DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Unrecorded.
by Fannie Isabelle Sherrick

The splendors of a southern sun
Caress the glowing sky;
O'er crested waves, the colors glance
And gleaming, softly die.
A gentle calm from heaven falls
And weaves a mystic spell;
A glowing grace that charms the soul--
Whose glory none can tell.
Oh, warm sweet treasures of a sun
Of endless fire and love;
Those dying embers are the flames
From heavenly fires above.
Unto the water's edge they creep
And bathe the seas in red;
Then die like shadows on the deep
With glory cold and dead.
A ship--a lone, dark wanderer
Upon the southern seas,
Speeds like a white-faced messenger
Before the dying breeze.
Her masts are tipped with amethyst,
A splendor all untold;
A crimson mantle wraps her round,
Her sails are made of gold.
The light wind dies--she slowly drifts,
Then stops--an idle thing;
While sunset clouds around her prow
A dreamy grandeur fling.
And eyes upon her deck look forth
With looks of longing pain;
A hundred sunsets they would give
Dear home to see again.
But see! a shadow as of night
Spreads o'er the crimson sky;
Like doomed and lifeless forms of earth
The clouds in heaven lie.
A silence falls--the ship stands still,
A fated thing of earth;
Then like a child of sin and wrong
The storm is given birth.
Oh! struggle well ye gallant crew
With storm and wind and wave;
For there are helpless women here
And children, too, to save.
Quick--sailors do your duty well--
And man the life-boats, too;
For soon the rocks will strand the ship,
And pierce her through and through.
See! like a woman turned to stone
A weeping mother stands;
Her heart seems like seems like some frozen thing--
She wrings her trembling hands;
Within her arms she holds a child
With frightened wond'ring eyes;
Below--the waters pitiless--
Above--the angry skies.
Beside her stands a fair young girl
With eyes that flash and quiver;
They are the only ones still left,
These three that moan and shiver.
But soon a voice shouts back the words--
Through all the deaf'ning roar:--
A strong hand grasps the trembling girl,
"There's room for just one more."
"Stay, stay," she cries with whitened face
"Why should I fear to die?
Oh, take this woman by my side,
Nor stay to question why.
She has a dear one 'mongst your crew,
She is a mother, too;
I am alone--I fear not death,
If this you'll only do."
The sailor grasped the mother's hand,
She turned and kissed the maid;
The tears of pity filled her eyes
Yet not one word she said.
The maiden stood with outstretched hands,
All hope indeed was gone;
And yet she stood with fearless heart,
Undaunted and alone.
"Oh, God, the heart that knows your love
Will never need to fear;
A priceless gem lies on my face,
The mother's grateful tear."
The lightnings swept across the ship,
The darkness wrapped her round;
Above the thunder of the storm,
There came no other sound.
The morning broke--the storm had fled,
The wreck was washed away;
And calmly now as yesterday
The sea in splendor lay.
The noble heart that throbbed with life
Lay fathoms deep below:
And what lies buried in that heart
The waves alone can know.
Love's Calendar
by Madison Julius Cawein

The spring may come in her pomp and splendor,
And Summer follow with rain and rose,
Or Fall lead in that old offender,
Winter, close-huddled up in snows:
Ever a-South the Love-wind blows
Into the heart, like a vane a-sway
From face to face of the girls it knows
But which is the fairest it 's hard to say.
If Lydia smile or Maud look tender,
Straight in your bosom the gladness glows;
But scarce at her side are you all surrender,
When Gertrude sings where the garden grows:
And your heart is a-bloom mid the blossoming rows,
For her hand to gather and toss away,
Or wear on her breast, as her fancy goes,
But which is the fairest it 's hard to say.
Let Helen pass, as a sapling slender,
Her cheek a berry, her mouth a rose,
Or Blanche or Laura to each you render
The worship due to the charms she shows:
But Ruth's a poem when these are prose;
Low at her feet your life you lay;
All of devotion to her it owes,
But which is the fairest it 's hard to say.
How can a man of his heart dispose
When Bess and Clara, and Kate and May
In form and feature no flaw disclose,
And which is the fairest it 's hard to say.
Summer Stillness
by Aldous Leonard Huxley

The stars are golden instants in the deep
Flawless expanse of night: the moon is set:
The river sleeps, entranced, a smooth cool sleep
Seeming so motionless that I forget
The hollow booming bridges, where it slides,
Dark with the sad looks that it bears along,
Towards a sea whose unreturning tides
Ravish the sighted ships and the sailors' song.
Fidele's Grassy Tomb
by Henry John Newbolt, Sir

The Squire sat propped in a pillowed chair,
His eyes were alive and clear of care,
But well he knew that the hour was come
To bid good-bye to his ancient home.
He looked on garden, wood, and hill,
He looked on the lake, sunny and still:
The last of earth that his eyes could see
Was the island church of Orchardleigh.
The last that his heart could understand
Was the touch of the tongue that licked his hand:
"Bury the dog at my feet," he said,
And his voice dropped, and the Squire was dead.
Now the dog was a hound of the Danish breed,
Staunch to love and strong at need:
He had dragged his master safe to shore
When the tide was ebbing at Elsinore.
From that day forth, as reason would,
He was named "Fidele," and made it good:
When the last of the mourners left the door
Fidele was dead on the chantry floor.
They buried him there at his master's feet,
And all that heard of it deemed it meet:
The story went the round for years,
Till it came at last to the Bishop's ears.
Bishop of Bath and Wells was he,
Lord of the lords of Orchardleigh;
And he wrote to the Parson the strongest screed
That Bishop may write or Parson read.
The sum of it was that a soulless hound
Was known to be buried in hallowed ground:
From scandal sore the Church to save
They must take the dog from his masters grave.
The heir was far in a foreign land,
The Parson was wax to my Lord's command:
He sent for the Sexton and bade him make
A lonely grave by the shore of the lake.
The Sexton sat by the water's brink
Where he used to sit when he used to think:
He reasoned slow, but he reasoned it out,
And his argument left him free from doubt.
"A Bishop," he said, "is the top of his trade:
But there's others can give him a start with the spade:
Yon dog, he carried the Squire ashore,
And a Christian couldn't ha' done no more.
The grave was dug; the mason came
And carved on stone Fidele's name;
But the dog that the Sexton laid inside
Was a dog that never had lived or died.
So the Parson was praised,and the scandal stayed,
Till, a long time after, the church decayed,
And, laying the floor anew, they found
In the tomb of the Squire the bones of a hound.
As for the Bishop of Bath and Wells
No more of him the story tells;
Doubtless he lived as a Prelate and Prince,
And died and was buried a century since.
And whether his view was right or wrong
Has little to do with this my song;
Something we owe him, you must allow;
And perhaps he has changed his mind by now.
The Squire in the family chantry sleeps,
The marble still his memory keeps:
Remember, when the name you spell,
There rest Fidele's bones as well.
For the Sexton's grave you need not search,
'Tis a nameless mound by the island church:
An ignorant fellow, of humble lot---
But. he knew one thing that a Bishop did not.
Why Spring Fell Flat
by Edward Dyson

The Spring is gone. I have not seen
Its fairies tripping on the Block,
Arcadians in grey and green,
The happy flapper in a frock
So dainty that the breezes fret
It like the smoke of cigarette.
I've seen no pixies of the pave
The season deck with flower and plume;
No slim, entrancing elves that wave
Their gossamers like wattle bloom;
But only staid, trim maids arrayed
In Autumn costumes tailor-made.
Not like a garden poppy strewn
And scented as an Eden fair
Has been the Block at afternoon.
So Spring came not to me this year.
Curse on the greedy profiteer
Who made the dear ones all too dear!
Young Lambs
by John Clare

The spring is coming by a many signs;
The trays are up, the hedges broken down,
That fenced the haystack, and the remnant shines
Like some old antique fragment weathered brown.
And where suns peep, in every sheltered place,
The little early buttercups unfold
A glittering star or two--till many trace
The edges of the blackthorn clumps in gold.
And then a little lamb bolts up behind
The hill and wags his tail to meet the yoe,
And then another, sheltered from the wind,
Lies all his length as dead--and lets me go
Close bye and never stirs but baking lies,
With legs stretched out as though he could not rise.
Early Love
by John Clare

The Spring of life is o'er with me,
And love and all gone by;
Like broken bough upon yon tree,
I'm left to fade and die.
Stern ruin seized my home and me,
And desolate's my cot:
Ruins of halls, the blasted tree,
Are emblems of my lot.
I lived and loved, I woo'd and won,
Her love was all to me,
But blight fell o'er that youthful one,
And like a blasted tree
I withered, till I all forgot
But Mary's smile on me;
She never lived where love was not,
And I from bonds was free.
The Spring it clothed the fields with pride,
When first we met together;
And then unknown to all beside
We loved in sunny weather;
We met where oaks grew overhead,
And whitethorns hung with may;
Wild thyme beneath her feet was spread,
And cows in quiet lay.
I thought her face was sweeter far
Than aught I'd seen before--
As simple as the cowslips are
Upon the rushy moor:
She seemed the muse of that sweet spot,
The lady of the plain,
And all was dull where she was not,
Till we met there again.
The Wandering Jew.
by James Whitcomb Riley

The stars are failing, and the sky
Is like a field of faded flowers;
The winds on weary wings go by;
The moon hides, and the temptest lowers;
And still through every clime and age
I wander on a pilgrimage
That all men know an idle quest,
For that the goal I seek is - REST!
I hear the voice of summer streams,
And, following, I find the brink
Of cooling springs, with childish dreams
Returning as I bend to drink - 
But suddenly, with startled eyes,
My face looks on its grim disguise
Of long gray beard; and so, distressed,
I hasten on, nor taste of rest.
I come upon a merry group
Of children in the dusky wood,
Who answer back the owlet's whoop,
That laughs as it had understood;
And I would pause a little space,
But that each happy blossom-face
Is like to one His hands have blessed
Who sent me forth in search of rest.
Sometimes I fain would stay my feet
In shady lanes, where huddled kine
Couch in the grasses cool and sweet,
And lift their patient eyes to mine;
But I, for thoughts that ever then
Go back to Bethlehem again,
Must needs fare on my weary quest,
And weep for very need of rest.
Is there no end?    I plead in vain:
Lost worlds nor living answer me.
Since Pontius Pilate's awful reign
Have I not passed eternity?
Have I not drank the fetid breath
Of every fevered phase of death,
And come unscathed through every pest
And scourge and plague that promised rest?
Have I not seen the stars go out
That shed their light o'er Galilee,
And mighty kingdoms tossed about
And crumbled clod-like in the sea?
Dead ashes of dead ages blow
And cover me like drifting snow,
And time laughs on as 'twere a jest
That I have any need of rest.
The Seasons of Love.
by George Pope Morris

The spring-time of love
Is both happy and gay,
For joy sprinkles blossoms
And balm in our way;
The sky, earth, and ocean,
In beauty repose,
And all the bright future
Is COLEUR DE ROSE.
The summer of love
Is the bloom of the heart,
When hill, grove, and valley,
Their music impart;
And the pure glow of heaven
Is seen in fond eyes,
As lakes show the rainbow
That's hung in the skies.
The autumn of love
Is the season of cheer--
Life's mild Indian summer,
The smile of the year!
Which comes when the golden
Ripe harvest is stored,
And yields its own blessings--
Repose and reward.
The winter of love
Is the beam that we win
While the storm scowls without,
From the sunshine within.
Love's reign is eternal--
The heart is his throne,
And he has all seasons
Of life for his own.
Rogue And Privateer
by Paul Cameron Brown

The Squirrel, a corsair,
rides the wind black arm
of a pressing sea,
Tribal hostilities finished,
she slinks into port.
Traveling lightly across open ground,
a squirrel upends a brigand sapling.
Grappling the ragged ends of a thicket
with riggings shredded by heavy wind and storm,
the arboreal sloop ascends to the highest mast;
a bush re-taken, the Crow's, Nest reconnointered.
Princess: A Medley: The Splendour Falls On Castle Walls
by Alfred Lord Tennyson

The splendour falls on castle walls
And snowy summits old in story:
The long light shakes across the lakes,
And the wild cataract leaps in glory.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.
O hark, O hear! how thin and clear,
And thinner, clearer, farther going!
O sweet and far from cliff and scar
The horns of Elfland faintly blowing!
Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying:
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.
O love, they die in yon rich sky,
They faint on hill or field or river:
Our echoes roll from soul to soul,
And grow for ever and for ever.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying,
And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dying, dying.
A Dream-Song
by George MacDonald

The stars are spinning their threads,
And the clouds are the dust that flies,
And the suns are weaving them up
For the day when the sleepers arise.
The ocean in music rolls,
The gems are turning to eyes,
And the trees are gathering souls
For the day when the sleepers arise.
The weepers are learning to smile,
And laughter to glean the sighs,
And hearts to bury their care and guile
For the day when the sleepers arise.
Oh, the dews and the moths and the daisy-red,
The larks and the glimmers and flows!
The lilies and sparrows and daily bread,
And the something that nobody knows!
The Dying Words of Stonewall Jackson.
by Sidney Lanier

"Order A. P. Hill to prepare for battle."
"Tell Major Hawks to advance the Commissary train."
"Let us cross the river and rest in the shade."
The stars of Night contain the glittering Day
And rain his glory down with sweeter grace
Upon the dark World's grand, enchanted face -
All loth to turn away.
And so the Day, about to yield his breath,
Utters the stars unto the listening Night,
To stand for burning fare-thee-wells of light
Said on the verge of death.
O hero-life that lit us like the sun!
O hero-words that glittered like the stars
And stood and shone above the gloomy wars
When the hero-life was done!
The phantoms of a battle came to dwell
I' the fitful vision of his dying eyes -
Yet even in battle-dreams, he sends supplies
To those he loved so well.
His army stands in battle-line arrayed:
His couriers fly: all's done: now God decide!
- And not till then saw he the Other Side
Or would accept the shade.
Thou Land whose sun is gone, thy stars remain!
Still shine the words that miniature his deeds.
O thrice-beloved, where'er thy great heart bleeds,
Solace hast thou for pain!
Georgia, September, 1865.
The Stranger
by Rudyard Kipling

The Stranger within my gate,
He may be true or kind,
But he does not talk my talk,
I cannot feel his mind.
I see the face and the eyes and the mouth,
But not the soul behind.
The men of my own stock,
They may do ill or well,
But they tell the lies I am wanted to,
They are used to the lies I tell;
And we do not need interpreters
When we go to buy or sell.
The Stranger within my gates,
He may be evil or good,
But I cannot tell what powers control,
What reasons sway his mood;
Nor when the Gods of his far-off land
Shall repossess his blood.
The men of my own stock,
Bitter bad they may be,
But, at least, they hear the things I hear,
And see the things I see;
And whatever I think of them and their likes
They think of the likes of me.
This was my father's belief
And this is also mine:
Let the corn be all one sheaf,
And the grapes be all one vine,
Ere our children's teeth are set on edge
By bitter bread and wine.
The Destroyers
by Rudyard Kipling

The strength of twice three thousand horse
That seeks the single goal;
The line that holds the rending course,
The hate that swings the whole;
The stripped hulls, slinking through the gloom,
At gaze and gone again,
The Brides of Death that wait the groom,
The Choosers of the Slain!
Offshore where sea and skyline blend
In rain, the daylight dies;
The sullen, shouldering swells attend
Night and our sacrifice.
Adown the stricken capes no flare,
No mark on spit or bar,,
Girdled and desperate we dare
The blindfold game of war.
Nearer the up-flung beams that spell
The council of our foes;
Clearer the barking guns that tell
Their scattered flank to close.
Sheer to the trap they crowd their way
From ports for this unbarred.
Quiet, and count our laden prey,
The convoy and her guard!
On shoal with scarce a foot below,
Where rock and islet throng,
Hidden and hushed we watch them throw
Their anxious lights along.
Not here, not here your danger lies,
(Stare hard, O hooded eyne!)
Save were the dazed rock-pigeons rise
The lit cliffs give no sign.
Therefore, to break the rest ye seek,
The Narrow Seas to clear,
Hark to the siren's whimpering shriek,
The driven death is here!
Look to your van a league away,,
What midnight terror stays
The bulk that checks against the spray
Her crackling tops ablaze?
Hit, and hard hit! The blow went home,
The muffled, knocking stroke,
The steam that overruns the foam,
The foam that thins to smoke,
The smoke that clokes the deep aboil,
The deep that chokes her throes
Till, streaked with ash and sleeked with oil,
The lukewarm whirlpools close!
A shadow down the sickened wave
Long since her slayer fled:
But hear their chattering quick-fires rave
Astern, abeam, ahead!
Panic that shells the drifting spar,
Loud waste with none to check,
Mad fear that rakes a scornful star
Or sweeps a consort's deck.
Now, while their silly smoke hangs thick,
Now ere their wits they find,
Lay in and lance them to the quick,
Our gallied whales are blind!
Good luck to those that see the end,
Good-bye to those that drown,
For each his chance as chance shall send,
And God for all! Shut down!
The strength of twice three thousand horse
That serve the one command;
The hand that heaves the headlong force,
The hate that backs the hand:
The doom-bolt in the darkness freed,
The mine that splits the main;
The white-hot wake, the 'wildering speed,
The Choosers of the Slain!
Calm After Storm.
by Giacomo Leopardi

The storm hath passed;
I hear the birds rejoice; the hen,
Returned into the road again,
Her cheerful notes repeats. The sky serene
Is, in the west, upon the mountain seen:
The country smiles; bright runs the silver stream.
Each heart is cheered; on every side revive
The sounds, the labors of the busy hive.
The workman gazes at the watery sky,
As standing at the door he sings,
His work in hand; the little wife goes forth,
And in her pail the gathered rain-drops brings;
The vendor of his wares, from lane to lane,
Begins his daily cry again.
The sun returns, and with his smile illumes
The villas on the neighboring hills;
Through open terraces and balconies,
The genial light pervades the cheerful rooms;
And, on the highway, from afar are heard
The tinkling of the bells, the creaking wheels
Of waggoner, his journey who resumes.
Cheered is each heart.
Whene'er, as now, doth life appear
A thing so pleasant and so dear?
When, with such love,
Does man unto his books or work return?
Or on himself new tasks impose?
When is he less regardful of his woes?
O pleasure, born of pain!
O idle joy, and vain,
Fruit of the fear just passed, which shook
The wretch who life abhorred, yet dreaded death!
With which each neighbor held his breath,
Silent, and cold, and wan,
Affrighted sore to see
The lightnings, clouds, and winds arrayed,
To do us injury!
O Nature courteous!
These are thy boons to us,
These the delights to mortals given!
Escape from pain, best gift of heaven!
Thou scatterest sorrows with a bounteous hand;
Grief springs spontaneous;
If, by some monstrous growth, miraculous,
Pleasure at times is born of pain,
It is a precious gain!
O human race, unto the gods so dear!
Too happy, in a respite brief
From any grief!
Then only blessed,
When Death releases thee unto thy rest!
Nonentity
by D. H. Lawrence (David Herbert Richards)

The stars that open and shut
Fall on my shallow breast
Like stars on a pool.
The soft wind, blowing cool
Laps little crest after crest
Of ripples across my breast.
And dark grass under my feet
Seems to dabble in me
Like grass in a brook.
Oh, and it is sweet
To be all these things, not to be
Any more myself.
For look,
I am weary of myself!
The Pleasures of Imagination - The First Book - The Argument
by Mark Akenside

THE ARGUMENT. 
The subject proposed. Dedication. The ideas of the supreme being, the exemplars of all things. The variety of constitution in the minds of men; with its final cause. The general character of a fine imagination. All the immediate pleasures of the human imagination proceed either from greatness or beauty in external objects. The pleasure from greatness; with its final cause. The natural connection of beauty with truth and good. The different orders of beauty in different objects. The infinite and all-comprehending form of beauty, which belongs to the divine mind. The partial and artificial forms of beauty, which belong to inferior intellectual beings. The origin and general conduct of beauty in man. The subordination of local beauties to the beauty of the universe. Conclusion.
Elegant Morning
by Alfred Lichtenstein

The street looks like eternal Sunday.
Lightly summerhouse rests against summerhouse.
Chauffeurs wheel by grandly.
Three fine citizens glide by quietly.
A song flies coolly out a window.
From a distance the wind carries a child's shout.
And in front of the villa of a duke stands,
All dressed up, like a stiff doll,
In a brightly colored scarf, red as a poppy,
The royal Bavarian legal apprentice,
Doctor of Jurisprudence Kuno Kohn.
Song.
by Thomas Hood

The stars are with the voyager
Wherever he may sail;
The moon is constant to her time;
The sun will never fail;
But follow, follow round the world,
The green earth and the sea,
So love is with the lover's heart,
Wherever he may be.
Wherever he may be, the stars
Must daily lose their light;
The moon will veil her in the shade;
The sun will set at night.
The sun may set, but constant love
Will shine when he's away;
So that dull night is never night,
And day is brighter day.
Weary Will
by Banjo Paterson (Andrew Barton)

The strongest creature for his size
But least equipped for combat
That dwells beneath Australian skies
Is Weary Will the Wombat.
He digs his homestead underground,
He's neither shrewd nor clever;
For kangaroos can leap and bound
But wombats dig forever.
The boundary rider's netting fence
Excites his irritation;
It is to his untutored sense
His pet abomination.
And when to pass it he desires,
Upon his task he'll centre
And dig a hole beneath the wires
Through which the dingoes enter.
And when to block the hole they strain
With logs and stones and rubble,
Bill Wombat digs it out again
Without the slightest trouble.
The boundary rider bows to fate,
Admits he's made a blunder
And rigs a little swinging gate
To let Bill Wombat under.
So most contentedly he goes
Between his haunt and burrow:
He does the only thing he knows,
And does it very thorough.