DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Nightfall
by Walter De La Mare

The last light fails - that shallow pool of day!
The coursers of the dark stamp down to drink,
Arch their wild necks, lift their wild heads and neigh;
Their drivers, gathering at the water-brink,
With eyes ashine from out their clustering hair,
Utter their hollow speech, or gaze afar,
Rapt in irradiant reverie, to where
Languishes, lost in light, the evening star.
Come the wood-nymphs to dance within the glooms,
Calling these charioteers with timbrels' din;
Ashen with twilight the dark forest looms
O'er the nocturnal beasts that prowl within
"O glory of beauty which the world makes fair!"
Pant they their serenading on the air.
Sound the loud hooves, and all abroad the sky
The lusty charioteers their stations take;
Planet to planet do the sweet Loves fly,
And in the zenith silver music wake.
Cities of men, in blindness hidden low,
Fume their faint flames to that arched firmament,
But all the dwellers in the lonely know
The unearthly are abroad, and weary and spent,
With rush extinguished, to their dreaming go.
And world and night and star-enclustered space
The glory of beauty are in one enravished face.
Rain After A Vaudeville Show
by Stephen Vincent Benet

The last pose flickered, failed. The screen's dead white
Glared in a sudden flooding of harsh light
Stabbing the eyes; and as I stumbled out
The curtain rose. A fat girl with a pout
And legs like hams, began to sing "His Mother".
Gusts of bad air rose in a choking smother;
Smoke, the wet steam of clothes, the stench of plush,
Powder, cheap perfume, mingled in a rush.
I stepped into the lobby -- and stood still
Struck dumb by sudden beauty, body and will.
Cleanness and rapture -- excellence made plain --
The storming, thrashing arrows of the rain!
Pouring and dripping on the roofs and rods,
Smelling of woods and hills and fresh-turned sods,
Black on the sidewalks, gray in the far sky,
Crashing on thirsty panes, on gutters dry,
Hurrying the crowd to shelter, making fair
The streets, the houses, and the heat-soaked air, --
Merciful, holy, charging, sweeping, flashing,
It smote the soul with a most iron clashing!...
Like dragons' eyes the street-lamps suddenly gleamed,
Yellow and round and dim-low globes of flame.
And, scarce-perceived, the clouds' tall banners streamed.
Out of the petty wars, the daily shame,
Beauty strove suddenly, and rose, and flowered....
I gripped my coat and plunged where awnings lowered.
Made one with hissing blackness, caught, embraced,
By splendor and by striving and swift haste --
Spring coming in with thunderings and strife --
I stamped the ground in the strong joy of life!
My Lady's Law
by Rudyard Kipling

The Law whereby my lady moves
Was never Law to me,
But 'tis enough that she approves
Whatever Law it be.
For in that Law, and by that Law
My constant course I'll steer;
Not that I heed or deem it dread,
But that she holds it dear.
Tho' Asia sent for my content
Her richest argosies,
Those would    I spurn, and bid return,
If that should give her ease.
With equal heart I'd watch depart
Each spiced sail from sight;
Sans bitterness, desiring less
Great gear than her delight.
Though Kings made swift with many a gift
My proven sword to hire,
I would not go nor serve 'em so,
Except at her desire.
With even mind, I'd put behind
Adventure and acclaim,
And clean give o'er, esteeming more
Her favour than my fame.
Yet such am I, yea, such am I,
Sore bond and freest free,
The Law that sways my lady's ways
Is mystery to me!
A Comparison.
by William Cowper

The lapse of time and rivers is the same,
Both speed their journey with a restless stream;
The silent pace, with which they steal away,
No wealth can bribe, no prayers persuade to stay;
Alike irrevocable both when past,
And a wide ocean swallows both at last.
Though each resemble each in every part,
A difference strikes at length the musing heart;
Streams never flow in vain; where streams abound,
How laughs the land with various plenty crown'd!
But time, that should enrich the nobler mind,
Neglected, leaves a dreary waste behind.
My Lady's Grave
by Emily Bronte

The linnet in the rocky dells,
The moor-lark in the air,
The bee among the heather bells
That hide my lady fair:
The wild deer browse above her breast;
The wild birds raise their brood;
And they, her smiles of love caress'd,
Have left her solitude!
I ween that when the grave's dark wall
Did first her form retain,
They thought their hearts could ne'er recall
The light of joy again.
They thought the tide of grief would flow
Uncheck'd through future years;
But where is all their anguish now,
And where are all their tears?
Well, let them fight for honour's breath,
Or pleasure's shade pursue,
The dweller in the land of death
Is changed and careless too.
And if their eyes should watch and weep
Till sorrow's source were dry,
She would not, in her tranquil sleep,
Return a single sigh!
Blow, west wind, by the lonely mound:
And murmur, summer streams!
There is no need of other sound
To soothe my lady's dreams.
Epitaph In Old Mode
by John Collings Squire, Sir

The leaves fall gently on the grass,
And all the willow trees, and poplar trees, and elder trees
That bend above her where she sleeps,
O all the willow trees, the willow trees
Breathe sighs upon her tomb.
O pause and pity, as you pass,
She loved so tenderly, so quietly, so hopelessly;
And sometimes comes one here and weeps:
She loved so tenderly, so tenderly,
And never told them whom.
Disappointment.
by Sophie M. (Almon) Hensley

The light has left the hill-side. Yesterday
These skies shewed blue against the dusky trees,
The leaves' soft murmur in the evening breeze
Was music, and the waves danced in the bay.
Then was my heart, as ever, far away
With you, - and I could see you as one sees
A mirrored face, - and happiness and ease
And hope were mine, in spite of long delay.
After these months of waiting, this is all!
Hope, dead, lies coffined, shrouded in despair,
With all the blessings of the outer air
Forgot, 'neath the black covering of a pall.
Only the darkening of the woodland ways,
A heart's low moaning over wasted days.
A Night Scene.
by Walter R. Cassels

The lights have faded from the little casement,
As though her closing eyes had brought on night;
And now she dreams--Ah! dreams supremely bright,
While silence reigns around from roof to basement.
And slow the moon is mounting up the sky,
Drawing Heaven's myriads in her queenly train,
Flinging rich largesse, as she passes by,
Of beauty freely over hill and plain.
Around the lattice creep the pure white roses,
And one light bough rests gently on the pane,
The diamond pane, through which the angel train
Gaze on the sister saint who there reposes;
The moonlight silvers softly o'er it now;
And round the eaves the south wind whispers lowly,
Waving the leaves like curls on maiden's brow;
The peace and stillness make the place seem holy.
The little garden where she daily strays,
Sleeps like the precinct of a place enchanted;
And many a flower by her own dear hands planted,
Waves mystically 'neath the starry rays.
There is such strange still beauty in the spot,
That in the misty moonshine oft it seems
A vision that the waking eye sees not,
But some fair plesaunce blooming up in dreams.
The dew distill'd perfumes richly rise,
And float unseen about the silent air,
Breathing a balmy sweetness everywhere,
Like some blest secret fresh from Paradise;
Upon the soul dim thoughts of Eden press,
Within the stillness of this inner shrine,
Where Nature has unveil'd her loveliness,
And to the angels bared her soul divine.
There is no sound upon the ear of Night;
The distant watch-dog's bay hath sunk to rest;
The thrush is brooding o'er his quiet nest;
And the light clouds sweep on with noiseless flight.
O heart, why beat so wildly--she will hear,
And start from slumber in serene surprise--
Away! away! why longer linger here
To mar the silence with thy swelling sighs!
In Autumn
by Alice Christiana Thompson Meynell

The leaves are many under my feet,
And drift one way.
Their scent of death is weary and sweet.
A flight of them is in the grey
Where sky and forest meet.
The low winds moan for dead sweet years;
The birds sing all for pain,
Of a common thing, to weary ears,--
Only a summer's fate of rain,
And a woman's fate of tears.
I walk to love and life alone
Over these mournful places,
Across the summer overthrown,
The dead joys of these silent faces,
To claim my own.
I know his heart has beat to bright
Sweet loves gone by.
I know the leaves that die to-night
Once budded to the sky,
And I shall die from his delight.
O leaves, so quietly ending now,
You have heard cuckoos sing.
And I will grow upon my bough
If only for a Spring,
And fall when the rain is on my brow.
O tell me, tell me ere you die,
Is it worth the pain?
You bloomed so fair, you waved so high;
Now that the sad days wane,
Are you repenting where you lie?
I lie amongst you, and I kiss
Your fragrance mouldering.
O dead delights, is it such bliss,
That tuneful Spring?
Is love so sweet, that comes to this?
O dying blisses of the year,
I hear the young lambs bleat,
The clamouring birds i' the copse I hear,
I hear the waving wheat,
Together laid on a dead-leaf bier.
Kiss me again as I kiss you;
Kiss me again;
For all your tuneful nights of dew,
In this your time of rain,
For all your kisses when Spring was new.
You will not, broken hearts; let be.
I pass across your death
To a golden summer you shall not see,
And in your dying breath
There is no benison for me.
There is an autumn yet to wane,
There are leaves yet to fall,
Which, when I kiss, may kiss again,
And, pitied, pity me all for all,
And love me in mist and rain.
Naiad Trance
by Paul Cameron Brown

The leaves on their trumpet flames
Richter scale inside pulse stems - 
into the gorge, la gorge
throat and crevice
of the canyon arroyo.
Walking the slit
into rheumatism earth
the twilight pain
of Paleozoic ice,
Jurassic Age
whence rupture
sculpted rock
River precipice
the afternoon dangling like shadow
beside taiga sun
lost to dark & rain
toward the water now,
ever, and chemical rushing sound.
Chameleon, I would swear
this journey was that,
worse, sorceress on my emotions;
I left pathways contoured with Merlin rock
& trees like Babbitt refugees
from the Nahanni,
fearful Dogrib aboriginals
swarming my imagination
their scalp-locks loaded for bear.
Arabesque boulder,
lavender curls of winter-wind swept moss and
berets of tiny, dead soldiers. The
moisture between
you and clearing.
Hushed forest
an envelope edge
of moisture patterns,
more leaves
in reindeer formation
asserting themselves
in beckoning sleighs and
trance of veined, elfin hand
skirting cracks & fissure gloom.
A Line-Storm Song
by Robert Lee Frost

The line-storm clouds fly tattered and swift.
The road is forlorn all day,
Where a myriad snowy quartz stones lift,
And the hoof-prints vanish away.
The roadside flowers, too wet for the bee,
Expend their bloom in vain.
Come over the hills and far with me,
And be my love in the rain.
The birds have less to say for themselves
In the wood-world's torn despair
Than now these numberless years the elves,
Although they are no less there:
All song of the woods is crushed like some
Wild, earily shattered rose.
Come, be my love in the wet woods, come,
Where the boughs rain when it blows.
There is the gale to urge behind
And bruit our singing down,
And the shallow waters aflutter with wind
From which to gather your gown.
What matter if we go clear to the west,
And come not through dry-shod?
For wilding brooch shall wet your breast
The rain-fresh goldenrod.
Oh, never this whelming east wind swells
But it seems like the sea's return
To the ancient lands where it left the shells
Before the age of the fern;
And it seems like the time when after doubt
Our love came back amain.
Oh, come forth into the storm and rout
And be my love in the rain.
The Winding Stair And Other Poems
by William Butler Yeats

IN MEMORY OF EVA GORE-BOOTH AND CON MARKIEWICZ
The light of evening, Lissadell,
Great windows open to the south,
Two girls in silk kimonos, both
Beautiful, one a gazelle.
But a raving autumn shears
Blossom from the summer's wreath;
The older is condemned to death,
Pardoned, drags out lonely years
Conspiring among the ignorant.
I know not what the younger dreams --
Some vague Utopia -- and she seems,
When withered old and skeleton-gaunt,
An image of such politics.
Many a time I think to seek
One or the other out and speak
Of that old Georgian mansion, mix
pictures of the mind, recall
That table and the talk of youth,
Two girls in silk kimonos, both
Beautiful, one a gazelle.
Dear shadows, now you know it all,
All the folly of a fight
With a common wrong or right.
The innocent and the beautiful.
Have no enemy but time;
Arise and bid me strike a match
And strike another till time catch;
Should the conflagration climb,
Run till all the sages know.
We the great gazebo built,
They convicted us of guilt;
Bid me strike a match and blow.
The Lights Of New York
by Sara Teasdale

The lightning spun your garment for the night
Of silver filaments with fire shot thru,
A broidery of lamps that lit for you
The steadfast splendor of enduring light.
The moon drifts dimly in the heaven's height,
Watching with wonder how the earth she knew
That lay so long wrapped deep in dark and dew,
Should wear upon her breast a star so white.
The festivals of Babylon were dark
With flaring flambeaux that the wind blew down;
The Saturnalia were a wild boy's lark
With rain-quenched torches dripping thru the town
But you have found a god and filched from him
A fire that neither wind nor rain can dim.
The Morning Walk
by John Clare

The linnet sat upon its nest,
By gales of morning softly prest,
His green wing and his greener breast
Were damp with dews of morning:
The dog-rose near the oaktree grew,
Blush'd swelling 'neath a veil of dew,
A pink's nest to its prickles grew,
Right early in the morning.
The sunshine glittered gold, the while
A country maiden clomb the stile;
Her straw hat couldn't hide the smile
That blushed like early morning.
The lark, with feathers all wet through,
Looked up above the glassy dew,
And to the neighbouring corn-field flew,
Fanning the gales of morning.
In every bush was heard a song,
On each grass blade, the whole way long,
A silver shining drop there hung,
The milky dew of morning.
Where stepping-stones stride o'er the brook
The rosy maid I overtook.
How ruddy was her healthy look,
So early in the morning!
I took her by the well-turned arm,
And led her over field and farm,
And kissed her tender cheek so warm,
A rose in early morning.
The spiders' lacework shone like glass,
Tied up to flowers and cat-tail grass;
The dew-drops bounced before the lass,
Sprinkling the early morning.
Her dark curls fanned among the gales,
The skylark whistled o'er the vales,
I told her love's delightful tales
Among the dews of morning.
She crop't a flower, shook oft' the dew,
And on her breast the wild rose grew;
She blushed as fair, as lovely, too--
The living rose of morning.
The Young Novice.
by Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

The lights yet gleamed on the holy shrine, the incense hung around,
But the rites were o'er, the silent church re-echoed to no sound;
Yet kneeling there on the altar steps, absorbed in ardent prayer,
Is a girl, as seraph meek and pure - as seraph heav'nly fair.
The blue eyes, veiled by the lashes long that rest on that bright cheek
Are humbly bent, while the snow-white hands are clasped in fervor meek,
While in the classic lip and brow, each feature of that face,
And graceful high-bred air, is seen she comes of noble race.
But, say, what means that dusky robe, that dark and flowing veil,
The silver cross - oh! need we ask? they tell at once their tale:
They say that, following in the path that fair as she have trod,
She hath renounced a fleeting world, to give herself to God.
Her sinless heart to no gay son of this earth hath she given,
Her's is a higher, holier lot, to be the Bride of Heaven;
And the calm peace of the cloister's walls, abode of humble worth,
Is the fit home for that spotless dove, too fair, too pure for earth.
In Autumn
by Alice Christiana Gertrude Thompson Meynell

The leaves are many under my feet,
And drift one way.
Their scent of death is weary and sweet.
A flight of them is in the grey
Where sky and forest meet.
The low winds moan for dead sweet years;
The birds sing all for pain,
Of a common thing, to weary ears,-
Only a summer's fate of rain,
And a woman's fate of tears.
I walk to love and life alone
Over these mournful places,
Across the summer overthrown,
The dead joys of these silent faces,
To claim my own.
I know his heart has beat to bright
Sweet loves gone by.
I know the leaves that die to-night
Once budded to the sky,
And I shall die from his delight.
O leaves, so quietly ending now,
You have heard cuckoos sing.
And I will grow upon my bough
If only for a Spring,
And fall when the rain is on my brow.
O tell me, tell me ere you die,
Is it worth the pain?
You bloomed so fair, you waved so high;
Now that the sad days wane,
Are you repenting where you lie?
I lie amongst you, and I kiss
Your fragrance mouldering.
O dead delights, is it such bliss,
That tuneful Spring?
Is love so sweet, that comes to this?
O dying blisses of the year,
I hear the young lambs bleat,
The clamouring birds i' the copse I hear,
I hear the waving wheat,
Together laid on a dead-leaf bier.
Kiss me again as I kiss you;
Kiss me again;
For all your tuneful nights of dew,
In this your time of rain,
For all your kisses when Spring was new.
You will not, broken hearts; let be.
I pass across your death
To a golden summer you shall not see,
And in your dying breath
There is no benison for me.
There is an autumn yet to wane,
There are leaves yet to fall,
Which, when I kiss, may kiss again,
And, pitied, pity me all for all,
And love me in mist and rain.
Poem: Le Jardin
by Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde

The lily's withered chalice falls
Around its rod of dusty gold,
And from the beech-trees on the wold
The last wood-pigeon coos and calls.
The gaudy leonine sunflower
Hangs black and barren on its stalk,
And down the windy garden walk
The dead leaves scatter, hour by hour.
Pale privet-petals white as milk
Are blown into a snowy mass:
The roses lie upon the grass
Like little shreds of crimson silk.
Le Jardin
by Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde

The lily's withered chalice falls
Around its rod of dusty gold,
And from the beech-trees on the wold
The last wood-pigeon coos and calls.
The gaudy leonine sunflower
Hangs black and barren on its stalk,
And down the windy garden walk
The dead leaves scatter, - hour by hour.
Pale privet-petals white as milk
Are blown into a snowy mass:
The roses lie upon the grass
Like little shreds of crimson silk.
Sonnet.
by John Carr (Sir)

The leaves are flutter'd by no tell-tale gales,
Clear melts the azure in the rosy west,
Scarce heard, the river winds along the vales,
And Eve has lull'd the vocal grove to rest.
To yon thick elms, my Delia! let us rove,
As slow the glories of the day retire;
There to thy lute breathe dulcet notes of love,
While thro' the vale they linger and expire.
Those honey'd tones, that melt upon the tongue, - 
Thy looks, serener than the scenes I sing, - 
Thy chaste desires, which angels might have sung,
Alone can quiet in this bosom bring,
Which burns for thee, and, kindled by thine eyes,
Bears a pure flame - the flame that never dies!
The Child In The Story Awakes
by Walter De La Mare

The light of dawn rose on my dreams,
And from afar I seemed to hear
In sleep the mellow blackbird call
Hollow and sweet and clear.
I prythee, Nurse, my casement open,
Wildly the garden peals with singing,
And hooting through the dewy pines
The goblins all are winging.
O listen the droning of the bees,
That in the roses take delight!
And see a cloud stays in the blue
Like an angel still and bright.
The gentle sky is spread like silk,
And, Nurse, the moon doth languish there,
As if it were a perfect jewel
In the morning's soft-spun hair.
The greyness of the distant hills
Is silvered in the lucid East,
See, now the sheeny-plum'd cock
Wags haughtily his crest.
'O come you out, O come you out,
Lily, and lavender, and lime;
The kingcup swings his golden bell,
And plumpy cherries drum the time.
'O come you out, O come you out!
Roses, and dew, and mignonette,
The sun is in the steep blue sky,
Sweetly the morning star is set.'
Great Grief, Great Glory.
by Robert Herrick

The less our sorrows here and suff'rings cease,
The more our crowns of glory there increase.
Cunctation In Correction.
by Robert Herrick

The lictors bundled up their rods; beside,
Knit them with knots with much ado unti'd,
That if, unknitting, men would yet repent,
They might escape the lash of punishment.
Love And Liberty.
by Horace Smith

The linnet had flown from its cage away,
And flitted and sang in the light of day--
Had flown from the lady who loved it well,
In Liberty's freer air to dwell.
Alas! poor bird, it was soon to prove,
Sweeter than Liberty is Love.
When night came on it had ceased to sing,
And had hidden its head beneath its wing.
It thought of the warm room left behind,
The shelter from cold and rain and wind;
It could not sleep, when to sleep it strove--
Liberty needeth the help of Love.
The night owls shrieked as they wheeled along,
Bent upon slaughter, and rapine, and wrong:
There was devilish mirth in their wild halloo,
And the linnet trembled when near they drew;
'Twas fearful to watch them madly rove,
Drunken with Liberty, left of Love.
When morning broke, a grey old crow
Was pecking some carrion down below;
A poor little lamb, half alive, half-dead,
And the crow at each peck turned up its head
With a cunning glance at the linnet above--
What a demon is Liberty left of Love!
Then an eagle hovered far up in the sky,
And the linnet trembled, but could not fly;
With a swoop to the earth the eagle fell,
And rose up anon with a savage yell.
The birds in the woodlands dared not move.
What a despot is Liberty left of Love!
By and bye there arrived, with chattering loud,
Chaffinch and sparrow and finch, in a cloud;
Round and around in their fierce attack,
They plucked the feathers from breast and back;
And the poor little linnet all vainly strove,
Fighting with Liberty left of Love.
"Alas!" it said, with a cry of pain,
"Carry me back to my cage again;
There let me dwell in peaceful ease,
Piping whatever songs I please;
Here, if I stay, my death shall prove,
Liberty dieth left of Love."