DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
The Hidden Love
by Arthur Hugh Clough

O let me love my love unto myself alone,
And know my knowledge to the world unknown;
No witness to my vision call,
Beholding, unbeheld of all;
And worship Thee, with Thee withdrawn apart,
Whoe'er, Whate'er Thou art,
Within the closest veil of mine own inmost heart.
What is it then to me
If others are inquisitive to see?
Why should I quit my place to go and ask
If other men are working at their task?
Leave my own buried roots to go
And see that brother plants shall grow;
And turn away from Thee, O Thou most Holy Light,
To look if other orbs their orbits keep aright,
Around their proper sun,
Deserting Thee, and being undone.
O let me love my love unto myself alone,
And know my knowledge to the world unknown;
And worship Thee, O hid One, O much sought,
As but man can or ought,
Within the abstracted'st shrine of my least breathed-on thought.
Better it were, thou sayest, to consent;
Feast while we may, and live ere life be spent;
Close up clear eyes, and call the unstable sure,
The unlovely lovely, and the filthy pure;
In self-belyings, self-deceivings roll,
And lose in Action, Passion, Talk, the soul.
Nay, better far to mark off thus much air,
And call it Heaven: place bliss and glory there;
Fix perfect homes in the unsubstantial sky,
And say, what is not, will be by-and-bye.
O Lion, Grand
by Louisa May Alcott

"O lion, grand,
Come over the sand,
And help me now, I pray!
Here's a little lass,
Who wants to pass;
Please carry her on her way."
An Ode To Fortune
by Eugene Field

O Lady Fortune! 't is to thee I call,
Dwelling at Antium, thou hast power to crown
The veriest clod with riches and renown,
And change a triumph to a funeral
The tillers of the soil and they that vex the seas,
Confessing thee supreme, on bended knees
Invoke thee, all.
Of Dacian tribes, of roving Scythian bands,
Of cities, nations, lawless tyrants red
With guiltless blood, art thou the haunting dread;
Within thy path no human valor stands,
And, arbiter of empires, at thy frown
The sceptre, once supreme, slips surely down
From kingly hands.
Necessity precedes thee in thy way;
Hope fawns on thee, and Honor, too, is seen
Dancing attendance with obsequious mien;
But with what coward and abject dismay
The faithless crowd and treacherous wantons fly
When once their jars of luscious wine run dry,--
Such ingrates they!
Fortune, I call on thee to bless
Our king,--our C'sar girt for foreign wars!
Help him to heal these fratricidal scars
That speak degenerate shame and wickedness;
And forge anew our impious spears and swords,
Wherewith we may against barbarian hordes
Our Past redress!
from France: An Ode: (exerpt)
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

V
...
O Liberty! with profitless endeavour
Have I pursued thee, many a weary hour;
But thou nor swell'st the victor's strain, nor ever
Didst breathe thy soul in forms of human power.
Alike from all, howe'er they praise thee,
(Nor prayer, nor boastful name delays thee)
Alike from Priestcraft's harpy minions,
And factious Blasphemy's obscener slaves,
Thou speedest on thy subtle pinions,
The guide of homeless winds, and playmate of the waves!
And there I felt thee! on that sea-cliff's verge,
Whose pines, scarce travelled by the breeze above,
Had made one murmur with the distant surge!
Yes, while I stood and gazed, my temples bare,
And shot my being through earth, sea, and air,
Possessing all things with intensest love,
O Liberty! my spirit felt thee there.
His Repentance
by Isabella Augusta, Lady Gregory

O King who art in Heaven, I scream to Thee again and aloud, for it is Thy grace I am hoping for.
I am in age and my shape is withered; many a day I have been going astray. When I was young my deeds were evil; I delighted greatly in quarrels and rows. I liked much better to be playing or drinking on a Sunday morning than to be going to Mass. I was given to great oaths, and I did not let lust or drunkenness pass me by.
The day has stolen away and I have not raised the hedge, until the crop in which Thou didst take delight is destroyed. I am a worthless stake in the corner of a hedge, or I am like a boat that has lost its rudder, that would be broken against a rock in the sea, and that would be drowned in the cold waves.
Parthenope To Ulysses.
by Charles Hamilton Musgrove

O king! what is the quest that evermore
Foredooms thy feet to roam, yet blinds thine eyes?
Why seek ye still for life's imperfect prize,
Or turn thy weary sail from shore to shore,
When here thou layest aside the ills of yore
To calm thy soul with dreams? Let it suffice--
This heart-sick burden of the worldly-wise--
That ye have borne it and the task is o'er,
Here see the world fade like a spark of fire,
While all thy restless ways grow full of peace,
And wear the fittest crown for them that tire
Their souls with life's unraveled mysteries,--
Above the old red roses of desire
The languid lotus of desire's surcease!
Young Love XIII - Met Once More
by Richard Le Gallienne

O Lady, I have looked on thee once more,
Thou too hast looked on me, as thou hadst said,
And though the joy was pain, the pain was bliss,
Bliss that more happy lovers well may miss:
Captives feast richly on a little bread,
So are we very rich who are so poor.
The Beech Tree's Petition
by Thomas Campbell

O leave this barren spot to me!
Spare, woodman, spare the beechen tree!
Though bush or floweret never grow
My dark unwarming shade below;
Nor summer bud perfume the dew
Of rosy blush, or yellow hue;
Nor fruits of autumn, blossom-born,
My green and glossy leaves adorn;
Nor murmuring tribes from me derive
Th' ambrosial amber of the hive;
Yet leave this barren spot to me:
Spare, woodman, spare the beechen tree!
Thrice twenty summers I have seen
The sky grow bright, the forest green;
And many a wintry wind have stood
In bloomless, fruitless solitude,
Since childhood in my pleasant bower
First spent its sweet and sportive hour;
Since youthful lovers in my shade
Their vows of truth and rapture made,
And on my trunk's surviving frame
Carved many a long-forgotten name.
Oh! by the sighs of gentle sound,
First breathed upon this sacred ground;
By all that Love has whispered here,
Or Beauty heard with ravished ear;
As Love's own altar honor me:
Spare, woodman, spare the beechen tree!
Invocation.
by Madison Julius Cawein

I.
O Life! O Death! O God!
Have I not striven?
Have I not known thee, God,
As thy stars know Heaven?
Have I not held thee true,
True as thy deepest,
Sweet and immaculate blue,
Of nights that feel thy dew?
Have I not known thee true,
O God that keepest?
II.
O God, my father, God!
Didst give me fire
To rise above the clod,
And soar, aspire!
What tho' I strive and strive,
And all my life says live,
The sneerful scorn of men
But beats it down again;
And, O! sun-centered high,
O God! grand poet!
Beneath thy tender sky
Each day new Keatses die,
And thou dost know it!
III.
They know thee beautiful!
They know thee bitter!
And all their eyes are full,
O God! most beautiful!
Of tears that glitter.
Thou art above their tears;
Thou art beyond their years;
Thou sittest, God of Hosts,
Among thy glorious ghosts,
So high and holy;
And canst thou know the tears,
The strivings and the fears,
O God of godly peers!
Of such so lowly?
IV.
They who were fondly fain
To tell what mother pain
Of Nature makes the rain;
They who were glad to know
The sorrow of her snow,
Of her wild winds the woe;
The magic of her light,
The passion of her night,
And of her death the might;
They who had tears and sighs
For every bud that dies
While the dew on it lies;
They who had utterance for
Each warm, rose-hearted star
That stammers from afar;
The demon of vast seas,
The lips of lyric trees,
Lays of sonorous bees;
The fragrance-fays that dower
Each wildwood bosk and bower
With its faint musk of flower;
Of Time the feverish flight;
Earth, man, and, last, man's right
To thee, O Infinite!
Hymeneal Retrospections.
by Thomas Hood

O Kate! my dear Partner, through joy and through strife!
When I look back at Hymen's dear day,
Not a lovelier bride ever chang'd to a wife,
Though you're now so old, wizen'd, and gray!
Those eyes, then, were stars, shining rulers of fate!
But as liquid as stars in a pool;
Though now they're so dim, they appear, my dear Kate,
Just like gooseberries boil'd for a fool!
That brow was like marble, so smooth and so fair;
Though it's wrinkled so crookedly now,
As if time, when those furrows were made by the share,
Had been tipsy whilst driving his plough!
Your nose, it was such as the sculptors all chose,
When a Venus demanded their skill;
Though now it can hardly be reckon'd a nose,
But a sort of Poll-Parroty bill!
Your mouth, it was then quite a bait for the bees,
Such a nectar there hung on each lip;
Though now it has taken that lemon-like squeeze,
Not a blue-bottle comes for a sip!
Your chin, it was one of Love's favorite haunts,
From its dimple he could not get loose;
Though now the neat hand of a barber it wants,
Or a singe, like the breast of a goose!
How rich were those locks, so abundant and full,
With their ringlets of auburn so deep!
Though now they look only like frizzles of wool,
By a bramble torn off from a sheep!
That neck, not a swan could excel it in grace,
While in whiteness it vied with your arms;
Though now a grave 'kerchief you properly place,
To conceal that scrag-end of your charms!
Your figure was tall, then, and perfectly straight,
Though it now has two twists from upright - 
But bless you! still bless you! my Partner! my Kate!
Though you be such a perfect old fright!
O Lay Thy Loof In Mine, Lass.
by Robert Burns

Tune - "Cordwainer's March."
I.
O lay thy loof in mine, lass,
In mine, lass, in mine, lass;
And swear on thy white hand, lass,
That thou wilt be my ain.
A slave to love's unbounded sway,
He aft has wrought me meikle wae;
But now he is my deadly fae,
Unless thou be my ain.
II.
There's monie a lass has broke my rest,
That for a blink I hae lo'ed best;
But thou art queen within my breast,
For ever to remain.
O lay thy loof in mine, lass,
In mine, lass, in mine, lass;
And swear on thy white hand, lass,
That thou wilt be my ain.
The Long Ago.
by Jean Blewett

O life has its seasons joyous and drear,
Its summer sun and its winter snow,
But the fairest of all, I tell you, dear,
Was the sweet old spring of the long ago - 
The ever and ever so long ago - 
When we walked together among the flowers,
When the world with beauty was all aglow.
O the rain and dew! O the shine and showers
Of the sweet old spring of the long ago!
The ever and ever so long ago.
A hunger for all of the past delight
Is stirred by the winds that softly blow.
Can you spare me a thought from heaven to-night
For the sweet old spring of the long ago? - 
The ever and ever so long ago.
Immortality
by Joseph Addison

O Liberty! thou goddess, heavenly bright,
profuse of bliss and pregnant with delight,
Eternal pleasures in thy presence reign,
And smiling Plenty leads thy smiling train.
Eased of her load Subjection grows more light,
And Poverty looks cheerful in thy sight.
Giv'st beauty to the sun and pleasures to the day.
thee, goddess, thee, Britannia's isle adores!
How oft has she exhausted all her stores!
How oft on fields of death thy presence sought,
Nor thinks the mighty prize too dearly bought!
On foreign mountains may the sun refine
the grape's soft juice and mellow it in wine.
With citron groves adorn a distant soil.
And the fat olives swell with floods of oil.
We envy not the warmer clime, that lies
in ten degrees of more indulgent skies;
Nor at the coarseness of our heaven repine,
Though o'er our heads the frozen Pleiads shine.
'Tis Liberty that crowns Britannia's isle,
And makes her barren rocks and her bleak mountains shine
On Death.
by John Clare

O life, thy name to me's a galling sound,
A sound I fain would wish to breathe no more;
One only peace for me my hopes have found,
When thy existence and wild race is o'er;
When Death, with one, heals every other wound,
And lays my aching head in the cold ground.
O happy hour! I only wish to have
Another moment's gasp, and then the grave.
I only wish for one departing sigh,
A welcome farewel take of all, and die.
Thou'st given me little, world, for thanks' return,
Thou tempst me little with thee still to 'bide:
One only cause in leaving thee I mourn,--
That I had e'er been born, nor in the cradle died.
O Living Always - Always Dying
by Walt Whitman

O living always - always dying!
O the burials of me, past and present!
O me, while I stride ahead, material, visible, imperious as ever!
O me, what I was for years, now dead, (I lament not - I am content;)
O to disengage myself from those corpses of me, which I turn and look at, where I cast them!
To pass on, (O living! always living!) and leave the corpses behind!
Bess And Her Spinning-Wheel.
by Robert Burns

Tune - "The sweet lass that lo'es me."
I.
O leeze me on my spinning-wheel,
O leeze me on the rock and reel;
Frae tap to tae that cleeds me bien,
And haps me fiel and warm at e'en!
I'll set me down and sing and spin,
While laigh descends the simmer sun,
Blest wi' content, and milk and meal
O leeze me on my spinning-wheel!
II.
On ilka hand the burnies trot,
And meet below my theekit cot;
The scented birk and hawthorn white,
Across the pool their arms unite,
Alike to screen the birdie's nest,
And little fishes' caller rest:
The sun blinks kindly in the biel',
Where blithe I turn my spinning-wheel.
III.
On lofty aiks the cushats wail,
And Echo cons the doolfu' tale;
The lintwhites in the hazel braes,
Delighted, rival ither's lays:
The craik amang the clover hay,
The paitrick whirrin o'er the ley,
The swallow jinkin round my shiel,
Amuse me at my spinning-wheel.
IV.
Wi' sma' to sell, and less to buy,
Aboon distress, below envy,
O wha wad leave this humble state,
For a' the pride of a' the great?
Amid their flaring, idle toys,
Amid their cumbrous, dinsome joys,
Can they the peace and pleasure feel
Of Bessy at her spinning-wheel?
Pine Needles
by Clark Ashton Smith

O little lances, dipped in grey,
And set in order straight and clean,
How delicately clear and keen
Your points against the sapphire day!
Attesting Nature's perfect art
Ye fringe the limpid firmament,
O little lances, keenly sent
To pierce with beauty to the heart!
The Spider And The Swallow.
by Jean de La Fontaine

[1]
'O Jupiter, whose fruitful brain,
By odd obstetrics freed from pain,
Bore Pallas,[2] erst my mortal foe,[3]
Pray listen to my tale of woe.
This Progne[4] takes my lawful prey.
As through the air she cuts her way,
And skims the waves in seeming play.
My flies she catches from my door, - 
'Yes, mine - I emphasize the word, - 
And, but for this accursed bird,
My net would hold an ample store:
For I have woven it of stuff
To hold the strongest strong enough.'
'Twas thus, in terms of insolence,
Complain'd the fretful spider, once
Of palace-tapestry a weaver,
But then a spinster and deceiver,
That hoped within her toils to bring
Of insects all that ply the wing.
The sister swift of Philomel,
Intent on business, prosper'd well;
In spite of the complaining pest,
The insects carried to her nest - 
Nest pitiless to suffering flies - 
Mouths gaping aye, to gormandize,
Of young ones clamouring,
And stammering,
With unintelligible cries.
The spider, with but head and feet.
And powerless to compete
With wings so fleet,
Soon saw herself a prey.
The swallow, passing swiftly by,
Bore web and all away,
The spinster dangling in the sky!
Two tables hath our Maker set
For all that in this world are met.
To seats around the first
The skilful, vigilant, and strong are beckon'd:
Their hunger and their thirst
The rest must quell with leavings at the second.
George Brown.
by Kate Seymour Maclean

O Leader fallen by the wayside prone,--
O strong great soul gone forth
For thee the wide inhospitable north,
And east and west, from sea to sea make moan:
And thy loved land, whose stalwart limbs and brain,
Beneath thy fostering care have thriven and grown
To stately stature, and erect proud head,
Freedom and Right and Justice to maintain
Here in her place inviolate. Without stain
The name and fame which stood for thee in stead
Of titles and dominions: all men's praise,
And some men's hate thou had'st, yet all shall weep thee dead;
O Leader, fallen mid-march in the ways,
Who shall fill up the measure of thy days!
A Wooing Song.
by Rose Hawthorne Lathrop

O love, I come; thy last glance guideth me!
Drawn, too, by webs of shadow, like thine hair;
For, Sweet, the mystery
Of thy dark hair the deepening dusk hath caught.
In early moonlight gleamings, lo, I see
Thy white hands beckon to the garden, where
Dim day and silvery darkness are inwrought
As our two lives, where, joining soul with soul,
The tints shall mingle in a fairer whole.
Oh! dost thou hear? I call, beloved, I call,
My stout heart trembling till thy words return;
Hope-lifted, I float faster with the fall
Of fear toward joy such fear alone can earn!
The Magdalen At The Madonna's Shrine.
by Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

O Madonna, pure and holy,
From sin's dark stain ever free,
Refuge of the sinner lowly,
I come - I come to thee!
Now with wreaths of sinful pleasure
Yet my tresses twined among;
From the dance's giddy measure,
From the idle jest and song.
See! I tear away the flowers
From my perfumed golden hair,
Closely tended in past hours
With such jealous, sinful care;
Never more for me they blossom,
Not for me those jewels vain:
On my arms or brow or bosom,
They shall never shine again.
Dost thou wonder at my daring
Thus to seek thy sacred shrine,
When the sinner's lot despairing,
Wretched - hopeless - should be mine?
To the instincts high of woman
Most unfaithful and untrue;
Yet Madonna, hope inspires me,
For thou wast a woman too.
Evil promptings, dark-despairing,
Whisper: "Leave this sacred spot;
Back to sinful joys, repairing,
In them live and struggle not!"
But a bright hope tells that heaven
May by me e'en yet be won,
That I yet may be forgiven,
Mary, by thy spotless Son!
Yes! I look on thy mild features,
Full of dove-like, tender love - 
Once the humblest of God's creatures,
Now with Him enthroned above!
Every trait angelic breathing
Sweetest promises of peace;
And the smile thy soft lips wreathing
Tell me that my griefs shall cease.
Soft the evening shadows gather
But no longer shall I wait,
I will rise and seek the Father,
For it is not yet too late;
And when earthly cares oppress me,
When life's paths my bruised feet pain;
Hither shall I come to rest me,
And new strength and courage gain!
O Long The Way
by Morris Rosenfeld

O long the way and short the day,
No light in tower or town,
The waters roar and far the shore--
My ship, my ship goes down!
'Tis all in vain to strive again,
My cry the billows drown,
The fight is done, the wind has won--
My ship, my ship goes down!
Bright sun, adieu! Thou'lt shine anew
When skies no longer frown,
But I--the deafening billows crash--
My ship, my ship goes down!
A Prayer
by Paul Laurence Dunbar

O Lord, the hard-won miles
Have worn my stumbling feet:
Oh, soothe me with thy smiles,
And make my life complete.
The thorns were thick and keen
Where'er I trembling trod;
The way was long between
My wounded feet and God.
Where healing waters flow
Do thou my footsteps lead.
My heart is aching so;
Thy gracious balm I need.
By The Earth's Corpse
by Thomas Hardy

I
"O Lord, why grievest Thou? -
Since Life has ceased to be
Upon this globe, now cold
As lunar land and sea,
And humankind, and fowl, and fur
Are gone eternally,
All is the same to Thee as ere
They knew mortality."
II
"O Time," replied the Lord,
"Thou read'st me ill, I ween;
Were all THE SAME, I should not grieve
At that late earthly scene,
Now blestly past - though planned by me
With interest close and keen! -
Nay, nay: things now are NOT the same
As they have earlier been.
III
"Written indelibly
On my eternal mind
Are all the wrongs endured
By Earth's poor patient kind,
Which my too oft unconscious hand
Let enter undesigned.
No god can cancel deeds foredone,
Or thy old coils unwind!
IV
"As when, in Noe's days,
I whelmed the plains with sea,
So at this last, when flesh
And herb but fossils be,
And, all extinct, their piteous dust
Revolves obliviously,
That I made Earth, and life, and man,
It still repenteth me!"
Path Of Life. (From The Villager's Verse-Book.)
by William Lisle Bowles

O Lord, in sickness and in health,
To every lot resigned,
Grant me, before all worldly wealth,
A meek and thankful mind!
As, life, thy upland path we tread,
And often pause in vain,
To think of friends and parents dead,
Oh, let us not complain!
The Lord may give or take away,
But nought our faith can move,
Whilst we to heaven can look and say,
Our Father lives above.
Fatima
by Alfred Lord Tennyson

O love, Love, Love! O withering might!
O sun, that from thy noonday height
Shudderest when I strain my sight,
Throbbing thro' all thy heat and light,
Lo, falling from my constant mind,
Lo, parch'd and wither'd, deaf and blind,
I whirl like leaves in roaring wind.
Last night I wasted hateful hours
Below the city's eastern towers:
I thirsted for the brooks, the showers:
I roll'd among the tender flowers:
I crush'd them on my breast, my mouth;
I look'd athwart the burning drouth
Of that long desert to the south.
Last night, when some one spoke his name,
From my swift blood that went and came
A thousand little shafts of flame
Were shiver'd in my narrow frame.
O Love, O fire! once he drew
With one long kiss my whole soul thro'
My lips, as sunlight drinketh dew.
Before he mounts the hill, I know
He cometh quickly: from below
Sweet gales, as from deep gardens, blow
Before him, striking on my brow.
In my dry brain my spirit soon,
Down-deepening from swoon to swoon,
Faints like a daled morning moon.
The wind sounds like a silver wire,
And from beyond the noon a fire
Is pour'd upon the hills, and nigher
The skies stoop down in their desire;
And, isled in sudden seas of light,
My heart, pierced thro' with fierce delight,
Bursts into blossom in his sight.
My whole soul waiting silently,
All naked in a sultry sky,
Droops blinded with his shining eye:
I will possess him or will die.
I will grow round him in his place,
Grow, live, die looking on his face,
Die, dying clasp'd in his embrace.
Lovely Polly Stewart.
by Robert Burns

Tune - "Ye're welcome, Charlie Stewart."
I.
O lovely Polly Stewart!
O charming Polly Stewart!
There's not a flower that blooms in May
That's half so fair as thou art.
The flower it blaws, it fades and fa's,
And art can ne'er renew it;
But worth and truth eternal youth
Will give to Polly Stewart.
II.
May he whose arms shall fauld thy charms
Possess a leal and true heart;
To him be given to ken the heaven
He grasps in Polly Stewart.
O lovely Polly Stewart!
O charming Polly Stewart!
There's ne'er a flower that blooms in May
That's half so sweet as thou art.