DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Astrolabius (The Child Of Abelard And Heloise)
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

I wrenched from a passing comet in its flight,
By that great force of two mad hearts aflame,
A soul incarnate, back to earth you came,
To glow like star-dust for a little night.
Deep shadows hide you wholly from our sight;
The centuries leave nothing but your name,
Tinged with the lustre of a splendid shame,
That blazed oblivion with rebellious light.
The mighty passion that became your cause,
Still burns its lengthening path across the years;
We feel its raptures, and we see its tears
And ponder on its retributive laws.
Time keeps that deathless story ever new;
Yet finds no answer, when we ask of you.
II
At Argenteuil, I saw the lonely cell
Where Heloise dreamed through her broken rest,
That baby lips pulled at her undried breast.
It needed but my woman's heart to tell
Of those long vigils and the tears that fell
When aching arms reached out in fruitless quest,
As after flight, wings brood an empty nest.
(So well I know that sorrow, ah, so well.)
Across the centuries there comes no sound
Of that vast anguish; not one sigh or word
Or echo of the mother loss has stirred,
The sea of silence, lasting and profound.
Yet to each heart, that once has felt this grief,
Sad Memory restores Time's missing leaf.
III
But what of you?    Who took the mother's place
When sweet expanding love its object sought?
Was there a voice to tell her tragic lot,
And did you ever look upon her face?
Was yours a cloistered seeking after grace?
Or in the flame of adolescent thought
Were Abelard's departed passions caught
To burn again in you and leave their trace?
Conceived in nature's bold primordial way
(As in their revolutions, suns create),
You came to earth, a soul immaculate,
Baptized in fire, with some great part to play.
What was that part, and wherefore hid from us,
Immortal mystery, Astrolabius!
To A Poet Whose Verses I Had Read
by Victoria Mary Sackville-West

I would not venture to dispraise or praise.
Too well I know the indifference which bounds
A poet in the narrow working-grounds
Where he is blind and deaf in all his ways.
He must work out alone his path to glory;
A thousand breaths are fanning him along;
A thousand tears end in one little song,
A thousand conflicts in one little story;
A thousand notes swell to a single chord.
He cannot tell where his direction tends;
He strives unguided towards indefinite ends;
He is an ignorant though absolute lord.
Idle Fame
by John Clare

I would not wish the burning blaze
Of fame around a restless world,
The thunder and the storm of praise
In crowded tumults heard and hurled.
I would not be a flower to stand
The stare of every passer-bye;
But in some nook of fairyland,
Seen in the praise of beauty's eye.
His Wish To God.
by Robert Herrick

I would to God that mine old age might have
Before my last, but here a living grave,
Some one poor almshouse; there to lie, or stir
Ghostlike, as in my meaner sepulchre;
A little piggin and a pipkin by,
To hold things fitting my necessity,
Which rightly used, both in their time and place,
Might me excite to fore and after-grace.
Thy Cross, my Christ, fix'd 'fore mine eyes should be,
Not to adore that, but to worship Thee.
So, here the remnant of my days I'd spend,
Reading Thy Bible, and my Book; so end.
Carving A Name.
by Horatio Alger, Jr.

I wrote my name upon the sand,
And trusted it would stand for aye;
But, soon, alas! the refluent sea
Had washed my feeble lines away.
I carved my name upon the wood,
And, after years, returned again;
I missed the shadow of the tree
That stretched of old upon the plain.
To solid marble next, my name
I gave as a perpetual trust;
An earthquake rent it to its base,
And now it lies, o'erlaid with dust.
All these have failed. In wiser mood
I turn and ask myself, "What then?"
If I would have my name endure,
I'll write it on the hearts of men,
In characters of living light,
Of kindly deeds and actions wrought.
And these, beyond the touch of time,
Shall live immortal as my thought.
My Rest
by Joseph Horatio Chant

I would not cherish a wish or thought
Displeasing, Lord, to Thee;
Thy will is good, and with wisdom fraught,
And that suffices me.
I cannot alter a plan of Thine,
And would not if I could;
I acquiesce in the will divine,
And find my highest good.
At times my vessel drifts near the shore,
And the beacon lights expire,
The surf-capped waves swell more and more,
And threaten with ruin dire;
But only the surface sea is rough;
The ocean's depths are calm,
And a star affords me light enough,
The Star of Bethlehem.
And by its light I discern the sand
And rocks along the coast,
And turn away toward a fairer land,
And standing at my post,
I guide my bark thro' the tempest wild,
Borne on by wind and tide,
Till God receives His weak, erring child,
And shelters near His side.
"Lo, I come, O Lord, to do Thy will!"
Shines from my star divine,
And my heart cries out, "In me fulfill
Also, Thy wise design."
I would not alter a plan of thine
If I the power possessed;
My will is lost in the will divine,
'Tis here I find my rest.
Lines For An Album
by James Whitcomb Riley

I would not trace the hackneyed phrase
Of shallow words and empty praise,
And prate of "peace" till one might think
My foolish pen was drunk with ink.
Nor will I here the wish express
Of "lasting love and happiness,"
And "cloudless skies" - for after all
"Into each life some rain must fall."
- No.    Keep the empty page below,
In my remembrance, white as snow -
Nor sigh to know the secret prayer
My spirit hand has written there.
The Height Of The Ridiculous
by Oliver Wendell Holmes

I wrote some lines once on a time
In wondrous merry mood,
And thought, as usual, men would say
They were exceeding good.
They were so queer, so very queer,
I laughed as I would die;
Albeit, in the general way,
A sober man am I.
I called my servant, and he came;
How kind it was of him
To mind a slender man like me,
He of the mighty limb.
"These to the printer," I exclaimed,
And, in my humorous way,
I added, (as a trifling jest,)
"There'll be the devil to pay."
He took the paper, and I watched,
And saw him peep within;
At the first line he read, his face
Was all upon the grin.
He read the next; the grin grew broad,
And shot from ear to ear;
He read the third; a chuckling noise
I now began to hear.
The fourth; he broke into a roar;
The fifth; his waistband split;
The sixth; he burst five buttons off,
And tumbled in a fit.
Ten days and nights, with sleepless eye,
I watched that wretched man,
And since, I never dare to write
As funny as I can.
They Desire A Better Country
by Christina Georgina Rossetti

(Macmillan's Magazine, March 1869.)
I
I would not if I could undo my past,
Tho' for its sake my future is a blank;
My past, for which I have myself to thank,
For all its faults and follies first and last.
I would not cast anew the lot once cast,
Or launch a second ship for one that sank,
Or drug with sweets the bitterness I drank,
Or break by feasting my perpetual fast.
I would not if I could: for much more dear
Is one remembrance than a hundred joys,
More than a thousand hopes in jubilee;
Dearer the music of one tearful voice
That unforgotten calls and calls to me,
'Follow me here, rise up, and follow here.'
II
What seekest thou far in the unknown land?
In hope I follow joy gone on before,
In hope and fear persistent more and more,
As the dry desert lengthens out its sand.
Whilst day and night I carry in my hand
The golden key to ope the golden door
Of golden home; yet mine eye weepeth sore
For the long journey that must make no stand.
And who is this that veiled doth walk with thee?
Lo, this is Love that walketh at my right;
One exile holds us both, and we are bound
To selfsame home-joys in the land of light.
Weeping thou walkest with him; weepeth he? - 
Some sobbing weep, some weep and make no sound.
III
A dimness of a glory glimmers here
Thro' veils and distance from the space remote,
A faintest far vibration of a note
Reaches to us and seems to bring us near,
Causing our face to glow with braver cheer,
Making the serried mist to stand afloat,
Subduing langour with an antidote,
And strengthening love almost to cast out fear,
Till for one moment golden city walls
Rise looming on us, golden walls of home,
Light of our eyes until the darkness falls;
Then thro' the outer darkness burdensome
I hear again the tender voice that calls,
'Follow me hither, follow, rise, and come.'
His Wish To God
by Robert Herrick

I would to God, that mine old age might have
Before my last, but here a living grave;
Some one poor almshouse, there to lie, or stir,
Ghost-like, as in my meaner sepulchre;
A little piggin, and a pipkin by,
To hold things fitting my necessity,
Which, rightly us'd, both in their time and place,
Might me excite to fore, and after, grace.
Thy cross, my Christ, fix'd 'fore mine eyes should be,
Not to adore that, but to worship Thee.
So here the remnant of my days I'd spend,
Reading Thy bible, and my book; so end.
Memory
by John Clare

I would not that my memory all should die,
And pass away with every common lot:
I would not that my humble dust should lie
In quite a strange and unfrequented spot,
By all unheeded and by all forgot,
With nothing save the heedless winds to sigh,
And nothing but the dewy morn to weep
About my grave, far hid from the world's eye:
I fain would have some friend to wander nigh
And find a path to where my ashes sleep--
Not the cold heart that merely passes by,
To read who lies beneath, but such as keep
Past memories warm with deeds of other years,
And pay to friendship some few friendly tears.
Dedication - Songs Of Labor
by John Greenleaf Whittier

I would the gift I offer here
Might graces from thy favor take,
And, seen through Friendship's atmosphere,
On softened lines and coloring, wear
The unaccustomed light of beauty, for thy sake.
Few leaves of Fancy's spring remain:
But what I have I give to thee,
The o'er-sunned bloom of summer's plain,
And paler flowers, the latter rain
Calls from the westering slope of life's autumnal lea.
Above the fallen groves of green,
Where youth's enchanted forest stood,
Dry root and moss'd trunk between,
A sober after-growth is seen,
As springs the pine where falls the gay-leafed maple wood!
Yet birds will sing, and breezes play
Their leaf-harps in the sombre tree;
And through the bleak and wintry day
It keeps its steady green alway,
So, even my after-thoughts may have a charm for thee.
Art's perfect forms no moral need,
And beauty is its own excuse;
But for the dull and flowerless weed
Some healing virtue still must plead,
And the rough ore must find its honors in its use.
So haply these, my simple lays
Of homely toil, may serve to show
The orchard bloom and tasselled maize
That skirt and gladden duty's ways,
The unsung beauty hid life's common things below.
Haply from them the toiler, bent
Above his forge or plough, may gain,
A manlier spirit of content,
And feel that life is wisest spent
Where the strong working hand makes strong the working brain.
The doom which to the guilty pair
Without the walls of Eden came,
Transforming sinless ease to care
And rugged toil, no more shall bear
The burden of old crime, or mark of primal shame.
A blessing now, a curse no more;
Since He, whose name we breathe with awe,
The coarse mechanic vesture wore,
A poor man toiling with the poor,
In labor, as in prayer, fulfilling the same law
Triangular Trade
by Paul Cameron Brown

I would watch him lifting
another drink from the fridge,
joke about the connection
with a triangular trade -
bedroom to kitchen fridge,
then to the bathroom -
only to repeat the cycle
not knowing such comments
scratched his eyes
climbing through the window
for escape.
I Would not Live Alway.
by John Hartley

"I would not live alway,"
Why should I wish to stay,
Now, when grown old and grey,
Enduring slow decay?
When power to do has fled,
'Twere better to be dead - 
The tree that's ceased to bear,
Has no right to be there.
Who cares to keep a bird
Whose note is never heard?
Yet many things abound,
Encumbering the ground;
Useless, unsightly wrecks,
That only serve to vex
The sight of those who boast
All that those wrecks have lost.
If God gave me this life, - 
Now, when worn out with strife,
May I not give it back
And move from out the track?
This world is not for drones!
The right to live each owns;
But he to earn that right
Must work with all his might.
When power to do has fled,
'Twere better to be dead.
The dog has had its day; - 
"I would not live alway."
Impromptu,
by George W. Sands

On The Reception Of A Letter.
I would love to have thee near me,
But when I think how drear
Is each hope that used to cheer me,
I cease to wish thee here.
I know that thou, wouldst not shrink from
The storms that burst on me,
But the bitter chalice I drink from,
I will not pass to thee.
I would share the world with thee, were it
With all its pleasures mine,
But the sorrows which I inherit,
I never will make thine!
Spacially Jim
by Bessie Morgan

I wus mighty good-lookin' when I wus young,
Peert an' black-eyed an' slim,
With fellers a-courtin' me Sunday nights,
'Sp'cially Jim.
The likeliest one of 'em all wus he,
Chipper an' han'som' an' trim;
But I toss'd up my head, an' made fun o' the crowd,
'Sp'cially Jim.
I said I hadn't no 'pinion o' men
An' I wouldn't take stock in him!
But they kep' up a-comin' in spite o' my talk,
'Sp'cially Jim.
I got so tired o' havin' 'em roun'
('Sp'cially Jim!),
I made up my mind I'd settle down
An' take up with him;
So we was married one Sunday in church,
'Twas crowded full to the brim,
'Twas the only way to get rid of 'em all,
'Sp'cially Jim.
"Is It Hot Enough Fer You?"
by George W. Doneghy

I.
I wouldn't mind the weather much--I'd sizzle and I'd stew,
And do the very best I could the heat to struggle through,
If I could find some way, you know, the feller to eschew,
Who greets you with the chestnut phrase--
"IS IT HOT ENOUGH FER YOU?"
II.
The mercury might climb the tube and spill right out the top--
The sweat might ooze from every pore and off my carcass drop--
I wouldn't mind the heat at all, and keep my temper too,
If it wasn't for the cuss who says--
"IS IT HOT ENOUGH FER YOU?"
III.
The sun might shine his level best--the sky seem molten brass--
The heat might dry up every stream, and burn up all the grass--
The evening come without a breeze--the morning have no dew--
If it wasn't for the 'moke' who asks
"IS IT HOT ENOUGH FER YOU?"
I Would Live In Your Love
by Sara Teasdale

I would live in your love as the sea-grasses live in the sea,
Borne up by each wave as it passes, drawn down by each wave that recedes;
I would empty my soul of the dreams that have gathered in me,
I would beat with your heart as it beats, I would follow your soul
as it leads.
Don Rafael.
by Emma Lazarus

"I would not have," he said,
"Tears, nor the black pall, nor the wormy grave,
Grief's hideous panoply I would not have
Round me when I am dead.
"Music and flowers and light,
And choric dances to guitar and flute,
Be these around me when my lips are mute,
Mine eyes are sealed from sight.
"So let me lie one day,
One long, eternal day, in sunshine bathed,
In cerements of silken tissue swathed,
Smothered 'neath flowers of May.
"One perfect day of peace,
Or ere clean flame consume my fleshly veil,
My life - a gilded vapor - shall exhale,
Brief as a sigh - and cease.
"But ere the torch be laid
To my unshrinking limbs by some true hand,
Athwart the orange-fragrant laughing land,
Bring many a dark-eyed maid
"From the bright, sea-kissed town;
My beautiful, beloved enemies,
Gemmed as the dew, voluptuous as the breeze,
Each in her festal gown.
"All those through whom I learned
The sweet of folly and the pains of love,
My Rose, my Star, my Comforter, my Dove,
For whom, poor moth, I burned.
"Loves of a day, and hour,
Or passions (vowed eternal) of a year,
Though each be strange to each, to me all dear
As to the bee the flower.
"Around me they shall move
In languid contra dances, and shall shed
Their smiling eyebeams as I were not dead,
But quick to flash back love.
"Something not alien quite
To tender ruth, perchance their breast shall fill,
Seeing him that was so mobile grown so still,
The fiery-veined so white.
"And when the dance is o'er,
The pinched guitar, the smitten tambourine,
Have ceased their rhythmic beat, - oh, friends of mine,
On my rich bier, then pour
"The garlands that ye wear,
The happy rose that on your bosom breathes,
The fresh-culled clusters and the dewy wreaths
That crown your fragrant hair.
"Though blind, I still shall see,
Though dead, shall feel your presence and shall know,
I who was beauty's life-long slave, shall so
Win her in death to me.
"Thanks, sisters, and farewell!
Back to your joys.    My brother shall make room
For my tried sword upon the high-piled bloom,
And fire the pinnacle.
"My soul, pure flame, shall leap
To meet its parent essence once again
My body dust and ashes shall remain,
Tired heart and brain shall sleep.
"Life has one gate alone,
Obscure, beset with peril and fierce pain.
Large death has many portals to his fane,
Why choose we to make moan?
"Why dwell with worms and clay
When we may soar through air on wings of flame,
Dissolve to small, white dust our perfect frame,
And never know decay?
"A brother's pious hand
The pure, fire-winnowed ashes shall inurn,
And lay them in the orange grove where burn
Globed suns that scent the land.
"The leaf shall be more green,
Even for my dust - more snowy-soft the flower,
More juicy-sweet the fruit's live pulp - the bower
Richer that I have been.
"For I would not," he said,
"Tears and the black pall and the wormy grave,
Grief's hideous panoply I would not have
Round me when I am dead."
Hannah Armstrong
by Edgar Lee Masters

I wrote him a letter asking him for old times, sake
To discharge my sick boy from the army;
But maybe he couldn't read it.
Then I went to town and had James Garber,
Who wrote beautifully, write him a letter.
But maybe that was lost in the mails.
So I traveled all the way to Washington.
I was more than an hour finding the White House.
And when I found it they turned me away,
Hiding their smiles.
Then I thought: "Oh, well, he ain't the same as when I boarded him
And he and my husband worked together
And all of us called him Abe, there in Menard."
As a last attempt I turned to a guard and said:
"Please say it's old Aunt Hannah Armstrong
From Illinois, come to see him about her sick boy
In the army."
Well, just in a moment they let me in!
And when he saw me he broke in a laugh,
And dropped his business as president,
And wrote in his own hand Doug's discharge,
Talking the while of the early days,
And telling stories.
Serenade.
by Juliana Horatia Ewing

I would not have you wake for me,
Fair lady, though I love you!
And though the night is warm, and all
The stars are out above you;
And though the dew's so light it could
Not hurt your little feet,
And nightingales in yonder wood
Are singing passing sweet.
Yet may my plaintive strain unite
And mingle with your dreaming,
And through the visions of the night
Just interweave my seeming.
Yet no! sleep on with fancy free
In that untroubled breast;
No song of mine, no thought of me,
Deserves to break your rest!
Sonnet
by John Charles McNeill

I would that love were subject unto law!
Upon his person I should lay distraint
And force him thus to answer my complaint,
Which I, in well-considered counts, should draw.
Not free to fly, he needs must seek some flaw
To mar my pleading, though his heart were faint;
Declare his counsel to me, and acquaint
Himself with maxim, precedent, and saw.
Ah, I could win him with authorities,
If suing thus in such a sober court;
Could read him many an ancient rhym'd report
Of such sad cases, tears would fill his eyes
And he confess a judgment, or resort
To some well-pleasing terms of compromise!
I Would In That Sweet Bosom Be
by James Joyce

I would in that sweet bosom be
(O sweet it is and fair it is!)
Where no rude wind might visit me.
Because of sad austerities
I would in that sweet bosom be.
I would be ever in that heart
(O soft I knock and soft entreat her!)
Where only peace might be my part.
Austerities were all the sweeter
So I were ever in that heart.
Warrior's Longing
by Alfred Lichtenstein

I would like to lie in my bed
In a white shirt,
Wished the beard was gone,
The head combed.
The fingers were clean,
The nails also,
You, my tender woman,
Might provide peace.
A Wreath Of Flowers
by Alan L. Strang

Written for Decoration Day, May 30, 1918.
I wove me a wreath of flowers
To place in memories hall,
In honor of the brave and fearless men
Who had answered our country's call.
The men who had answered, and fought, and died
For the cause of freedom, our country's pride!
I wove me a wreath of flowers
With many a sigh and tear,
As a tribute to all the good and true
Who were given few honors here.
The man of humble piety
Who lived and died in obscurity.
A wreath of flowers, a little thing
For flowers wither and fade;
But the fragrance they shed is not soon forgot
By me, who the wreath has made.
So the virtues of those who have gone before,
Will always be treasured in memory's store.
To Mother
by Fay Inchfawn

I would that you should know,
Dear mother, that I love you -- love you so!
That I remember other days and years;
Remember childish joys and childish fears.
And this, because my baby's little hand
Opened my own heart's door and made me understand.
I wonder how you could
Be always kind and good!
So quick to hear; to tend
My smallest ills; to lend
Such sympathising ears
Swifter than ancient seer's.
I never yet knew hands so soft and kind,
Nor any cheek so smooth, nor any mind
So full of tender thoughts. . . . Dear mother, now
I think that I can guess a little how
You must have looked for some response, some sign,
That all my tiresome wayward heart was thine.
And sure it was! You were my first dear love!
You who first pointed me to God above;
You who seemed hearkening to my lightest word,
And in the dark night seasons always heard
When I came trembling, knocking at your door.
Forgive me, mother, if my whims outwore
Your patient heart. Or if in later days
I sought out foolish unfamiliar ways;
If ever, mother dear, I loosed my hold
Of your loved hand; or, headstrong, thought you cold,
Forgive me, mother! Oh, forgive me, dear!
I am come back at last -- you see me here,
Your loving child. . . . And, mother, on my knee
I pray that thus my child may think of me!
Song
by John Clare

I would not feign a single sigh
Nor weep a single tear for thee:
The soul within these orbs burns dry;
A desert spreads where love should be.
I would not be a worm to crawl
A writhing suppliant in thy way;
For love is life, is heaven, and all
The beams of an immortal day.
For sighs are idle things and vain,
And tears for idiots vainly fall.
I would not kiss thy face again
Nor round thy shining slippers crawl.
Love is the honey, not the bee,
Nor would I turn its sweets to gall
For all the beauty found in thee,
Thy lily neck, rose cheek, and all.
I would not feign a single tale
Thy kindness or thy love to seek;
Nor sigh for Jenny of the Vale,
Her ruby smile or rosy cheek.
I would not have a pain to own
For those dark curls and those bright eyes
A frowning lip, a heart of stone,
False love and folly I despise.
I Write About The Butterfly
by Louisa May Alcott

"I write about the butterfly,
It is a pretty thing;
And flies about like the birds,
But it does not sing.
"First it is a little grub,
And then it is a nice yellow cocoon,
And then the butterfly
Eats its way out soon.
"They live on dew and honey,
They do not have any hive,
They do not sting like wasps, and bees, and hornets,
And to be as good as they are we should strive.