DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Scots Prologue, For Mr. Sutherland's Benefit Night, Dumfries.
by Robert Burns

What needs this din about the town o' Lon'on,
How this new play an' that new sang is comin'?
Why is outlandish stuff sae meikle courted?
Does nonsense mend like whiskey, when imported?
Is there nae poet, burning keen for fame,
Will try to gie us songs and plays at hame?
For comedy abroad he need nae toil,
A fool and knave are plants of every soil;
Nor need he hunt as far as Rome and Greece
To gather matter for a serious piece;
There's themes enough in Caledonian story,
Would show the tragic muse in a' her glory.
Is there no daring bard will rise, and tell
How glorious Wallace stood, how hapless fell?
Where are the muses fled that could produce
A drama worthy o' the name o' Bruce;
How here, even here, he first unsheath'd the sword,
'Gainst mighty England and her guilty lord,
And after mony a bloody, deathless doing,
Wrench'd his dear country from the jaws of ruin?
O for a Shakspeare or an Otway scene,
To draw the lovely, hapless Scottish Queen!
Vain all th' omnipotence of female charms
'Gainst headlong, ruthless, mad Rebellion's arms.
She fell, but fell with spirit truly Roman,
To glut the vengeance of a rival woman;
A woman, tho' the phrase may seem uncivil,
As able and as cruel as the Devil!
One Douglas lives in Home's immortal page,
But Douglases were heroes every age:
And tho' your fathers, prodigal of life,
A Douglas follow'd to the martial strife,
Perhaps if bowls row right, and right succeeds,
Ye yet may follow where a Douglas leads!
As ye hae generous done, if a' the land
Would take the muses' servants by the hand;
Not only hear, but patronize, befriend them,
And where ye justly can commend, commend them;
And aiblins when they winna stand the test,
Wink hard, and say the folks hae done their best!
Would a' the land do this, then I'll be caution
Ye'll soon hae poets o' the Scottish nation,
Will gar fame blaw until her trumpet crack,
And warsle time, on' lay him on his back!
For us and for our stage should ony spier,
"Whose aught thae chiels maks a' this bustle here!"
My best leg foremost, I'll set up my brow,
We have the honour to belong to you!
We're your ain bairns, e'en guide us as ye like,
But like good withers, shore before ye strike.
And gratefu' still I hope ye'll ever find us,
For a' the patronage and meikle kindness
We've got frae a' professions, sets, and ranks:
God help us! we're but poor, ye'se get but thanks.
What Of The Darkness?
by Richard Le Gallienne

What of the darkness? Is it very fair?
Are there great calms and find ye silence there?
Like soft-shut lilies all your faces glow
With some strange peace our faces never know,
With some great faith our faces never dare.
Dwells it in Darkness? Do you find it there?
Is it a Bosom where tired heads may lie?
Is it a Mouth to kiss our weeping dry?
Is it a Hand to still the pulse's leap?
Is it a Voice that holds the runes of sleep?
Day shows us not such comfort anywhere.
Dwells it in Darkness? Do you find it there?
Out of the Day's deceiving light we call,
Day that shows man so great and God so small,
That hides the stars and magnifies the grass;
O is the Darkness too a lying glass,
Or, undistracted, do you find truth there?
What of the Darkness? Is it very fair?
Quite Forsaken
by D. H. Lawrence (David Herbert Richards)

What pain, to wake and miss you!
To wake with a tightened heart,
And mouth reaching forward to kiss you!
This then at last is the dawn, and the bell
Clanging at the farm! Such bewilderment
Comes with the sight of the room, I cannot tell.
It is raining. Down the half-obscure road
Four labourers pass with their scythes
Dejectedly; - a huntsman goes by with his load:
A gun, and a bunched-up deer, its four little feet
Clustered dead. - And this is the dawn
For which I wanted the night to retreat!
September 1913
by William Butler Yeats

What need you, being come to sense,
But fumble in a greasy till
And add the halfpence to the pence
And prayer to shivering prayer, until
You have dried the marrow from the bone;
For men were born to pray and save:
Romantic Ireland's dead and gone,
It's with O'Leary in the grave.
Yet they were of a different kind
The names that stilled your childish play,
They have gone about the world like wind,
But little time had they to pray
For whom the hangman's rope was spun,
And what, God help us, could they save:
Romantic Ireland's dead and gone,
It's with O'Leary in the grave.
Was it for this the wild geese spread
The grey wing upon every tide;
For this that all that blood was shed,
For this Edward Fitzgerald died,
And Robert Emmet and Wolfe Tone,
All that delirium of the brave;
Romantic Ireland's dead and gone,
It's with O'Leary in the grave.
Yet could we turn the years again,
And call those exiles as they were,
In all their loneliness and pain
You'd cry 'Some woman's yellow hair
Has maddened every mother's son':
They weighed so lightly what they gave,
But let them be, they're dead and gone,
They're with O'Leary in the grave.
Maiden Wishes.
by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

WHAT pleasure to me
A bridegroom would be!
When married we are,
They call us mamma.
No need then to sew,
To school we ne'er go;
Command uncontroll'd,
Have maids, whom to scold;
Choose clothes at our ease,
Of what tradesmen we please;
Walk freely about,
And go to each rout,
And unrestrained are
By papa or mamma.
Vain Questioning
by Walter De La Mare

What needest thou? - a few brief hours of rest
Wherein to seek thyself in thine own breast;
A transient silence wherein truth could say
Such was thy constant hope, and this thy way? - 
O burden of life that is
A livelong tangle of perplexities!
What seekest thou? - a truce from that thou art;
Some steadfast refuge from a fickle heart;
Still to be thou, and yet no thing of scorn,
To find no stay here, and yet not forlorn? - 
O riddle of life that is
An endless war 'twixt contrarieties.
Leave this vain questioning. Is not sweet the rose?
Sings not the wild bird ere to rest he goes?
Hath not in miracle brave June returned?
Burns not her beauty as of old it burned?
O foolish one to roam
So far in thine own mind away from home!
Where blooms the flower when her petals fade,
Where sleepeth echo by earth's music made,
Where all things transient to the changeless win,
There waits the peace thy spirit dwelleth in.
Composed on The Eve Of The Marriage Of A Friend In The Vale Of Grasmere
by William Wordsworth

What need of clamorous bells, or ribands gay,
These humble nuptials to proclaim or grace?
Angels of love, look down upon the place;
Shed on the chosen vale a sun-bright day!
Yet no proud gladness would the Bride display
Even for such promise: serious is her face,
Modest her mien; and she, whose thoughts keep pace
With gentleness, in that becoming way
Will thank you. Faultless does the Maid appear;
No disproportion in her soul, no strife:
But, when the closer view of wedded life
Hath shown that nothing human can be clear
From frailty, for that insight may the Wife
To her indulgent Lord become more dear.
To His Brother, Nicholas Herrick.
by Robert Herrick

What others have with cheapness seen and ease
In varnish'd maps, by th' help of compasses,
Or read in volumes and those books with all
Their large narrations incanonical,
Thou hast beheld those seas and countries far,
And tell'st to us what once they were, and are.
So that with bold truth thou can'st now relate
This kingdom's fortune, and that empire's fate:
Can'st talk to us of Sharon, where a spring
Of roses have an endless flourishing;
Of Sion, Sinai, Nebo, and with them
Make known to us the new Jerusalem;
The Mount of Olives, Calvary, and where
Is, and hast seen, thy Saviour's sepulchre.
So that the man that will but lay his ears
As inapostate to the thing he hears,
Shall by his hearing quickly come to see
The truth of travels less in books than thee.
Helen Of Tyre
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

What phantom is this that appears
Through the purple mist of the years,
Itself but a mist like these?
A woman of cloud and of fire;
It is she; it is Helen of Tyre,
The town in the midst of the seas.
O Tyre! in thy crowded streets
The phantom appears and retreats,
And the Israelites that sell
Thy lilies and lions of brass,
Look up as they see her pass,
And murmur "Jezebel!"
Then another phantom is seen
At her side, in a gray gabardine,
With beard that floats to his waist;
It is Simon Magus, the Seer;
He speaks, and she pauses to hear
The words he utters in haste.
He says: "From this evil fame,
From this life of sorrow and shame,
I will lift thee and make thee mine;
Thou hast been Queen Candace,
And Helen of Troy, and shalt be
The Intelligence Divine!"
Oh, sweet as the breath of morn,
To the fallen and forlorn
Are whispered words of praise;
For the famished heart believes
The falsehood that tempts and deceives,
And the promise that betrays.
So she follows from land to land
The wizard's beckoning hand,
As a leaf is blown by the gust,
Till she vanishes into night.
O reader, stoop down and write
With thy finger in the dust.
O town in the midst of the seas,
With thy rafts of cedar trees,
Thy merchandise and thy ships,
Thou, too, art become as naught,
A phantom, a shadow, a thought,
A name upon men's lips.
Pain And Time Strive Not.
by William Morris

What part of the dread eternity
Are those strange minutes that I gain,
Mazed with the doubt of love and pain,
When I thy delicate face may see,
A little while before farewell?
What share of the world's yearning-tide
That flash, when new day bare and white
Blots out my half-dream's faint delight,
And there is nothing by my side,
And well remembered is farewell?
What drop in the grey flood of tears
That time, when the long day toiled through,
Worn out, shows nought for me to do,
And nothing worth my labour bears
The longing of that last farewell?
What pity from the heavens above,
What heed from out eternity,
What word from the swift world for me?
Speak, heed, and pity, O tender love,
Who knew'st the days before farewell!
Women Useless.
by Robert Herrick

What need we marry women, when
Without their use we may have men,
And such as will in short time be
For murder fit, or mutiny?
As Cadmus once a new way found,
By throwing teeth into the ground;
From which poor seed, and rudely sown,
Sprung up a war-like nation:
So let us iron, silver, gold,
Brass, lead, or tin throw into th' mould;
And we shall see in little space
Rise up of men a fighting race.
If this can be, say then, what need
Have we of women or their seed?
Change Gives Content.
by Robert Herrick

What now we like anon we disapprove:
The new successor drives away old love.
Three Flower Petals.
by Archibald Lampman

What saw I yesterday walking apart
In a leafy place where the cattle wait?
Something to keep for a charm in my heart - 
A little sweet girl in a garden gate.
Laughing she lay in the gold sun's might,
And held for a target to shelter her,
In her little soft fingers, round and white,
The gold-rimmed face of a sunflower.
Laughing she lay on the stone that stands
For a rough-hewn step in that sunny place,
And her yellow hair hung down to her hands,
Shadowing over her dimpled face.
Her eyes like the blue of the sky, made dim
With the might of the sun that looked at her,
Shone laughing over the serried rim,
Golden set, of the sunflower.
Laughing, for token she gave to me
Three petals out of the sunflower; - 
When the petals are withered and gone, shall be
Three verses of mine for praise of her,
That a tender dream of her face may rise
And lighten me yet in another hour,
Of her sunny hair and her beautiful eyes,
Laughing over the gold sunflower.
Wasted Love
by Algernon Charles Swinburne

What shall be done for sorrow
With love whose race is run?
Where help is none to borrow,
What shall be done?
In vain his hands have spun
The web, or drawn the furrow:
No rest their toil hath won.
His task is all gone thorough,
And fruit thereof is none:
And who dare say to-morrow
What shall be done?
At Last
by Madison Julius Cawein

What shall be said to him,
Now he is dead?
Now that his eyes are dim,
Low lies his head?
What shall be said to him,
Now he is dead?
One word to whisper of
Low in his ear;
Sweet, but the one word "love"
Haply he'll hear.
One word to whisper of
Low in his ear.
What shall be given him,
Now he is dead?
Now that his eyes are dim,
Low lies his head?
What shall be given him,
Now he is dead?
Hope, that life long denied
Here to his heart,
Sweet, lay it now beside,
Never to part.
Hope, that life long denied
Here to his heart.
The House Of Dust: Part 03: 11: Conversation: Undertones
by Conrad Potter Aiken

What shall we talk of? Li Po? Hokusai?
You narrow your long dark eyes to fascinate me;
You smile a little. . . .Outside, the night goes by.
I walk alone in a forest of ghostly trees . . .
Your pale hands rest palm downwards on your knees.
'These lines, converging, they suggest such distance!
The soul is drawn away, beyond horizons.
Lured out to what? One dares not think.
Sometimes, I glimpse these infinite perspectives
In intimate talk (with such as you) and shrink . . .
'One feels so petty! One feels such, emptiness!'
You mimic horror, let fall your lifted hand,
And smile at me; with brooding tenderness . . .
Alone on darkened waters I fall and rise;
Slow waves above me break, faint waves of cries.
'And then these colors . . . but who would dare describe them?
This faint rose-coral pink . . this green, pistachio?
So insubstantial! Like the dim ghostly things
Two lovers find in love's still-twilight chambers . . .
Old peacock-fans, and fragrant silks, and rings . . .
'Rings, let us say, drawn from the hapless fingers
Of some great lady, many centuries nameless,
Or is that too sepulchral? dulled with dust;
And necklaces that crumble if you touch them;
And gold brocades that, breathed on, fall to rust.
'No, I am wrong . . . it is not these I sought for!
Why did they come to mind? You understand me,
You know these strange vagaries of the brain!'
I walk alone in a forest of ghostly trees;
Your pale hands rest palm downwards on your knees;
These strange vagaries of yours are all too plain.
'But why perplex ourselves with tedious problems
Of art or . . . such things? . . . while we sit here, living,
With all that's in our secret hearts to say!'
Hearts? Your pale hand softly strokes the satin.
You play deep music, know well what you play.
You stroke the satin with thrilling of finger-tips,
You smile, with faintly perfumed lips,
You loose your thoughts like birds,
Brushing our dreams with soft and shadowy words . .
We know your words are foolish, yet sit here bound
In tremulous webs of sound.
'How beautiful is intimate talk like this!
It is as if we dissolved grey walls between us,
Stepped through the solid portals, become but shadows,
To hear a hidden music . . . Our own vast shadows
Lean to a giant size on the windy walls,
Or dwindle away; we hear our soft footfalls
Echo forever behind us, ghostly clear,
Music sings far off, flows suddenly near,
And dies away like rain . . .
We walk through subterranean caves again,
Vaguely above us feeling
A shadowy weight of frescos on the ceiling,
Strange half-lit things,
Soundless grotesques with writhing claws and wings . . .
And here a beautiful face looks down upon us;
And someone hurries before, unseen, and sings . . .
Have we seen all, I wonder, in these chambers,
Or is there yet some gorgeous vault, arched low,
Where sleeps an amazing beauty we do not know? . . '
The question falls: we walk in silence together,
Thinking of that deep vault and of its secret . . .
This lamp, these books, this fire
Are suddenly blown away in a whistling darkness.
Deep walls crash down in the whirlwind of desire.
The Sonnets CXIX - What potions have I drunk of Siren tears
by William Shakespeare

What potions have I drunk of Siren tears,
Distill'd from limbecks foul as hell within,
Applying fears to hopes, and hopes to fears,
Still losing when I saw myself to win!
What wretched errors hath my heart committed,
Whilst it hath thought itself so blessed never!
How have mine eyes out of their spheres been fitted,
In the distraction of this madding fever!
O benefit of ill! now I find true
That better is, by evil still made better;
And ruin'd love, when it is built anew,
Grows fairer than at first, more strong, far greater.
So I return rebuk'd to my content,
And gain by ill thrice more than I have spent.
Here, Sailor
by Walt Whitman

What ship, puzzled at sea, cons for the true reckoning?
Or, coming in, to avoid the bars, and follow the channel, a perfect pilot needs?
Here, sailor! Here, ship! take aboard the most perfect pilot,
Whom, in a little boat, putting off, and rowing, I, hailing you, offer.
To ----
by Frances Anne Kemble (Fanny)

What recks the sun, how weep the heavy flowers
All the sad night, when he is far away?
What recks he, how they mourn, through those dark hours,
Till back again he leads the smiling day?
As lifts each watery bloom its tearful eye,
And blesses from its lowly seat, the god,
In his great glory he goes through the sky,
And recks not of the blessing from the sod.
And what is it to thee, oh, thou, my fate!
That all my hope, and joy, remains with thee?
That thy departing, leaves me desolate,
That thy returning, brings back life to me?
I blame not thee, for all the strife, and woe,
That for thy sake daily disturbs my life;
I blame not thee, that Heaven has made me so,
That all the love I can, is woe, and strife.
I blame not thee, that I may ne'er impart
The tempest, and the death, and the despair,
That words, and looks, of thine make in my heart,
And turn by turn, riot and stagnate there.
Oh! I have found my sin's sharp scourge in thee,
For loving thee, as one should love but Heaven;
Therefore, oh, thou beloved! I blame not thee,
But by my anguish hope to be forgiven.
The Crusaders
by Edward Dyson

What price yer humble, Dicko Smith, in gaudy putties girt,
With sand-blight in his optics, and much leaner than he started,
Round the 'Oly Land cavorting in three- quarters of a shirt,
And imposin' on the natives ez one Dick the Lion 'Earted?
We are drivin' out the infidel, we're hittin' up the Turk,
Same ez Richard slung his right across the Saracen invader
In old days of which I'm readin'. Now we're gettin' in our work,
'N' what price me nibs, I ask yeh, ez a qualified Crusader!
'Ere I am, a thirsty Templar in the fields of Palestine,
Where that hefty little fighter, Bobby Sable, smit the heathen,
And where Richard Coor de Lion trimmed the Moslem good 'n' fine,
'N' he took the belt from Saladin, the slickest Dago breathin'.
There's no plume upon me helmet, 'n' no red cross on me chest,
'N' so fur they haven't dressed me in a swanking load of metal;
We've no 'Oly Grail I know of, but we do our little best
With a jamtin, 'n' a billy, 'n' a battered ole mess kettle.
Quite a lot of guyver missin' from our brand of chivalry;
We don't make a pert procession when we're movin' up the forces;
We've no pretty, pawin' stallion, 'n' no pennants flowin' free,
'N' no giddy, gaudy bedquilts make a circus of the 'orses.
We 'most always slip the cattle 'n' we cut out all the dog
When it fairly comes to buttin' into battle's hectic fever,
Goin' forward on our wishbones, with our noses in the bog,
'N' we 'eave a pot iv blazes at the cursed unbeliever.
Fancy-dress them old Crusaders wore, and alwiz kep' a band.
What we wear's so near to nothin' that it's often 'ardly proper,
And we swings a tank iv iron scrap across the 'Oly Land
From a dinkie gun we nipped ashore the other side of Jopper.
We ain't ever very natty, for the climate here is hot;
When it isn't liquid mud the dust is thicker than the vermin.
Ten to one our bold Noureddin is some waddlin' Turkish pot,
'N' the Saladin we're on to is a snortin' red-eyed German.
But be'old the eighth Crusade, 'n' Dicko Smith is in the van,
Dicko Coor de Lion from Carlton what could teach King Dick a trifle,
For he'd bomb his Royal Jills from out his baked-pertater can,
Or he'd pink him full of leakage with a quaint repeatin' rif1e.
We have sunk our claws in Mizpah, and Siloam is in view.
By my 'alidom from Agra we will send the Faithful reelin'!
Those old-timers botched the contract, but we mean to put it through.
Knights Templars from Balmain, the Port, Monaro, Nhill, andl Ealin'.
We 'are wipin' up Jerus'lem; we were ready with a hose
Spoutin' lead, a dandy cleaner that you bet you can rely on;
And Moss Isaacs, Cohn, and Cohen, Moses, Offelbloom 'n' those
Can all pack their bettin' bags, and come right home again to Zion.
The Fifth Ode Of Horace. Lib. I.
by John Milton

Quis multa gracilis te puer in Rosa Rendred almost word for word without Rhyme according to the Latin Measure, as near as the Language permit.
What slender Youth bedew'd with liquid odours
Courts thee on Roses in some pleasant Cave,
Pyrrha for whom bind'st thou
In wreaths thy golden Hair,
Plain in thy neatness; O how oft shall he
On Faith and changed Gods complain: and Seas
Rough with black winds and storms
Unwonted shall admire:
Who now enjoyes thee credulous, all Gold,
Who alwayes vacant, alwayes amiable
Hopes thee; of flattering gales
Unmindfull. Hapless they
To whom thou untry'd seem'st fair. Me in my vow'd
Picture the sacred wall declares t' have hung
My dank and dropping weeds
To the stern God of Sea.
Absence.
by Frances Anne Kemble (Fanny)

What shall I do with all the days and hours
That must be counted ere I see thy face?
How shall I charm the interval that lowers
Between this time and that sweet time of grace?
Shall I in slumber steep each weary sense,
Weary with longing? - shall I flee away
Into past days, and with some fond pretence
Cheat myself to forget the present day?
Shall love for thee lay on my soul the sin
Of casting from me God's great gift of time;
Shall I these mists of memory locked within,
Leave, and forget, life's purposes sublime?
Oh! how, or by what means, may I contrive
To bring the hour that brings thee back more near?
How may I teach my drooping hope to live
Until that blessed time, and thou art here?
I'll tell thee: for thy sake, I will lay hold
Of all good aims, and consecrate to thee,
In worthy deeds, each moment that is told
While thou, beloved one! art far from me.
For thee I will arouse my thoughts to try
All heavenward flights, all high and holy strains;
For thy dear sake I will walk patiently
Through these long hours, nor call their minutes pains.
I will this dreary blank of absence make
A noble task time, and will therein strive
To follow excellence, and to o'ertake
More good than I have won, since yet I live.
So may this doomed time build up in me
A thousand graces which shall thus be thine;
So may my love and longing hallowed be,
And thy dear thought an influence divine.