DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Old Ireland
by Walt Whitman

Far hence, amid an isle of wondrous beauty,
Crouching over a grave, an ancient, sorrowful mother,
Once a queen - now lean and tatter'd, seated on the ground,
Her old white hair drooping dishevel'd round her shoulders;
At her feet fallen an unused royal harp,
Long silent - she too long silent - mourning her shrouded hope and heir;
Of all the earth her heart most full of sorrow, because most full of love.
Yet a word, ancient mother;
You need crouch there no longer on the cold ground, with forehead between your knees;
O you need not sit there, veil'd in your old white hair, so dishevel'd;
For know you, the one you mourn is not in that grave;
It was an illusion - the heir, the son you love, was not really dead;
The Lord is not dead - he is risen again, young and strong, in another country;
Even while you wept there by your fallen harp, by the grave,
What you wept for, was translated, pass'd from the grave,
The winds favor'd, and the sea sail'd it,
And now with rosy and new blood,
Moves to-day in a new country.
Poems From "A Shropshire Lad" - LVI - The Day Of Battle
by Alfred Edward Housman

"Far I hear the bugle blow
To call me where I would not go,
And the guns begin the song,
'Soldier, fly or stay for long.'"
"Comrade, if to turn and fly
Made a soldier never die,
Fly I would, for who would not?
'Tis sure no pleasure to be shot."
"But since the man that runs away
Lives to die another day,
And cowards' funerals, when they come
Are not wept so well at home."
"Therefore, though the best is bad,
Stand and do the best my lad;
Stand and fight and see your slain,
And take the bullet in your brain."
Song Of The Old Bullock-Driver
by Henry Lawson

Far back in the days when the blacks used to ramble
In long single file 'neath the evergreen tree,
The wool-teams in season came down from Coonamble,
And journeyed for weeks on their way to the sea,
'Twas then that our hearts and our sinews were stronger,
For those were the days when the bushman was bred.
We journeyed on roads that were rougher and longer
Than roads where the feet of our grandchildren tread.
With mates who have gone to the great Never-Never,
And mates whom I've not seen for many a day,
I camped on the banks of the Cudgegong River
And yarned at the fire by the old bullock-dray.
I would summon them back from the far Riverina,
From days that shall be from all others distinct,
And sing to the sound of an old concertina
Their rugged old songs where strange fancies were linked.
We never were lonely, for, camping together,
We yarned and we smoked the long evenings away,
And little I cared for the signs of the weather
When snug in my hammock slung under the dray.
We rose with the dawn, were it ever so chilly,
When yokes and tarpaulins were covered with frost,
And toasted the bacon and boiled the black billy,
Where high on the camp-fire the branches were tossed.
On flats where the air was suggestive of 'possums,
And homesteads and fences were hinting of change,
We saw the faint glimmer of appletree blossoms
And far in the distance the blue of the range;
And here in the rain, there was small use in flogging
The poor, tortured bullocks that tugged at the load,
When down to the axles the waggons were bogging
And traffic was making a marsh of the road.
'Twas hard on the beasts on the terrible pinches,
Where two teams of bullocks were yoked to a load,
And tugging and slipping, and moving by inches,
Half-way to the summit they clung to the road.
And then, when the last of the pinches was bested,
(You'll surely not say that a glass was a sin?)
The bullocks lay down 'neath the gum trees and rested,
The bullockies steered for the bar of the inn.
Then slowly we crawled by the trees that kept tally
Of miles that were passed on the long journey down.
We saw the wild beauty of Capertee Valley,
As slowly we rounded the base of the Crown.
But, ah! the poor bullocks were cruelly goaded
While climbing the hills from the flats and the vales;
'Twas here that the teams were so often unloaded
That all knew the meaning of counting your bales.'
And, oh! but the best-paying load that I carried
Was one to the run where my sweetheart was nurse.
We courted awhile, and agreed to get married,
And couple our futures for better or worse.
And as my old feet grew too weary to drag on
The miles of rough metal they met by the way,
My eldest grew up and I gave him the waggon,
He's plodding along by the bullocks to-day.
Dogtown
by Madison Julius Cawein

Far as the eye can see the land is grey,
And desolation sits among the stones
Looking on ruin who, from rocks like bones,
Stares with a dead face at the dying day.
Mounds, where the barberry and bay hold sway,
Show where homes rose once; where the village crones
Gossiped, and man, with many sighs and groans,
Laboured and loved and went its daily way.
Only the crow now, like a hag returned,
Croaks on the common that its hoarse voice mocks.
Meseems that here the sorrow of the earth
Has lost herself, and, with the past concerned,
Sits with the ghosts of dreams that haunt these rocks,
And old despairs to which man's soul gave birth.
Retirement.
by William Cowper

Far from the world, O Lord, I flee,
From strife and tumult far;
From scenes where Satan wages still
His most successful war.
The calm retreat, the silent shade,
With prayer and praise agree;
And seem by thy sweet bounty made
For those who follow thee.
There, if thy Spirit touch the soul,
And grace her mean abode,
Oh, with what peace, and joy, and love,
She communes with her God!
There like the nightingale she pours
Her solitary lays;
Nor asks a witness of her song,
Nor thirsts for human praise.
Author and Guardian of my life,
Sweet source of light divine,
And (all harmonious names in one)
My Saviour, thou art mine!
What thanks I owe thee, and what love,
A boundless, endless store,
Shall echo through the realms above
When time shall be no more.
The Pilot Of The Plains
by Emily Pauline Johnson

"False," they said, "thy Pale-face lover, from the land of waking morn;
Rise and wed thy Redskin wooer, nobler warrior ne'er was born;
Cease thy watching, cease thy dreaming,
Show the white thine Indian scorn."
Thus they taunted her, declaring, "He remembers naught of thee:
Likely some white maid he wooeth, far beyond the inland sea."
But she answered ever kindly,
"He will come again to me,"
Till the dusk of Indian summer crept athwart the western skies;
But a deeper dusk was burning in her dark and dreaming eyes,
As she scanned the rolling prairie,
Where the foothills fall, and rise.
Till the autumn came and vanished, till the season of the rains,
Till the western world lay fettered in midwinter's crystal chains,
Still she listened for his coming,
Still she watched the distant plains.
Then a night with nor'land tempest, nor'land snows a-swirling fast,
Out upon the pathless prairie came the Pale-face through the blast,
Calling, calling, "Yakonwita,
I am coming, love, at last."
Hovered night above, about him, dark its wings and cold and dread;
Never unto trail or tepee were his straying footsteps led;
Till benumbed, he sank, and pillowed
On the drifting snows his head,
Saying, "O! my Yakonwita call me, call me, be my guide
To the lodge beyond the prairie - for I vowed ere winter died
I would come again, beloved;
I would claim my Indian bride."
"Yakonwita, Yakonwita!" Oh, the dreariness that strains
Through the voice that calling, quivers, till a whisper but remains,
"Yakonwita, Yakonwita,
I am lost upon the plains."
But the Silent Spirit hushed him, lulled him as he cried anew,
"Save me, save me! O! beloved, I am Pale but I am true.
Yakonwita, Yakonwita,
I am dying, love, for you."
Leagues afar, across the prairie, she had risen from her bed,
Roused her kinsmen from their slumber: "He has come to-night," she said.
"I can hear him calling, calling;
But his voice is as the dead.
"Listen!" and they sate all silent, while the tempest louder grew,
And a spirit-voice called faintly, "I am dying, love, for you."
Then they wailed, "O! Yakonwita.
He was Pale, but he was true."
Wrapped she then her ermine round her, stepped without the tepee door,
Saying, "I must follow, follow, though he call for evermore,
Yakonwita, Yakonwita;"
And they never saw her more.
Late at night, say Indian hunters, when the starlight clouds or wanes,
Far away they see a maiden, misty as the autumn rains,
Guiding with her lamp of moonlight
Hunters lost upon the plains.
The Valley Of The Nile.
by Thomas Moore

Far as the sight can reach, beneath as clear
And blue a heaven as ever blest this sphere,
Gardens and pillared streets and porphyry domes
And high-built temples, fit to be the homes
Of mighty gods, and pyramids whose hour
Outlasts all time, above the waters tower!
Then, too, the scenes of pomp and joy that make
One theatre of this vast peopled lake,
Where all that Love, Religion, Commerce gives
Of life and motion, ever moves and lives,
Here, up in the steps of temples, from the wave
Ascending, in procession slow and grave,
Priests in white garments go, with sacred wands
And silver cymbals gleaming in their hands:
While there, rich barks--fresh from those sunny tracts
Far off, beyond the sounding cataracts--
Glide with their precious lading to the sea,
Plumes of bright birds, rhinoceros' ivory,
Gems from the isle of Mero', and those grains
Of gold, washed down by Abyssinian rains.
Here, where the waters wind into a bay
Shadowy and cool, some pilgrims on their way
To Sa's or Bubastus, among beds
Of lotos flowers that close above their heads,
Push their light barks, and hid as in a bower
Sing, talk, or sleep away the sultry hour,
While haply, not far off, beneath a bank
Of blossoming acacias, many a prank
Is played in the cool current by a train
Of laughing nymphs, lovely as she whose chain
Around two conquerors of the world was cast;
But, for a third too feeble, broke at last.
Martyrs Of Peace
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Fame writes ever its song and story,
For heroes of war, in letters of glory.
But where is the story and where is the song
For the heroes of peace and the martyrs of wrong?
They fight their battles in shop and mine;
They die at their posts and make no sign.
They herd like beasts in a slaughter pen;
They live like cattle and suffer like men.
Why, set by the horrors of such a life,
Like a merry-go-round seems the battle's strife,
And the open sea, and the open boat,
And the deadly cannon with bellowing throat.
Oh, what are they all, with death thrown in,
To the life that has nothing to lose or win - 
The life that has nothing to hope or gain
But ill-paid labour and beds of pain?
Fame, where is your story and where is your song
For the martyrs of peace and the victims of wrong?
Plus Ultra
by Algernon Charles Swinburne

Far beyond the sunrise and the sunset rises
Heaven, with worlds on worlds that lighten and respond:
Thought can see not thence the goal of hope's surmises
Far beyond.
Night and day have made an everlasting bond
Each with each to hide in yet more deep disguises
Truth, till souls of men that thirst for truth despond.
All that man in pride of spirit slights or prizes,
All the dreams that make him fearful, fain, or fond,
Fade at forethought's touch of life's unknown surprises
Far beyond.
A Morning Exercise
by William Wordsworth

Fancy, who leads the pastimes of the glad,
Full oft is pleased a wayward dart to throw;
Sending sad shadows after things not sad,
Peopling the harmless fields with signs of woe:
Beneath her sway, a simple forest cry
Becomes an echo of man's misery.
Blithe ravens croak of death; and when the owl
Tries his two voices for a favourite strain
'Tu-whit, Tu-whoo!' the unsuspecting fowl
Forebodes mishap or seems but to complain;
Fancy, intent to harass and annoy,
Can thus pervert the evidence of joy.
Through border wilds where naked Indians stray,
Myriads of notes attest her subtle skill;
A feathered task-master cries, "Work away!"
And, in thy iteration, "Whip poor will!"
Is heard the spirit of a toil-worn slave,
Lashed out of life, not quiet in the grave.
What wonder? at her bidding, ancient lays
Steeped in dire grief the voice of Philomel;
And that fleet messenger of summer days,
The Swallow, twittered subject to like spell;
But ne'er could Fancy bend the buoyant Lark
To melancholy service, hark! O hark!
The daisy sleeps upon the dewy lawn,
Not lifting yet the head that evening bowed;
But 'He' is risen, a later star of dawn,
Glittering and twinkling near yon rosy cloud;
Bright gem instinct with music, vocal spark;
The happiest bird that sprang out of the Ark!
Hail, blest above all kinds! Supremely skilled
Restless with fixed to balance, high with low,
Thou leav'st the halcyon free her hopes to build
On such forbearance as the deep may show;
Perpetual flight, unchecked by earthly ties,
Leav'st to the wandering bird of paradise.
Faithful, though swift as lightning, the meek dove;
Yet more hath Nature reconciled in thee;
So constant with thy downward eye of love,
Yet, in aerial singleness, so free;
So humble, yet so ready to rejoice
In power of wing and never-wearied voice.
To the last point of vision, and beyond,
Mount, daring warbler! that love-prompted strain,
('Twixt thee and thine a never-failing bond)
Thrills not the less the bosom of the plain:
Yet might'st thou seem, proud privilege! to sing
All independent of the leafy spring.
How would it please old Ocean to partake,
With sailors longing for a breeze in vain,
The harmony thy notes most gladly make
Where earth resembles most his own domain!
Urania's self might welcome with pleased ear
These matins mounting towards her native sphere.
Chanter by heaven attracted, whom no bars
To day-light known deter from that pursuit,
'Tis well that some sage instinct, when the stars
Come forth at evening, keeps Thee still and mute;
For not an eyelid could to sleep incline
Wert thou among them, singing as they shine!
Two Sonnets On Fame
by John Keats

I.
Fame, like a wayward girl, will still be coy
To those who woo her with too slavish knees,
But makes surrender to some thoughtless boy,
And dotes the more upon a heart at ease;
She is a Gypsy, will not speak to those
Who have not learnt to be content without her;
A Jilt, whose ear was never whisper'd close,
Who thinks they scandal her who talk about her;
A very Gypsy is she, Nilus-born,
Sister-in-law to jealous Potiphar;
Ye love-sick Bards! repay her scorn for scorn;
Ye Artists lovelorn! madmen that ye are!
Make your best bow to her and bid adieu,
Then, if she likes it, she will follow you.
II.
"You cannot eat your cake and have it too."
- Proverb.
How fever'd is the man, who cannot look
Upon his mortal days with temperate blood,
Who vexes all the leaves of his life's book,
And robs his fair name of its maidenhood;
It is as if the rose should pluck herself,
On the ripe plum finger its misty bloom,
As if a Naiad, like a meddling elf,
Should darken her pure grot with muddy gloom:
But the rose leaves herself upon the briar,
For winds to kiss and grateful bees to feed,
And the ripe plum still wears its dim attire,
The undisturbed lake has crystal space;
Why then should man, teasing the world for grace,
Spoil his salvation for a fierce miscreed?
The Favor Of The Muses.
by Friedrich Schiller

Fame with the vulgar expires; but, Muse immortal, thou bearest
Those whom thou lovest, who love thee, into Mnemosyne's arms.
Far Away
by Abram Joseph Ryan

"Far Away!" what does it mean?
A change of heart with a change of place?
When footsteps pass from scene to scene,
Fades soul from soul with face from face?
Are hearts the slaves or lords of space?
"Far Away!" what does it mean?
Does distance sever there from here?
Can leagues of land part hearts? -- I ween
They cannot; for the trickling tear
Says "Far Away" means "Far More Near".
"Far Away!" -- the mournful miles
Are but the mystery of space
That blends our sighs, but parts our smiles,
For love will find a meeting place
When face is farthest off from face.
"Far Away!" we meet in dreams,
As 'round the altar of the night
Far-parted stars send down their gleams
To meet in one embrace of light
And make the brow of darkness bright.
"Far Away!" we meet in tears,
That tell the path of weary feet;
And all the good-byes of the years
But make the wanderer's welcome sweet,
The rains of parted clouds thus meet.
"Far Away!" we meet in prayer,
You know the temple and the shrine;
Before it bows the brow of care,
Upon it tapers dimly shine;
'Tis mercy's home, and yours and mine.
"Far Away!" it falls between
What is to-day and what has been;
But ah! what is meet, what is not,
In every hour and every spot,
Where lips breathe on "I have forgot."
"Far Away!" there is no far!
Nor days nor distance e'er can bar
My spirit from your spirits -- nay,
Farewell may waft a face away,
But still with you my heart will stay.
"Far Away!" I sing its song,
But while the music moves along,
From out each word an echo clear
Falls trembling on my spirit's ear,
"Far Away" means "Far More Near".
The Nepean
by John Le Gay Brereton

Far down the reach a creeping mist
Hung dim along the mountain side;
On shadowed water, sleek and whist,
I let the lazy shallop glide.
The ripple scarcely cut the green
That edged the central path of grey.
I drew the oars, and, all unseen,
Gave reverent greeting to the day.
Naked I stood with arms outspread
That opened wide the gates of dream;
Then breathless bent my wondering head
And sprang to meet the silent stream.
I slid and floated like a seal,
And bade my senses revel free,
From cheek to footsole I could feel
Her soft cool hands caressing me.
A noise of tiny wavelets woke,
I quenched my drouth with delicate sips,
And, as I drank, the surface broke
In eager kisses on my lips.
The scented breath of morning turned
To incense as toward the west
At last, rock-altar'd, I discerned
The sunshine on the mountain crest.
That light of blessing from the sky
Made us the fuel of its blaze,
And fragrant bush and stream and I
Were one aspiring cry of praise.
Far, Far Away Is Mirth Withdrawn
by Emily Bronte

Far, far away is mirth withdrawn
'Tis three long hours before the morn
And I watch lonely, drearily
So come thou shade commune with me
Deserted one! thy corpse lies cold
And mingled with a foreign mould
Year after year the grass grows green
Above the dust where thou hast been.
I will not name thy blighted name
Tarnished by unforgotton shame
Though not because my bosom torn
Joins the mad world in all its scorn
Thy phantom face is dark with woe
Tears have left ghastly traces there,
Those ceaseless tears! I wish their flow
Could quench thy wild despair.
They deluge my heart like the rain
On cursed Gomorrah's howling plain
Yet when I hear thy foes deride
I must cling closely to thy side
Our mutual foes, they will not rest
From trampling on thy buried breast
Glutting there hatred with the doom
They picture thine, beyond the tomb
But God is not like human kind
Man cannot read the Almighty mind
Vengeance will never tortue they
Nor hunt thy soul eternally
Then do not in this night of grief
This time of over whelming fear
O do not think that God can leave
Forget, forsake, refuse to hear!
What have I dreamt? He lies asleep
With whom my heart would vainly weep
He rests - and I endure the woe
That left his spirit long ago
At Dawn.
by Madison Julius Cawein

Far off I heard dark waters rush;
The sky was cold; the dawn broke green;
And wrapped in twilight and strange hush
The gray wind moaned between.
A voice rang through the House of Sleep,
And through its halls there went a tread;
Mysterious raiment seemed to sweep
Around the pallid dead.
And then I knew that I had died,
I, who had suffered so and sinned - 
And 't was myself I stood beside
In the wild dawn and wind.
Marlena
by Herman Melville

Far off in the sea is Marlena,
A land of shades and streams,
A land of many delights,
Dark and bold, thy shores, Marlena;
But green, and timorous, thy soft knolls,
Crouching behind the woodlands.
All shady thy hills; all gleaming thy springs,
Like eyes in the earth looking at you.
How charming thy haunts, Marlena!--
Oh, the waters that flow through Onimoo;
Oh, the leaves that rustle through Ponoo:
Oh, the roses that blossom in Tarma.
Come, and see the valley of Vina:
How sweet, how sweet, the Isles from Hina:
'Tis aye afternoon of the full, full moon,
And ever the season of fruit,
And ever the hour of flowers,
And never the time of rains and gales,
All in and about Marlena.
Soft sigh the boughs in the stilly air,
Soft lap the beach the billows there;
And in the woods or by the streams,
You needs must nod in the Land of Dreams.
A Singing Lesson
by Algernon Charles Swinburne

Far-fetched and dear-bought, as the proverb rehearses,
Is good, or was held so, for ladies:    but nought
In a song can be good if the turn of the verse is
Far-fetched and dear-bought.
As the turn of a wave should it sound, and the thought
Ring smooth, and as light as the spray that disperses
Be the gleam of the words for the garb thereof wrought.
Let the soul in it shine through the sound as it pierces
Men's hearts with possession of music unsought;
For the bounties of song are no jealous god's mercies,
Far-fetched and dear-bought.
Fare Thee Well, Thou Lovely One! (Sicilian Air.)
by Thomas Moore

Fare thee well, thou lovely one!
Lovely still, but dear no more;
Once his soul of truth is gone,
Love's sweet life is o'er.
Thy words, what e'er their flattering spell,
Could scarce have thus deceived;
But eyes that acted truth so well
Were sure to be believed.
Then, fare thee well, thou lovely one!
Lovely still, but dear no more;
Once his soul of truth is gone,
Love's sweet life is o'er.
Yet those eyes look constant still,
True as stars they keep their light;
Still those cheeks their pledge fulfil
Of blushing always bright.
'Tis only on thy changeful heart
The blame of falsehood lies;
Love lives in every other part,
But there, alas! he dies.
Then, fare thee well, thou lovely one!
Lovely still, but dear no more;
Once his soul of truth is gone,
Love's sweet life is o'er.
Tom Deadlight
by Herman Melville

During a tempest encountered homeward-bound from the Mediterranean, a grizzled petty-officer, one of the two captains of the forecastle, dying at night in his hammock, swung in the sick-bay under the tiered gun-decks of the British Dreadnaught, 98, wandering in his mind, though with glimpses of sanity, and starting up at whiles, sings by snatches his good-bye and last injunctions to two messmates, his watchers, one of whom fans the fevered tar with the flap of his old sou'wester. Some names and phrases, with here and there a line, or part of one; these, in his aberration, wrested into incoherency from their original connection and import, he voluntarily derives, as he does the measure, from a famous old sea-ditty, whose cadences, long rife, and now humming in the collapsing brain, attune the last flutterings of distempered thought.
Farewell and adieu to you noble hearties,--
Farewell and adieu to you ladies of Spain,
For I've received orders for to sail for the Deadman,
But hope with the grand fleet to see you again.
I have hove my ship to, with main-top-sail aback, boys;
I have hove my ship to, for the strike soundings clear--
The black scud a'flying; but, by God's blessing, dam' me,
Right up the Channel for the Deadman I'll steer.
I have worried through the waters that are called the Doldrums,
And growled at Sargasso that clogs while ye grope--
Blast my eyes, but the light-ship is hid by the mist, lads:--
Flying Dutchman--odds bobbs--off the Cape of Good Hope!
But what's this I feel that is fanning my cheek, Matt?
The white goney's wing?--how she rolls!-- 't is the Cape!--
Give my kit to the mess, Jock, for kin none is mine, none;
And tell Holy Joe to avast with the crape.
Dead reckoning, says Joe, it won't do to go by;
But they doused all the glims, Matt, in sky t' other night.
Dead reckoning is good for to sail for the Deadman;
And Tom Deadlight he thinks it may reckon near right.
The signal!--it streams for the grand fleet to anchor.
The captains--the trumpets--the hullabaloo!
Stand by for blue-blazes, and mind your shank-painters,
For the Lord High Admiral, he's squinting at you!
But give me my tot, Matt, before I roll over;
Jock, let's have your flipper, it's good for to feel;
And don't sew me up without baccy in mouth, boys,
And don't blubber like lubbers when I turn up my keel.