DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Foreword To Bib Ballads
by Ringgold Wilmer Lardner

Dear Parents: - Don't imagine, please,
It's in a boastful spirit
I fashion verses such as these;
That's not the truth or near it.
A hundred or a thousand, yes,
A million kids there may be
Who aren't one iota less
Attractive than this baby.
I'll venture that your household has
As valuable a treasure
As mine, but mine I know, and as
For yours, I've not that pleasure.
And that is why my book's about
Just one, O Dads and Mothers;
But babes are babes, and mine, no doubt,
Is very much like others.
Feelings Of A French Royalist, On The Disinterment Of The Remains Of The Duke D'Enghien
by William Wordsworth

Dear Reliques! from a pit of vilest mould
Uprisen to lodge among ancestral kings;
And to inflict shame's salutary stings
On the remorseless hearts of men grown old
In a blind worship; men perversely bold
Even to this hour, yet, some shall now forsake
Their monstrous Idol if the dead e'er spake,
To warn the living; if truth were ever told
By aught redeemed out of the hollow grave:
O murdered Prince! meek, loyal, pious, brave!
The power of retribution once was given:
But 'tis a rueful thought that willow bands
So often tie the thunder-wielding hands
Of Justice sent to earth from highest Heaven!
To Mr. Pierpont Morgan
by Thomas William Hodgson Crosland

Dear Mr. Pierpont Morgan, -
I hasten to give you a hearty British welcome.
Come to my arms;
I am in the Trust line myself -
That is to say, I used to be
Before people started putting up announcements
To the effect that
"Poor Trust is dead,
Bad pay killed him."
Some day, an I mistake not, Mr. Morgan,
Your Trust will die:
All Trusts are grass.
Ponder it!
I am a political economist, and I know.
Meanwhile I am very pleased to think
That we have amongst us a man of your financial prowess
And purchasing power.
There is a certain class of British person
Who apparently goes in bodily fear of you.
That class of person has groaned loudly over your steel exploit,
And he has groaned loudlier still
Over your purchase of the Leyland Line of Steamships.
To groan over a fair deal of any kind
Appears to me, my dear Mr. Pierpont Morgan,
To be an entirely stupid proceeding.
Nobody can come to grief by selling things,
Providing they sell them at the right price.
You have bought the Leyland Line of Steamships:
I see no reason why you should not buy all the other lines
If you want them, and have the wherewithal to pay for them,
For in the long run everything comes to him who vends.
You buy my steamships, or my steelworks,
Or, for that matter, my caller herrin':
I take your money, I put it in your bank,
And live sumptuously on the interest.
You have all the trouble
Inasmuch as you have to rake up the interest.
I sit at home and enjoy myself,
You scheme, and scheme, and scheme, and scheme, and scheme, and scheme, and scheme,
I am happy,
I hope you are.
Between ourselves I should not tremble
If you bought up Great Britain and Ireland (especially Ireland),
And all that in them is,
Providing always, as I have said before,
That you paid the price.
Indeed, I hope to live to see the day
When Englishmen will cease to toil and spin,
And derive their incomes
Wholly and solely from American dividends.
Fools buy things, my dear Mr. Pierpont Morgan,
Wise men sell them.
That is particularly true
When the article involved happens to be poetry.
Nevertheless, as you appear to be in a buying frame of mind,
I take this opportunity of informing you
That I have at my villa at Hindhead
A large and varied stock
Of sonnets, odes, rhymes, jingles, and what not,
Which I am prepared to sell at an enormous sacrifice.
My price to you for the lot would be
Fifteen Million Dollars.
If you care to deal, I undertake to melt your cheque
At your own bank,
And to invest the proceeds in any concerns
In which you happen to be interested,
So that you would not only get the poetry,
But also your money back again.
This, at any rate, is how it seems to me.
Vale!
To March.
by Emily Elizabeth Dickinson

Dear March, come in!
How glad I am!
I looked for you before.
Put down your hat --
You must have walked --
How out of breath you are!
Dear March, how are you?
And the rest?
Did you leave Nature well?
Oh, March, come right upstairs with me,
I have so much to tell!
I got your letter, and the birds';
The maples never knew
That you were coming, -- I declare,
How red their faces grew!
But, March, forgive me --
And all those hills
You left for me to hue;
There was no purple suitable,
You took it all with you.
Who knocks? That April!
Lock the door!
I will not be pursued!
He stayed away a year, to call
When I am occupied.
But trifles look so trivial
As soon as you have come,
That blame is just as dear as praise
And praise as mere as blame.
To My Mother In Canada, From Sick-Bed In Italy
by Frank James Prewett

Dear mother, from the sure sun and warm seas
Of Italy, I, sick, remember now
What sometimes is forgot in times of ease,
Our love, the always felt but unspoken vow.
So send I beckoning hands from here to there,
And kiss your black once, now white thin-grown hair
And your stooped small shoulder and pinched brow.
Here, mother, there is sunshine every day;
It warms the bones and breathes upon the heart;
But you I see out-plod a little way,
Bitten with cold; your cheeks and fingers smart.
Would you were here, we might in temples lie,
And look from azure into azure sky,
And paradise achieve, slipping death's part.
But now 'tis time for sleep: I think no speech
There needs to pass between us what we mean,
For we soul-venturing mingle each with each.
So, mother, pass across the world unseen
And share in me some wished-for dream in you;
For so brings destiny her pledges true,
The mother withered, in the son grown green.
A Boy's Hopes.
by Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

Dear mother, dry those flowing tears,
They grieve me much to see;
And calm, oh! calm thine anxious fears - 
What dost thou dread for me?
'Tis true that tempests wild oft ride
Above the stormy main,
But, then, in Him I will confide
Who doth their bounds ordain.
I go to win renown and fame
Upon the glorious sea;
But still my heart will be the same - 
I'll ever turn to thee!
See, yonder wait our gallant crew,
So, weep not, mother dear;
My father was a sailor too - 
What hast thou then to fear?
Is it not better I should seek
To win the name he bore,
Than waste my youth in pastimes weak
Upon the tiresome shore?
Then, look not thus so sad and wan,
For yet your son you'll see
Return with wealth and honors won
Upon the glorious sea.
To The True-Born Briton
by Thomas William Hodgson Crosland

(After Peace Night)
Dear Sir, or Madam,
As the case may be,
When Britain first,
At Heaving's command,
Arose from out
The azure main,
This was the chawter
Of that land
And gawdian a-a-a-a-angels
Sang this strain:
Don't you think so?
For my own part,
I am quite sure of it:
Monday night convinced me.
Mafeking night,
As you may remember,
Was a honeyed
And beautiful affair.
But
Peace night,
I think,
Really outdid it in splendours.
At the cafe
Which I most frequent,
All was Peace.
Round the table next mine,
There were seventeen Jews,
With a Union Jack.
Ever and anon
(Between drinks, as it were),
They held up
That Union Jack
And yelled:
"Shend him victoriouth,
'Appy and gloriouth,
Long to-o reign over uth,
&c., &c."
I wonder, my dear Sir, or Madam,
Why the Jews are so pleased:
I can't make it out.
Howsomever,
Pleased they are,
And a pleased Jew
Is worth a king's ransom,
Or words to that effect.
Peace, my dear Sir, or Madam,
Is a chaste and choice
Thing.
Outside the aforesaid cafe,
The crowd
Was so numerous
And exuberant
That I was compelled
(Much to my annoyance, of course)
To remain inside
Till closing-time.
Then I went home
In the friendly embrace
Of a four-wheeler.
For a little while,
There was much shouting and yelling and roaring and squeaking and singing;
And then I knew
No more.
My cab
Bowled away
Through the sweet evening air
(That is to say,
If the common or Regent Street growler
Ever does bowl away),
And all the time
I snored.
Duly awakened
Outside my bungalow,
I raked up the fare,
And, in reply to kind enquiries
In the hall,
I remarked:
"Peace, O woman of mine,
Peace!"
To The Quiet Observer
by James Whitcomb Riley

AFTER HIS LONG SILENCE
Dear old friend of us all in need
Who know the worth of a friend indeed,
How rejoiced are we all to learn
Of your glad return.
We who have missed your voice so long -
Even as March might miss the song
Of the sugar-bird in the maples when
They're tapped again.
Even as the memory of these
Blended sweets, - the sap of the trees
And the song of the birds, and the old camp too,
We think of you.
Hail to you, then, with welcomes deep
As grateful hearts may laugh or weep! -
You give us not only the bird that sings,
But all good things.
Parables
by Richard Le Gallienne

I
Dear Love, you ask if I be true,
If other women move
The heart that only beats for you
With pulses all of love.
Out in the chilly dew one morn
I plucked a wild sweet rose,
A little silver bud new-born
And longing to unclose.
I took it, loving new-born things,
I knew my heart was warm,
'O little silver rose, come in
And shelter from the storm.'
And soon, against my body pressed,
I felt its petals part,
And, looking down within my breast
I saw its golden heart.
O such a golden heart it has,
Your eyes may never see,
To others it is always shut,
It opens but for me.
But that is why you see me pass
The honeysuckle there,
And leave the lilies in the grass,
Although they be so fair;
Why the strange orchid half-accurst -
Circe of flowers she grows -
Can tempt me not: see! in my heart,
Silver and gold, my rose.
II
Deep in a hidden lane we were,
My little love and I;
When lo! as we stood kissing there -
A flower against the sky!
Frail as a tear its beauty hung -
O spare it, little hand.
But innocence like its, alas!
Desire may not withstand.
And so I clambered up the bank
And threw the blossom down,
But we were sadder for its sake
As we walked back to town.
To The Master Of Balliol
by Alfred Lord Tennyson

Dear Master in our classic town,
You, loved by all the younger gown
There at Balliol,
Lay your Plato for one minute down,
II
And read a Grecian tale re-told,
Which, cast in later Grecian mould,
Quintus Calaber
Somewhat lazily handled of old;
III
And on this white midwinter day'
For have the far-off hymns of May,
All her melodies,
All her harmonies echo'd away?'
IV
To-day, before you turn again
To thoughts that lift the soul of men,
Hear my cataract's
Downward thunder in hollow and glen,
V
Till, led by dream and vague desire,
The woman, gliding toward the pyre,
Find her warrior
Stark and dark in his funeral fire.
Sent For The Album Of The Rev. G---- C----,
by Thomas Gent

With a Drawing of the Head of an Eminent Artist.
Dear Sir, you remember, when Herod of Jewry
Had given a ball, how a shocking old fury
Demanded, so bent was the vixen on slaughter.
The head of St. John at the hand of her daughter:
Now do not detest me, nor hold me in dread,
Because, like King Herod, I send you a head:
Not a saint's, by-the-bye, although taken from life,
But a head of my friend, by the hand of my wife.
Monitory Verses. To A Young Lady, Who Indulged Too Gloomy Ideas Of Our Sublunary State.
by William Hayley

Dear nymph of a feeling, and delicate mind!
Whose eye the rash tears of timidity blind,
When fancy alarm'd takes a heart-chilling hue,
And the prospect of life is all dark in thy view,
Let me, as thy monitor, mild and sincere,
To thy spirit the gift of existence endear!
And shew thee, if darkened by fear or chagrin,
The sunshine of friendship can gild every scene!
Those, who true to the Ruler of every hour,
Rely on his mercy, and trust in his power;
Whatso'er is their lot, may, by viewing it right,
Convert all its darkness to visions of light
When mortals of hope the fair presage assume,
Even death's sable pall is no object of gloom:
They smile on the path which their best friends have trod,
And rejoice, when they feel, they are summon'd to God.
Be it long, my young friend, ere such joy can be thine,
First embrace all the gifts, faith exults to resign.
The best prelude to death is, without mental strife.
To be grateful for all the pure pleasures of life:
And many pure pleasures to mortals are given,
Sick or well, rich or poor, by the bounty of heaven,
If we all draw them forth (by well acting our part,)
From that mine of delight, an affectionate heart!
Mary Queen Of Scots - Landing At The Mouth Of The Derwent, Workington
by William Wordsworth

Dear to the Loves, and to the Graces vowed,
The Queen drew back the wimple that she wore;
And to the throng, that on the Cumbrian shore
Her landing hailed, how touchingly she bowed!
And like a Star (that, from a heavy cloud
Of pine-tree foliage poised in air, forth darts,
When a soft summer gale at evening parts
The gloom that did its loveliness enshroud)
She smiled; but Time, the old Saturnian seer,
Sighed on the wing as her foot pressed the strand,
With step prelusive to a long array
Of woes and degradations hand in hand
Weeping captivity, and shuddering fear
Stilled by the ensanguined block of Fotheringay!
Bleak Weather.
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Dear Love, where the red lilies blossomed and grew
The white snows are falling;
And all through the woods where I wandered with you
The loud winds are calling;
And the robin that piped to us tune upon tune,
Neath the oak, you remember,
O'er hill-top and forest has followed the June
And left us December.
He has left like a friend who is true in the sun
And false in the shadows;
He has found new delights in the land where he's gone,
Greener woodlands and meadows.
Let him go! what care we? let the snow shroud the lea,
Let it drift on the heather;
We can sing through it all: I have you, you have me.
And we'll laugh at the weather.
The old year may die and a new year be born
That is bleaker and colder:
It cannot dismay us; we dare it, we scorn,
For our love makes us bolder.
Ah, Robin! sing loud on your far distant lea,
You friend in fair weather!
But here is a song sung that's fuller of glee,
By two warm hearts together.
To Dan Leno
by Thomas William Hodgson Crosland

Dear Mr. Leno,
It is now many happy weeks
Since I had the pleasure of addressing you.
On the last occasion, you will remember,
You were fresh from Sandringham,
With a medal and sundry excellent stories
As to the manner in which you had been received
By His Majesty the King
And the Members of the Royal Family.
"To see them laugh," you told us, "was a treat."
Since then you have gone about
With a diamond "E" in your cravat,
And "The King's Jester" written all over you
As I have already stated,
I do not doubt for a moment
That the King really did laugh
At Mr. Leno.
I have laughed at him
(That is to say, at Mr. Leno) myself,
And I know what it is;
But to-day, Mr. Leno,
To-day being the 1st of April,
It is my turn to laugh,
And I do so with a right good will,
For to-day, Mr. Leno,
Your cup appears to be full,
Inasmuch as for this day only
You are actually editing a paper!
Now when a man takes to editing papers
All is over with him:
The next step is
Into the unutterable dark.
I have read your paper, Mr. Leno,
And I find that on the whole
It has been remarkably well edited:
That is to say, you as Editor
And your big co-editor,
Mr. Campbell of that ilk,
Have had the good sense
To edit the paper
In the only way in which an editor
Should edit a paper,
Namely, by leaving it to itself
As much as possible.
If all editors would have the sense
To take this wise course,
Contributors and subordinates, generally,
Would, to say the least of it,
Have a fairly happy life.
It seems in a way a pity, Mr. Leno,
That you should waste yourself
Upon an evening paper,
When there are so many morning papers
Requiring Editors:
The Daily Chronicle, for example,
Would have offered you a fair field
For the exercise of your extraordinary abilities;
Even the Times might, for once in a way,
Have added lustre to itself
By taking on
Your joyous and winning lucubrations;
Then there is Punch,
Which journal, I understand,
Is always (and still) on the look-out
For that humour
Which somehow never comes its way.
But there, Mr. Leno,
You have missed your chance,
And possibly it will not come round again.
As you are young in journalism,
Let me say three things to you:
Imprimis, never be an Editor,
It is better to be in the ballet;
Item, always be on either a morning paper or a weekly.
The all-day papers keep one too busy.
Item, if you are an editor only for a day,
Be sure to subscribe to the Newspaper Press Fund;
Otherwise, what will your widow do?
A Letter
by Paul Laurence Dunbar

Dear Miss Lucy: I been t'inkin' dat I 'd write you long fo' dis,
But dis writin' 's mighty tejous, an' you know jes' how it is.
But I 's got a little lesure, so I teks my pen in han'
Fu' to let you know my feelin's since I retched dis furrin' lan'.
I 's right well, I 's glad to tell you (dough dis climate ain't to blame),
An' I hopes w'en dese lines reach you, dat dey 'll fin' yo' se'f de same.
Cose I 'se feelin kin' o' homesick--dat 's ez nachul ez kin be,
Wen a feller 's mo'n th'ee thousand miles across dat awful sea.
(Don't you let nobidy fool you 'bout de ocean bein' gran';
If you want to see de billers, you jes' view dem f'om de lan'.)
'Bout de people? We been t'inkin' dat all white folks was alak;
But dese Englishmen is diffunt, an' dey 's curus fu' a fac'.
Fust, dey's heavier an' redder in dey make-up an' dey looks,
An' dey don't put salt nor pepper in a blessed t'ing dey cooks!
Wen dey gin you good ol' tu'nips, ca'ots, pa'snips, beets, an' sich,
Ef dey ain't some one to tell you, you cain't 'stinguish which is which.
Wen I t'ought I 's eatin' chicken--you may b'lieve dis hyeah 's a lie--
But de waiter beat me down dat I was eatin' rabbit pie.
An' dey 'd t'ink dat you was crazy--jes' a reg'lar ravin' loon,
Ef you 'd speak erbout a 'possum or a piece o' good ol' coon.
O, hit's mighty nice, dis trav'lin', an' I 's kin' o' glad I come.
But, I reckon, now I 's willin' fu' to tek my way back home.
I done see de Crystal Palace, an' I 's hyeahd dey string-band play,
But I has n't seen no banjos layin' nowhahs roun' dis way.
Jes' gin ol' Jim Bowles a banjo, an' he 'd not go very fu',
'Fo' he 'd outplayed all dese fiddlers, wif dey flourish and dey stir.
Evahbiddy dat I 's met wif has been monst'ous kin an' good;
But I t'ink I 'd lak it better to be down in Jones's wood,
Where we ust to have sich frolics, Lucy, you an' me an' Nelse,
Dough my appetite 'ud call me, ef dey was n't nuffin else.
I 'd jes' lak to have some sweet-pertaters roasted in de skin;
I 's a-longin' fu' my chittlin's an' my mustard greens ergin;
I 's a-wishin' fu' some buttermilk, an' co'n braid, good an' brown,
An' a drap o' good ol' bourbon fu' to wash my feelin's down!
An' I 's comin' back to see you jes' as ehly as I kin,
So you better not go spa'kin' wif dat wuffless scoun'el Quin!
Well, I reckon, I mus' close now; write ez soon's dis reaches you;
Gi' my love to Sister Mandy an' to Uncle Isham, too.
Tell de folks I sen' 'em howdy; gin a kiss to pap an' mam;
Closin' I is, deah Miss Lucy, Still Yo' Own True-Lovin' Sam.
P. S. Ef you cain't mek out dis letter, lay it by erpon de she'f,
An' when I git home, I 'll read it, darlin', to you my own se'f.
To Her Most Honoured Father
by Anne Bradstreet

Dear Sir of late delighted with the sight
Of your four Sisters cloth'd in black and white,
Of fairer Dames the Sun ne'r saw the face;
Though made a pedestal for Adams Race;
Their worth so shines in those rich lines you show
Their paralels to finde I scarely know
To climbe their Climes, I have nor strength nor skill
To mount so high requires an Eagle's quill;
Yet view thereof did cause my thoughts to soar,
My lowly pen might wait upon those four
I bring my four times four, now meanly clad
To do their homage, unto yours, full glad:
Who for their Age, their worth and quality
Might seem of yours to claim precedency:
But by my humble hand, thus rudely pen'd
They are your bounden handmaids to attend
These same are they, from whom we being have
These are of all, the Life, the Nurse, the Grave;
These are the hot, the cold, the moist, the dry,
That sink, that swim, that fill, that upwards fly,
Of these consists our bodies, Cloathes and Food,
The World, the useful, hurtful, and the good,
Sweet harmony they keep, yet jar oft times
Their discord doth appear, by these harsh rimes
Yours did contest for wealth, for Arts, for Age,
My first do shew their good, and then their rage.
My other foures do intermixed tell
Each others faults, and where themselves excell,
How hot and dry contend with moist and cold,
How Air and Earth no correspondence hold,
And yet in equal tempers, how they 'gree
How divers natures make one Unity
Something of all (though mean) I did intend
But fear'd you'ld judge Du Bartas was my friend.
I honour him, but dare not wear his wealth
My goods are true (though poor) I love no stealth
But if I did I durst not send them you
Who must reward a Thief, but with his due.
I shall not need, mine innocence to clear
These ragged lines, will do 't when they appear:
On what they are, your mild aspect I crave
Accept my best, my worst vouchsafe a Grave.
From her that to your self, more duty owes
Then water in the boundess Ocean flows.
March 20, 1642.
Little Mary's Linnet. (From The Villager's Verse-Book.)
by William Lisle Bowles

Dear Mary, if thy little bird
Should, all the winter long,
Pleased from the window to be heard,
Repay thee with a song;
A lesson let it still convey
To all with sense endued;
And such the voice, oh! let it say,
The still small voice of love.
Our Hills.
by Sidney Lanier

Dear Mother-Earth
Of Titan birth,
Yon hills are your large breasts, and often I
Have climbed to their top-nipples, fain and dry
To drink my mother's-milk so near the sky.
O ye hill-stains,
Red, for all rains!
The blood that made you has all bled for us,
The hearts that paid you are all dead for us,
The trees that shade you groan with lead, for us!
And O, hill-sides,
Like giants' brides
Ye sleep in ravine-rumpled draperies,
And weep your springs in tearful memories
Of days that stained your robes with stains like these!
Sleep on, ye hills!
Weep on, ye rills!
The stainers have decreed the stains shall stay.
They chain the hands might wash the stains away.
They wait with cold hearts till we "rue the day".
O Mother-Earth
Of Titan birth,
Thy mother's-milk is curdled with aloe.
- Like hills, Men, lift calm heads through any woe,
And weep, but bow not an inch, for any foe!
Thou Sorrow-height
We climb by night,
Thou hast no hell-deep chasm save Disgrace.
To stoop, will fling us down its fouled space:
Stand proud! The Dawn will meet us, face to face,
For down steep hills the Dawn loves best to race!
A Simile
by Matthew Prior

Dear Thomas, didst thou never pop
Thy head into a tin-man's shop?
There, Thomas, didst thou never see
('Tis but by way of simile)
A squirrel spend his little rage
In jumping round a rolling cage?
The cage, as either side turn'd up,
Striking a ring of bells a-top? 
Mov'd in the orb, pleas'd with the chimes,
The foolish creature thinks he climbs:
But here or there, turn wood or wire,
He never gets two inches higher.
So fares it with those merry blades,
That frisk it under Pindus' shades.
In noble songs, and lofty odes,
They tread on stars, and talk with gods;
Still dancing in an airy round,
Still pleas'd with their own verses' sound;
Brought back, how fast soe'er they go,
Always aspiring, always low.
Extract From The Conclusion Of A Poem
by William Wordsworth

Dear native regions, I foretell,
From what I feel at this farewell,
That, wheresoe'er my steps may tend,
And whensoe'er my course shall end,
If in that hour a single tie
Survive of local sympathy,
My soul will cast the backward view,
The longing look alone on you.
Thus, while the Sun sinks down to rest
Far in the regions of the west,
Though to the vale no parting beam
Be given, not one memorial gleam,
A lingering light he fondly throws
On the dear hills where first he rose.