DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Father And Son.
by Walter R. Cassels

The King call'd forth his first-born, and took him by the hand,
"Come! boy, and see the people you must soon command:
A bold and stalwart nation, dauntless in the fight,
Strong as an iron buckler to guard their monarch's right."
Then the trumpets sounded, and his vassals came,
Gather'd round his banner, loudly rang his name;
Clash'd their burnish'd targets, waved their flashing steel
A goodly gath'ring look'd they, arm'd from head to heel.
"Child! my heart beats proudly, now I feel a king,
As I look around me on this martial ring;
There I see the sinews that support a state,
There I see the strength that makes a monarch great.
Men whose life is glory--men whose death is fame,
Living still in story past the reach of shame."
Many years pass'd over--the old King was dead,
And his child, his first-born, reign'd in his stead.
Many years he reign'd, and upon his brow
Now the frost of age lay like the winter's snow.
So he took his son forth, as his father had,
"Come! and see thy people," said he to the lad.
And they rode together through the busy town:
Many a peaceful merchant passing up and down;
Loud the workman's hammer sounded through the air
Portly look'd the craftsmen, standing 'mid their ware;
And the sounds of labour, blent with cheerful song,
Told of peace and plenty as they rode along.
Smith and craftsman pausing, youth and smiling lass,
Trader, man and master, stood to see them pass,
With a bonnet lifted, and "God bless him!" said
By many a gentle bosom, many a reverend head.
So the father turn'd him to his son and cried,
"Are not these bold subjects worth a monarch's pride?
In their own free circles, by their quiet hearth,
Rearing him a bulwark steady as the Earth:
On their mighty anvils, with a giant's skill,
Bending stubborn iron to his lightest will:
Prosperous and happy, free in heart and soul,
These send forth my glory to the furthest Pole.
Where is there in story any fame above
That King's whose deeds are written in his people's love?"
The Parting (2)
by Anne Bronte

1
The lady of Alzerno's hall
Is waiting for her lord;
The blackbird's song, the cuckoo's call
No joy to her afford.
She smiles not at the summer's sun,
Nor at the winter's blast;
She mourns that she is still alone
Though three long years have passed.
2
I knew her when her eye was bright,
I knew her when her step was light
And blithesome as a mountain doe's,
And when her cheek was like the rose,
And when her voice was full and free,
And when her smile was sweet to see.
3
But now the lustre of her eye,
So dimmed with many a tear;
Her footstep's elasticity,
Is tamed with grief and fear;
The rose has left her hollow cheeks;
In low and mournful tone she speaks,
And when she smiles 'tis but a gleam
Of sunshine on a winter's day,
That faintly beams through dreary clouds,
And in a moment dies away.
It does not warm, it does not cheer,
It makes us sigh for summer days
When fields are green, and skies are clear,
And when the sun has kinder rays.
4
For three years she has waited there,
Still hoping for her lord's return,
But vainly she may hope and fear
And vainly watch and weep and mourn;
She may wait him till her hairs are grey,
And she may wear her life away,
But to his lady and his home
Her noble lord will never come.
5
'I wish I knew the worst,' she said,
'I wish I could despair.
These fruitless hopes, this constant dread,
Are more than I can bear!'
'Then do not hope and do not weep,
He loved thee faithfully,
And nothing short of death could keep
So true a heart from thee;
Eliza, he would never go,
And leave thee thus to mourn,
He must be dead, for death alone
Could hinder his return.'
6
'Twas thus I spoke because I felt
As if my heart would break,
To see her thus so slowly pining
For Alzerno's sake.
But more than that I would not tell,
Though all the while I knew so well
The time and nature of his death.
For when he drew his parting breath
His head was pillowed on my knee,
And his dark eyes were turned to me
With and agonised heart-breaking glance,
Until they saw me not
O, the look of a dying man
Can never be forgot!
Nursery Rhyme. VII. Historical
by Unknown

[From MS. Sloane, 1489, fol. 19, written in the time of Charles I.]
The king of France, and four thousand men,
They drew their swords, and put them up again.
Royal Sponsors
by Thomas Hardy

"The king and the queen will stand to the child;
'Twill be handed down in song;
And it's no more than their deserving,
With my lord so faithful at Court so long,
And so staunch and strong.
"O never before was known such a thing!
'Twill be a grand time for all;
And the beef will be a whole-roast bullock,
And the servants will have a feast in the hall,
And the ladies a ball.
"While from Jordan's stream by a traveller,
In a flagon of silver wrought,
And by caravan, stage-coach, wain, and waggon
A precious trickle has been brought,
Clear as when caught."
The morning came. To the park of the peer
The royal couple bore;
And the font was filled with the Jordan water,
And the household awaited their guests before
The carpeted door.
But when they went to the silk-lined cot
The child was found to have died.
"What's now to be done? We can disappoint not
The king and queen!" the family cried
With eyes spread wide.
"Even now they approach the chestnut-drive!
The service must be read."
"Well, since we can't christen the child alive,
By God we shall have to christen him dead!"
The marquis said.
Thus, breath-forsaken, a corpse was taken
To the private chapel - yea -
And the king knew not, nor the queen, God wot,
That they answered for one returned to clay
At the font that day.
Nursery Rhyme. X. Historical
by Unknown

[Another version. The nurse sings the first line, and repeats it, time after time, until the expectant little one asks, what next? Then comes the climax.]
The king of France, the king of France, with forty thousand men,
Oh, they all went up the hill, and so - came back again!
The Red King
by Charles Kingsley

The King was drinking in Malwood Hall,
There came in a monk before them all:
He thrust by squire, he thrust by knight,
Stood over against the dais aright;
And, 'The word of the Lord, thou cruel Red King,
The word of the Lord to thee I bring.
A grimly sweven I dreamt yestreen;
I saw thee lie under the hollins green,
And through thine heart an arrow keen;
And out of thy body a smoke did rise,
Which smirched the sunshine out of the skies:
So if thou God's anointed be
I rede thee unto thy soul thou see.
For mitre and pall thou hast y-sold,
False knight to Christ, for gain and gold;
And for this thy forest were digged down all,
Steading and hamlet and churches tall;
And Christes poor were ousten forth,
To beg their bread from south to north.
So tarry at home, and fast and pray,
Lest fiends hunt thee in the judgment-day.'
The monk he vanished where he stood;
King William sterte up wroth and wood;
Quod he, 'Fools' wits will jump together;
The Hampshire ale and the thunder weather
Have turned the brains for us both, I think;
And monks are curst when they fall to drink.
A lothly sweven I dreamt last night,
How there hoved anigh me a griesly knight,
Did smite me down to the pit of hell;
I shrieked and woke, so fast I fell.
There's Tyrrel as sour as I, perdie,
So he of you all shall hunt with me;
A grimly brace for a hart to see.'
The Red King down from Malwood came;
His heart with wine was all aflame,
His eyne were shotten, red as blood,
He rated and swore, wherever he rode.
They roused a hart, that grimly brace,
A hart of ten, a hart of grease,
Fled over against the kinges place.
The sun it blinded the kinges ee,
A fathom behind his hocks shot he:
'Shoot thou,' quod he, 'in the fiendes name,
To lose such a quarry were seven years' shame.'
And he hove up his hand to mark the game.
Tyrrel he shot full light, God wot;
For whether the saints they swerved the shot,
'Or whether by treason, men knowen not,
But under the arm, in a secret part,
The iron fled through the kinges heart.
The turf it squelched where the Red King fell;
And the fiends they carried his soul to hell,
Quod 'His master's name it hath sped him well.'
Tyrrel he smiled full grim that day,
Quod 'Shooting of kings is no bairns' play;'
And he smote in the spurs, and fled fast away.
As he pricked along by Fritham plain,
The green tufts flew behind like rain;
The waters were out, and over the sward:
He swam his horse like a stalwart lord:
Men clepen that water Tyrrel's ford.
By Rhinefield and by Osmondsleigh,
Through glade and furze brake fast drove he,
Until he heard the roaring sea;
Quod he, 'Those gay waves they call me.'
By Mary's grace a seely boat
On Christchurch bar did lie afloat;
He gave the shipmen mark and groat,
To ferry him over to Normandie,
And there he fell to sanctuarie;
God send his soul all bliss to see.
And fend our princes every one,
From foul mishap and trahison;
But kings that harrow Christian men
Shall England never bide again.
In the New Forest, 1847,
When The Ladies Come To The Shearing Shed
by Henry Lawson

'The ladies are coming,' the super says
To the shearers sweltering there,
And 'the ladies' means in the shearing shed:
'Don't cut 'em too bad. Don't swear.'
The ghost of a pause in the shed's rough heart,
And lower is bowed each head;
And nothing is heard, save a whispered word,
And the roar of the shearing-shed.
The tall, shy rouser has lost his wits,
And his limbs are all astray;
He leaves a fleece on the shearing-board,
And his broom in the shearer's way.
There's a curse in store for that jackaroo
As down by the wall he slants,
And the ringer bends with his legs askew
And wishes he'd 'patched them pants.'
They are girls from the city. (Our hearts rebel
As we squint at their dainty feet.)
And they gush and say in a girly way
That 'the dear little lambs' are 'sweet.'
And Bill, the ringer, who'd scorn the use
Of a childish word like 'damn,'
Would give a pound that his tongue were loose
As he tackles a lively lamb.
Swift thoughts of homes in the coastal towns,
Or rivers and waving grass,
And a weight on our hearts that we cannot define
That comes as the ladies pass.
But the rouser ventures a nervous dig
In the ribs of the next to him;
And Barcoo says to his pen-mate: 'Twig
'The style of the last un, Jim.'
Jim Moonlight gives her a careless glance,
Then he catches his breath with pain,
His strong hand shakes and the sunlights dance
As he bends to his work again.
But he's well disguised in a bristling beard,
Bronzed skin, and his shearer's dress;
And whatever Jim Moonlight hoped or feared
Were hard for his mates to guess.
Jim Moonlight, wiping his broad, white brow,
Explains, with a doleful smile:
'A stitch in the side,' and 'he's all right now',
But he leans on the beam awhile,
And gazes out in the blazing noon
On the clearing, brown and bare,
She has come and gone, like a breath of June,
In December's heat and glare.
The bushmen are big rough boys at the best,
With hearts of a larger growth;
But they hide those hearts with a brutal jest,
And the pain with a reckless oath.
Though the Bills and Jims of the bush-bard sing
Of their life loves, lost or dead,
The love of a girl is a sacred thing
Not voiced in a shearing-shed.
Nursery Rhyme. VIII. Historical
by Unknown

[In a tract, called 'Pigges Corantoe, or Newes from the North,' 4to Lond. 1642, p. 3, this is called "Old Tarlton's Song." It is perhaps a parody on the popular epigram of "Jack and Jill." I do not know the period of the battle to which it appears to allude, but Tarlton died in the year 1588, so that the rhyme must be earlier.]
The king of France went up the hill,
With twenty thousand men;
The king of France came down the hill,
And ne'er went up again.
Christmas Carol
by Sara Teasdale

The kings they came from out the south,
All dressed in ermine fine;
They bore Him gold and chrysoprase,
And gifts of precious wine.
The shepherds came from out the north,
Their coats were brown and old;
They brought Him little new-born lambs
They had not any gold.
The wise men came from out the east,
And they were wrapped in white;
The star that led them all the way
Did glorify the night.
The angels came from heaven high,
And they were clad with wings;
And lo, they brought a joyful song
The host of heaven sings.
The kings they knocked upon the door,
The wise men entered in,
The shepherds followed after them
To hear the song begin.
The angels sang through all the night
Until the rising sun,
But little Jesus fell asleep
Before the song was done.
The Lady Poverty
by Alice Christiana Gertrude Thompson Meynell

The Lady Poverty was fair:
But she has lost her looks of late,
With change of times and change of air.
Ah slattern, she neglects her hair,
Her gown, her shoes. She keeps no state
As once when her pure feet were bare.
Or - almost worse, if worse can be -
She scolds in parlours; dusts and trims,
Watches and counts. Oh, is this she
Whom Francis met, whose step was free,
Who with Obedience carolled hymns,
In Umbria walked with Chastity?
Where is her ladyhood? Not here,
Not among modern kinds of men;
But in the stony fields, where clear
Through the thin trees the skies appear;
In delicate spare soil and fen,
And slender landscape and austere.
Willie O' Winsbury
by Frank Sidgwick

The Text is from the Campbell MSS.
The Story was imagined by Kinloch to possess a quasi-historical foundation: James V. of Scotland, who eventually married Madeleine, elder daughter of Francis I., having been previously betrothed 'by treaty' to Marie de Bourbon, daughter of the Duke of Vend'me, returned to Scotland in 1537. The theory is neither probable nor plausible.
WILLIE O' WINSBURY
1.
The king he hath been a prisoner,
A prisoner lang in Spain, O,
And Willie o' the Winsbury
Has lain lang wi' his daughter at hame, O.
2.
'What aileth thee, my daughter Janet,
Ye look so pale and wan?
Have ye had any sore sickness,
Or have ye been lying wi' a man?
Or is it for me, your father dear,
And biding sae lang in Spain?'
3.
'I have not had any sore sickness,
Nor yet been lying wi' a man;
But it is for you, my father dear,
In biding sae lang in Spain.'
4.
'Cast ye off your berry-brown gown,
Stand straight upon the stone,
That I may ken ye by yere shape,
Whether ye be a maiden or none.'
5.
She's coosten off her berry-brown gown,
Stooden straight upo' yon stone;
Her apron was short, her haunches were round,
Her face it was pale and wan.
6.
'Is it to a man o' might, Janet?
Or is it to a man of fame?
Or is it to any of the rank robbers
That's lately come out o' Spain?'
7.
'It is not to a man of might,' she said,
'Nor is it to a man of fame;
But it is to William of Winsbury;
I could lye nae langer my lane.'
8.
The king's called on his merry men all,
By thirty and by three:
'Go fetch me William of Winsbury,
For hanged he shall be.'
9.
But when he cam' the king before,
He was clad o' the red silk;
His hair was like to threeds o' gold,
And his skin was as white as milk.
10.
'It is nae wonder,' said the king,
'That my daughter's love ye did win;
Had I been a woman, as I am a man,
My bedfellow ye should hae been.
11.
'Will ye marry my daughter Janet,
By the truth of thy right hand?
I'll gi'e ye gold, I'll gi'e ye money,
And I'll gi'e ye an earldom o' land.'
12.
'Yes, I'll marry yere daughter Janet,
By the truth of my right hand;
But I'll hae nane o' yer gold, I'll hae nane o' yer money,
Nor I winna hae an earldom o' land.
13.
'For I hae eighteen corn-mills
Runs all in water clear,
And there's as much corn in each o' them
As they can grind in a year.'
The Kine Of My Father
by Dora Sigerson Shorter

The kine of my rather, they are straying from my keeping;
The young goat's at mischief, but little can I do:
For all through the night did I hear the Banshee keening;
O youth of my loving, and is it well with you?
All through the night sat my mother with my sorrow;
'Whisht, it is the wind, O one childeen of my heart!'
My hair with the wind, and my two hands clasped in anguish;
Black head of my darling! too long are we apart.
Were your grave at my feet, I would think it half a blessing;
I could herd then the cattle, and drive the goats away;
Many a Paternoster I would say for your safe keeping;
I could sleep above your heart, until the dawn of day.
I see you on the prairie, hot with thirst and faint with hunger;
The head that I love lying low upon the sand.
The vultures shriek impatient, and the coyote dogs are howling,
Till the blood is pulsing cold within your clenching hand.
I see you on the waters, so white, so still forlorn,
Your dear eyes unclosing beneath a foreign rain:
A plaything of the winds, you turn and drift unceasing,
No grave for your resting; O mine the bitter pain!
All through the night did I hear the Banshee keening:
Somewhere you are dying, and nothing can I do;
My hair with the wind, and my two hands clasped in anguish;
Bitter is your trouble-and I am far from you.
In Memoriam. - Mr. John Warburton,
by Lydia Howard Sigourney

Died at Hartford, November, 1861.
The knot of crape upon yon stately door,
And sadness brooding o'er the sun-bright halls,
What do they signify?
Death hath been there
Where truth and goodness hand in hand with love
Walk'd for so many years.
Death hath been there,
To do mid flowing tears his mighty work,
Extinguishing the tyranny of pain
And taking the immortal essence home
Where it would be.
Yet is there left behind
A transcript that we cherish, and a chasm
We have no power to fill. Almost it seems
That we beheld him still, with quiet step
Moving among us, saintly and serene,
Clear-sighted, upright, held in high regard,
Yet meekly unambitious, seeking nought
Of windy honor from the mouth of men
But with the Gospel's perfect code content,
Breathing good-will to all.
Freely his wealth
Wrought blessed channels mid the sons of need,
Lending Philanthropy and Piety
A stronger impulse in their mission-course
To ameliorate and save.
So, thus intent
On higher deeds and aims than earth supplies,
An adept in that true philosophy
Learnt only in Christ's school, he calmly went
Unto his Master and the Class above.
Lines On the Burial of Mrs. Mary L. Ward, at Dale Cemetery, Sing-Sing, May 3, 1853.
by George Pope Morris

The knell was tolled--the requiem sung,
The solemn burial-service read;
And tributes from the heart and tongue
Were rendered to the dead.
The dead?--Religion answers, "No!
She is not dead--She can not die!
A mortal left this vale of wo!--
An angel lives on high!"
The earth upon her coffin-lid
Sounded a hollow, harsh adieu!
The mound arose, and she was hid
For ever from the view!
For ever?--Drearily the thought
Passed, like an ice-bolt, through the brain;
When Faith the recollection brought
That we shall meet again.
The mourners wound their silent way
Adown the mountain's gentle slope,
Which, basking in the smile of May,
Looked cheerfully as hope.
As hope?--What hope?--That boundless One
God in His love and mercy gave;
Which brightens, with salvation's sun,
The darkness of the grave.
The River Duddon - A Series Of Sonnets, 1820. - XXXI - The Kirk Of Ulpha To The Pilgrim's Eye
by William Wordsworth

The Kirk of Ulpha to the pilgrim's eye
Is welcome as a star, that doth present
Its shining forehead through the peaceful rent
Of a black cloud diffused o'er half the sky:
Or as a fruitful palm-tree towering high
O'er the parched waste beside an Arab's tent;
Or the Indian tree whose branches, downward bent,
Take root again, a boundless canopy.
How sweet were leisure! could it yield no more
Than 'mid that wave-washed Churchyard to recline,
From pastoral graves extracting thoughts divine;
Or there to pace, and mark the summits hoar
Of distant moonlit mountains faintly shine,
Soothed by the unseen River's gentle roar.
After an Epigram of Clement Marot
by Alan Seeger

The lad I was I longer now
Nor am nor shall be evermore.
Spring's lovely blossoms from my brow
Have shed their petals on the floor.
Thou, Love, hast been my lord, thy shrine
Above all gods' best served by me.
Dear Love, could life again be mine
How bettered should that service be!
Poems From "A Shropshire Lad" - XXIII
by Alfred Edward Housman

The lads in their hundreds to Ludlow come in for the fair,
There's men from the barn and the forge and the mill and the fold,
The lads for the girls and the lads for the liquor are there,
And there with the rest are the lads that will never be old.
There's chaps from the town and the field and the till and the cart,
And many to count are the stalwart, and many the brave,
And many the handsome of face and the handsome of heart,
And few that will carry their looks or their truth to the grave.
I wish one could know them, I wish there were tokens to tell
The fortunate fellows that now you can never discern;
And then one could talk with them friendly and wish them farewell
And watch them depart on the way that they will not return.
But now you may stare as you like and there's nothing to scan;
And brushing your elbow unguessed-at and not to be told
They carry back bright to the coiner the mintage of man,
The lads that will die in their glory and never be old.
Cur, Horse, And Shepherd's Dog.
by John Gay

The lad of mediocre spirit
Blurs not with modesty his merit.
On all exerting wit and tongue,
His rattling jokes, at random flung,
Bespatter widely friend and foe.
Too late the forward boy will know
That jokes are often paid in kind,
Or rankle longer in the mind.
A village cur, with treble throat,
Thought he owned music's purest note,
And on the highway lay, to show it
Or to philosopher or poet.
Soon as a roadster's trot was heard,
He rose, with nose and ears upreared;
As he passed by assailed his heels,
Nor left him till they reached the fields.
But, as it happened once, a pad,
Assailed by Master Snarl, like mad,
Flung out, and knocked him in the mire;
Nor did he stop to care, inquire,
If he had hurt him. On his way
Pad passed, and puppy bleeding lay.
A shepherd's dog, who saw him bleed,
Who hated Snarl and all his breed,
Said, "This was brought about by prate,
Which horses - even horses - hate!"
Epitaph On The Lady Mary Villiers
by Thomas Carew

The Lady Mary Villiers lies
Under this stone; with weeping eyes
The parents that first gave her birth,
And their sad friends, laid her in earth.
If any of them, Reader, were
Known unto thee, shed a tear;
Or if thyself possess a gem
As dear to thee, as this to them,
Though a stranger to this place,
Bewail in theirs thine own hard case:
For thou perhaps at thy return
May'st find thy Darling in an urn.
Sonnet LIII. Written In The Spring 1785 On The Death Of The Poet Laureat.
by Anna Seward

The knell of WHITEHEAD tolls! - his cares are past,
The hapless tribute of his purchas'd lays,
His servile, his Egyptian tasks of praise! - 
If not sublime his strains, Fame justly plac'd
Their power above their work. - Now, with wide gaze
Of much indignant wonder, she surveys
To the life-labouring oar assiduous haste
A glowing Bard, by every Muse embrac'd. - 
O, WARTON! chosen Priest of Phoebus' choir!
Shall thy rapt song be venal? hymn the THRONE,
Whether its edicts just applause inspire,
Or PATRIOT VIRTUE view them with a frown?
What needs for this the golden-stringed Lyre,
The snowy Tunic, and the Sun-bright Zone[1]!
1: Ensigns of Apollo's Priesthood.