
Who holds aloft the shield of England's fame.
Mourn for our hero, men of Northern race!
We do not know his sin; we only know
His sword was keen. He laughed death in the face,
And struck, for Empire's sake, a giant blow.
His arm was strong. Ah! well they learnt, the foe.
The echo of his deeds is ringing yet,
Will ring for aye. All else ... let us forget.
A Plan The Muses Entertained.
by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

A plan the Muses entertain'd
Methodically to impart
To Psyche the poetic art;
Prosaic-pure her soul remain'd.
No wondrous sounds escaped her lyre
E'en in the fairest Summer night;
But Amor came with glance of fire, 
The lesson soon was learn'd aright.
Epitaph On Benjamin Tremlyn, An Old Soldier, Buried In Bremhill Churchyard At The Age Of 92.
by William Lisle Bowles

A poor old soldier shall not lie unknown,
Without a verse, and this recording stone.
'Twas his in youth o'er distant lands to stray,
Danger and death companions of his way.
Here in his native village, drooping, age
Closed the lone evening of his pilgrimage.
Speak of the past, of names of high renown,
Or his brave comrades long to dust gone down,
His eye with instant animation glowed,
Though ninety winters on his head had snowed.
His country, whilst he lived, a boon supplied,
And faith her shield held o'er him when he died;
Hope, Christian, that his spirit lives with God,
And pluck the wild weeds from his lowly sod,
Where, dust to dust, beside the chancel's shade,
Till the last trumpet sounds, a brave man's bones are laid.
Miscellaneous Sonnets, 1842 - I - 'A Poet'! He Hath Put His Heart To School
by William Wordsworth

'A poet'! He hath put his heart to school,
Nor dares to move unpropped upon the staff
Which Art hath lodged within his hand must laugh
By precept only, and shed tears by rule.
Thy Art be Nature; the live current quaff,
And let the groveler sip his stagnant pool,
In fear that else, when Critics grave and cool
Have killed him, Scorn should write his epitaph.
How does the Meadow-flower its bloom unfold?
Because the lovely little flower is free
Down to its root, and, in that freedom, bold;
And so the grandeur of the Forest-tree
Comes not by casting in a formal mould,
But from its 'own' divine vitality.
Sonnet
by Alice Christiana Gertrude Thompson Meynell

A poet of one mood in all my lays,
Ranging all life to sing one only love,
Like a west wind across the world I move,
Sweeping my harp of floods mine own wild ways.
The countries change, but not the west-wind days
Which are my songs. My soft skies shine above,
And on all seas the colours of a dove,
And on all fields a flash of silver greys.
I make the whole world answer to my art
And sweet monotonous meanings. In your ears
I change not ever, bearing, for my part,
One thought that is the treasure of my years,
A small cloud full of rain upon my heart
And in mine arms, clasped, like a child in tears.
The Sun-Shower.
by George Parsons Lathrop

A penciled shade the sky doth sweep,
And transient glooms creep in to sleep
Amid the orchard;
Fantastic breezes pull the trees
Hither and yon, to vagaries
Of aspect tortured.
Then, like the downcast dreamy fringe
Of eyelids, when dim gates unhinge
That locked their tears,
Falls on the hills a mist of rain, - 
So faint, it seems to fade again;
Yet swiftly nears.
Now sparkles the air, all steely-bright,
With drops swept down in arrow-flight,
Keen, quivering lines.
Ceased in a breath the showery sound;
And teasingly, now, as I look around,
Sweet sunlight shines!
Primavera
by Paul Cameron Brown

A poem is perishable and,
like it,
so much of life is spent
in intervals -
the jarring second
regaining consciousness,
a post-mortem flick
of the lank equestrian eyelid
that signals morning's first crepuscular move.
... a little salad consciousness
about the tumescent room
with the sentient purr of a cat;
her musky oils
a green verdure
lapping primordial scent
to engross a little readiness
as the day progresses
to its Oedipal stage
and arrested development.
Pleasures of Fancy
by John Clare

A path, old tree, goes by thee crooking on,
And through this little gate that claps and bangs
Against thy rifted trunk, what steps hath gone?
Though but a lonely way, yet mystery hangs
Oer crowds of pastoral scenes recordless here.
The boy might climb the nest in thy young boughs
That's slept half an eternity; in fear
The herdsman may have left his startled cows
For shelter when heaven's thunder voice was near;
Here too the woodman on his wallet laid
For pillow may have slept an hour away;
And poet pastoral, lover of the shade,
Here sat and mused half some long summer day
While some old shepherd listened to the lay.
In Sight Of The Town Of Cockermouth
by William Wordsworth

A point of life between my Parent's dust,
And yours, my buried Little-ones! am I;
And to those graves looking habitually
In kindred quiet I repose my trust.
Death to the innocent is more than just,
And, to the sinner, mercifully bent;
So may I hope, if truly I repent
And meekly bear the ills which bear I must:
And You, my Offspring! that do still remain,
Yet may outstrip me in the appointed race,
If e'er, through fault of mine, in mutual pain
We breathed together for a moment's space,
The wrong, by love provoked, let love arraign,
And only love keep in your hearts a place.
The Victim
by Alfred Lord Tennyson

I.
A plague upon the people fell,
A famine after laid them low;
Then thorpe and byre arose in fire,
For on them brake the sudden foe;
So thick they died the people cried,
'The Gods are moved against the land.'
The Priest in horror about his altar
To Thor and Odin lifted a hand:
'Help us from famine
And plague and strife!
What would you have of us?
Human life?
Were it our nearest,
Were it our dearest,'
Answer, O answer!'
We give you his life.'
II.
But still the foeman spoil'd and burn'd,
And cattle died, and deer in wood,
And bird in air, and fishes turn'd
And whiten'd all the rolling flood;
And dead men lay all over the way,
Or down in a furrow scathed with flame;
And ever and aye the Priesthood moan'd,
Till at last it seem'd that an answer came:
'The King is happy
In child and wife;
Take you his dearest,
Give us a life.'
III.
The Priest went out by heath and hill;
The King was hunting in the wild;
They found the mother sitting still;
She cast her arms about the child.
The child was only eight summers old,
His beauty still with his years increased,
His face was ruddy, his hair was gold;
He seem'd a victim due to the priest.
The Priest beheld him,
And cried with joy,
'The Gods have answer'd;
We give them the boy.'
IV.
The King return'd from out the wild,
He bore but little game in hand;
The mother said, 'They have taken the child
To spill his blood and heal the land.
The land is sick, the people diseased,
And blight and famine on all the lea;
The holy Gods, they must be appeased,
So I pray you tell the truth to me.
They have taken our son,
They will have his life.
Is he your dearest?
Or I, the wife?'
V.
The King bent low, with hand on brow,
He stay'd his arms upon his knee:
'O wife, what use to answer now?
For now the Priest has judged for me.'
The King was shaken with holy fear;
'The Gods,' he said, 'would have chosen well;
Yet both are near, and both are dear,
And which the dearest I cannot tell!'
But the Priest was happy,
His victim won:
'We have his dearest,
His only son!'
VI.
The rites prepared, the victim bared,
The knife uprising toward the blow,
To the altar-stone she sprang alone:
'Me, not my darling, no!'
He caught her away with a sudden cry;
Suddenly from him brake his wife,
And shrieking, 'I am his dearest, I'
I am his dearest!' rush'd on the knife.
And the Priest was happy:
'O Father Odin,
We give you a life.
Which was his nearest?
Who was his dearest?
The Gods have answer'd;
We give them the wife!'
Lines On Methodist Union, September, 1883.
by James McIntyre

A pleasing sight to-day we see,
Four churches joined in harmony,
There difference was but trivial,
But strove each other to outrival.
In friendship now they do unite,
And Satan only they do fight,
And they'll plant churches in North West,
Where they can serve the Lord the best.
Lord Tennyson.
by Ramakrishna, T.

A poet of my native land has said -
The life the good and virtuous lead on earth
Is like the black-eyed maiden of the East,
Who paints the lids to look more bright and fair.
The eyes may smart and water, but withal
She loves to please them that behold her face.
E'en so, my Master, thine own life has been.
Thy songs have pleased the world, thy thoughts divine
Have purified, likewise ennobled man.
And what are they, those songs and thoughts divine,
But sad experience of thy life, dipt deep
In thine own tears, and traced on nature's page?
To please and teach the world for two dear ones
You mourned - a friend in youth, a son in age
'Tis said the life that gives one moment's joy
To one lone mortal is not lived in vain;
But lives like thine God grants as shining lights
That we in darkness Him aright may see.
Nay more, such lives the more by ills beset
Do shine the more and better teach His ways.
Alas! thou'rt gone that wert so kind to one
Obscure - a stranger in a distant land.
Accept from him this wreath uncouth of words
Which do but half express the grief he feels.
Help In Need.
by James McIntyre

A poor man's horse it ran away,
Soon man upon the roadside lay,
With his leg all badly broken,
Of sympathy some gave token.
One said your trouble grieves my heart,
But with his money would not part,
Another said, while heaving sighs,
It brings the tears into mine eyes.
But a good true hearted man,
His heart with kindness it o'er ran,
The poorest man among the three,
A pound he did contribute free.
Others gave in empty feeling,
But this poor man he did bring healing,
The giver only Lord doth prize,
Who helps afflicted for to rise.