DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Femina Contra Mundum
by Gilbert Keith Chesterton

The sun was black with judgment, and the moon
Blood: but between
I saw a man stand, saying, 'To me at least
The grass is green.
'There was no star that I forgot to fear
With love and wonder.
The birds have loved me'; but no answer came--
Only the thunder.
Once more the man stood, saying, 'A cottage door,
Wherethrough I gazed
That instant as I turned--yea, I am vile;
Yet my eyes blazed.
'For I had weighed the mountains in a balance,
And the skies in a scale,
I come to sell the stars--old lamps for new--
Old stars for sale.'
Then a calm voice fell all the thunder through,
A tone less rough:
'Thou hast begun to love one of my works
Almost enough.'
Hampton Beach
by John Greenleaf Whittier

The sunlight glitters keen and bright,
Where, miles away,
Lies stretching to my dazzled sight
A luminous belt, a misty light,
Beyond the dark pine bluffs and wastes of sandy gray.
The tremulous shadow of the Sea!
Against its ground
Of silvery light, rock, hill, and tree,
Still as a picture, clear and free,
With varying outline mark the coast for miles around.
On, on, we tread with loose-flung rein
Our seaward way,
Through dark-green fields and blossoming grain,
Where the wild brier-rose skirts the lane,
And bends above our heads the flowering locust spray.
Ha! like a kind hand on my brow
Comes this fresh breeze,
Cooling its dull and feverish glow,
While through my being seems to flow
The breath of a new life, the healing of the seas!
Now rest we, where this grassy mound
His feet hath set
In the great waters, which have bound
His granite ankles greenly round
With long and tangled moss, and weeds with cool spray wet.
Good-by to Pain and Care! I take
Mine ease to-day
Here where these sunny waters break,
And ripples this keen breeze, I shake
All burdens from the heart, all weary thoughts away.
I draw a freer breath, I seem
Like all I see
Waves in the sun, the white-winged gleam,
Of sea-birds in the slanting beam,
And far-off sails which flit before the south-wind free.
So when Time's veil shall fall asunder,
The soul may know
No fearful change, nor sudden wonder,
Nor sink the weight of mystery under,
But with the upward rise, and with the vastness grow.
And all we shrink from now may seem
No new revealing;
Familiar as our childhood's stream,
Or pleasant memory of a dream
The loved and cherished Past upon the new life stealing.
Serene and mild the untried light
May have its dawning;
And, as in summer's northern night
The evening and the dawn unite,
The sunset hues of Time blend with the soul's new morning.
I sit alone; in foam and spray
Wave after wave
Breaks on the rocks which, stern and gray,
Shoulder the broken tide away,
Or murmurs hoarse and strong through mossy cleft and cave.
What heed I of the dusty land
And noisy town?
I see the mighty deep expand
From its white line of glimmering sand
To where the blue of heaven on bluer waves shuts down!
In listless quietude of mind,
I yield to all
The change of cloud and wave and wind
And passive on the flood reclined,
I wander with the waves, and with them rise and fall.
But look, thou dreamer! wave and shore
In shadow lie;
The night-wind warns me back once more
To where, my native hill-tops o'er,
Bends like an arch of fire the glowing sunset sky.
So then, beach, bluff, and wave, farewell!
I bear with me
No token stone nor glittering shell,
But long and oft shall Memory tell
Of this brief thoughtful hour of musing by the Sea.
The Higher Pantheism
by Alfred Lord Tennyson

The Higher Pantheism
The sun, the moon, the stars, the seas, the hills and the plains'
Are not these, O Soul, the Vision of Him who reigns?
Is not the Vision He? tho' He be not that which He seems?
Dreams are true while they last, and do we not live in dreams?
Earth, these solid stars, this weight of body and limb,
Are they not sign and symbol of thy division from Him?
Dark is the world to thee: thyself art the reason why;
For is He not all but that which has power to feel 'I am I'?
Glory about thee, without thee; and thou fulfillest thy doom
Making Him broken gleams, and a stifled splendour and gloom.
Speak to Him thou for He hears, and Spirit with Spirit can meet'
Closer is He than breathing, and nearer than hands and feet.
God is law, say the wise; O Soul, and let us rejoice,
For if He thunder by law the thunder is yet His voice.
Law is God, say some: no God at all, says the fool;
For all we have power to see is a straight staff bent in a pool;
And the ear of man cannot hear, and the eye of man cannot see;
But if we could see and hear, this Vision'were it not He?
Queen Victoria.
by Jean Blewett

1837.
The sunshine streaming through the stain'd glass
Touched her with rosy colors as she stood,
The maiden Queen of all the British realm,
In the old Abbey on that soft June day.
Youth shone within her eyes, where God had set
All steadfastness, and high resolve, and truth;
Youth flushed her cheek, dwelt on the smooth white brow
Whereon the heavy golden circlet lay.
The ashes of dead kings, the history of
A nation's growth, of strife, and victory,
The mighty past called soft through aisle and nave:
"Be strong, O Queen; be strong as thou art fair!"
A virgin, white of soul and unafraid,
Since back of her was God, and at her feet
A people loyal to the core, and strong,
And loving well her sweetness and her youth.
1901.
Upon her woman's head earth's richest crown
Hath sat with grace these sixty years and more.
Her hand, her slender woman's hand, hath held
The weightiest sceptre, held it with such power
All homage hath been hers, at home, abroad,
Where'er hath dwelt a chivalrous regard
For strength of purpose and for purity,
For grand achievement and for noble aim.
To-day the cares of State no longer vex;
To-day the crown is laid from off her brow.
Dead! The great heart of her no more will beat
With tenderness for all beneath her rule.
Dead! The clear eyes of her no more will guard
The nation's welfare. Dead! The arm of her
No more will strike a mighty blow for right
And justice; make a wide world stand amazed
That one so gentle as old England's Queen
Could be so fearless and so powerful!
Full wearily the sense of grief doth press
And weight us down. The good Queen is no more;
And we are fain to weep as children weep
When greedy death comes to the home and bears
From thence the mother, whose unfailing love
Hath been their wealth, their safeguard, and their pride.
O bells that toll in every zone and clime!
There is a sound of sobbing in your breath.
East, west, north, south, the solemn clamor goes,
Voicing a great, a universal grief!
Songs of the Fleet - The Song of the Sou' Wester
by Henry John Newbolt, Sir

The sun was lost in a leaden sky,
And the shore lay under our lee;
When a great Sou' Wester hurricane high
Came rollicking up the sea.
He played with the fleet as a boy with boats
Till out for the Downs we ran,
And he laugh'd with the roar of a thousand throats
At the militant ways of man:
Oh!    I am the enemy most of might,
The other be who you please!
Gunner and guns may all be right,
Flags a-flying and armour tight,
But I am the fellow you've first to fight--
The giant that swings the seas.
A dozen of middies were down below
Chasing the X they love,
While the table curtseyed long and slow
And the lamps were giddy above.
The lesson was all of a ship and a shot,
And some of it may have been true,
But the word they heard and never forgot
Was the word of the wind that blew:
Oh!    I am the enemy most of might,
The other be who you please!
Gunner and guns may all be right,
Flags a-flying and armour tight,
But I am the fellow you've first to fight--
The giant that swings the seas.
The Middy with luck is a Captain soon,
With luck he may hear one day
His own big guns a-humming the tune
"'Twas in Trafalgar's Bay."
But wherever he goes, with friends or foes,
And whatever may there befall,
He'll hear for ever a voice he knows
For ever defying them all:
Oh!    I am the enemy most of might,
The other be who you please!
Gunner and guns may all be right,
Flags a-flying and armour tight,
But I am the fellow you've first to fight--
The giant that swings the seas.
The Massacre of the Bards
by Mary Hannay Foott

The sunlight from the sky is swept,
But, over Snowdon's summit kept,
One brand of cloud yet burns,
By ghostly hands far out of sight,
Held, glowing, in the even-light,
As Fate still keeps the weapon bright
That lingers and returns.
-    -    -    -    -    -
O day of slaughter! Day of woe!
But once, a thousand years ago,
Such day has Britain seen;
When blushed her hoary hills with shame
At Mona's sacrifice of flame;
While shrieks from out the burning came
Across the strait between.
Death-helping day! That couldst not find
One weeping cloud to hide behind!
Cursed day whose light was given
For search-mate to the Saxon sword
Through coverts that our rocks afford,
While Edward's godless minions poured
The blood of the unshriven!
-    -    -    -    -    -
Ill fare we when the trees are rent,
Whose friendly shelter erst was lent
In sun, and wind, and rain.
Ill fare we when the thunder-shocks
Let loose the torrents from their rocks,
To sweep away the mountain-flocks,
And flood the standing grain.
But where the forest-giants groan,
By winds that waste the woods o'erthrown,
New saplings blithely spring!
Sank herd and harvest 'neath the tide?
There's bleating on the mountain-side;
O'er cornfields, ere the dew has dried
To-morrow's lark shall sing!
Sore sighs the land when she has need
The dragon-jaws of war to feed
With those who love her best;
And long shall Cambria's tears be shed
For him who late her armies led,
Llewellyn, whose dissevered head
The Saxon crowned in jest!
Yet, in their stead whose blood is spilt,
Newcomers seize the sword's warm hilt,
Or o'er it reach the ground!
Llewellyn! every night-watch drear
With grief for thee, brings morning near;
That morn when Arthur shall appear,
Once more our leader crowned!
But when the blood of bards is poured,
Who gathers their forgotten hoard
From memories sealed by fate?
What daring songster e'er shall soar
For us to Heaven's death-guarded door,
And tell thereafter of the store
That glimmers through the grate?
When Famine's empty hand is filled,
When years the shattered oaks rebuild,
Shall heroes spring again,
Brave spirits of the past to greet
Who rise at minstrel-summons sweet,
When bards the olden tales repeat
Of Britain's mighty slain?
Nay, by the harps our fathers heard
No more shall Britain's heart be stirred,
Lost is the ancient lore!
Spent is the breath of song, that fanned
Freedom's low fires! The bard's light hand,
Whose beckoning brought the martial band,
Shall seek the strings no more!
Bird Raptures.
by Christina Georgina Rossetti

The sunrise wakes the lark to sing,
The moonrise wakes the nightingale.
Come darkness, moonrise, every thing
That is so silent, sweet, and pale:
Come, so ye wake the nightingale.
Make haste to mount, thou wistful moon,
Make haste to wake the nightingale:
Let silence set the world in tune
To hearken to that wordless tale
Which warbles from the nightingale
O herald skylark, stay thy flight
One moment, for a nightingale
Floods us with sorrow and delight.
To-morrow thou shalt hoist the sail;
Leave us to-night the nightingale.
The Alps At Day-Break.
by Samuel Rogers

The sun-beams streak the azure skies,
And line with light the mountain's brow:
With hounds and horns the hunters rise,
And chase the roebuck thro' the snow.
From rock to rock, with giant-bound,
High on their iron poles they pass;
Mute, lest the air, convuls'd by sound,
Rend from above a frozen mass. [1]
The goats wind slow their wonted way,
Up craggy steeps and ridges rude;
Mark'd by the wild wolf for his prey,
From desert cave or hanging wood.
And while the torrent thunders loud,
And as the echoing cliffs reply,
The huts peep o'er the morning-cloud,
Perch'd, like an eagle's nest, on high.
The Sword and the Staff
by George Pope Morris

The sword of the hero!
The staff of the sage!
Whose valor and wisdom
Are stamped on the age!
Time-hallowed mementos
Of those who have riven
The sceptre from tyrants,
"The lightning from heaven!"
This weapon, O Freedom!
Was drawn by the son,
And it never was sheathed
Till the battle was won!
No stain of dishonor
Upon it we see!
'Twas never surrendered--
Except to the free!
While Fame claims the hero
And patriot sage,
Their names to emblazon
On History's page,
No holier relics
Will liberty hoard
Than FRANKLIN's staff, guarded
By WASHINGTON's sword.
The Sleepers
by Bliss Carman (William)

The tall carnations down the garden walks
Bowed on their stalks.
Said Jock-a-dreams to John-a-nods,
"What are the odds
That we shall wake up here within the sun,
When time is done,
And pick up all the treasures one by one
Our hands let fall in sleep?" "You have begun
To mutter in your dreams,"
Said John-a-nods to Jock-a-dreams,
And they both slept again.
The tall carnations in the sunset glow
Burned row on row.
Said John-a-nods to Jock-a-dreams,
"To me it seems
A thousand years since last you stirred and spoke,
And I awoke.
Was that the wind then trying to provoke
His brothers in their blessed sleep?" "They choke,
Who mutter in their nods,"
Said Jock-a-dreams to John-a-nods.
And they both slept again.
The tall carnations only heard a sigh
Of dusk go by.
The Vow Of Washington
by John Greenleaf Whittier

The sword was sheathed: in April's sun
Lay green the fields by Freedom won;
And severed sections, weary of debates,
Joined hands at last and were United States.
O City sitting by the Sea
How proud the day that dawned on thee,
When the new era, long desired, began,
And, in its need, the hour had found the man!
One thought the cannon salvos spoke,
The resonant bell-tower's vibrant stroke,
The voiceful streets, the plaudit-echoing halls,
And prayer and hymn borne heavenward from St. Paul's!
How felt the land in every part
The strong throb of a nation's heart,
As its great leader gave, with reverent awe,
His pledge to Union, Liberty, and Law.
That pledge the heavens above him heard,
That vow the sleep of centuries stirred;
In world-wide wonder listening peoples bent
Their gaze on Freedom's great experiment.
Could it succeed? Of honor sold
And hopes deceived all history told.
Above the wrecks that strewed the mournful past,
Was the long dream of ages true at last?
Thank God! the people's choice was just,
The one man equal to his trust,
Wise beyond lore, and without weakness good,
Calm in the strength of flawless rectitude.
His rule of justice, order, peace,
Made possible the world's release;
Taught prince and serf that power is but a trust,
And rule, alone, which serves the ruled, is just;
That Freedom generous is, but strong
In hate of fraud and selfish wrong,
Pretence that turns her holy truths to lies,
And lawless license masking in her guise.
Land of his love! with one glad voice
Let thy great sisterhood rejoice;
A century's suns o'er thee have risen and set,
And, God be praised, we are one nation yet.
And still we trust the years to be
Shall prove his hope was destiny,
Leaving our flag, with all its added stars,
Unrent by faction and unstained by wars.
Lo! where with patient toil he nursed
And trained the new-set plant at first,
The widening branches of a stately tree
Stretch from the sunrise to the sunset sea.
And in its broad and sheltering shade,
Sitting with none to make afraid,
Were we now silent, through each mighty limb,
The winds of heaven would sing the praise of him.
Our first and best! his ashes lie
Beneath his own Virginian sky.
Forgive, forget, O true and just and brave,
The storm that swept above thy sacred grave.
For, ever in the awful strife
And dark hours of the nation's life,
Through the fierce tumult pierced his warning word,
Their father's voice his erring children heard.
The change for which he prayed and sought
In that sharp agony was wrought;
No partial interest draws its alien line
'Twixt North and South, the cypress and the pine!
One people now, all doubt beyond,
His name shall be our Union-bond;
We lift our hands to Heaven, and here and now.
Take on our lips the old Centennial vow.
For rule and trust must needs be ours;
Chooser and chosen both are powers
Equal in service as in rights; the claim
Of Duty rests on each and all the same.
Then let the sovereign millions, where
Our banner floats in sun and air,
From the warm palm-lands to Alaska's cold,
Repeat with us the pledge a century old
The Weird Lady
by Charles Kingsley

The swevens came up round Harold the Earl,
Like motes in the sunnes beam;
And over him stood the Weird Lady,
In her charmed castle over the sea,
Sang 'Lie thou still and dream.'
'Thy steed is dead in his stall, Earl Harold,
Since thou hast been with me;
The rust has eaten thy harness bright,
And the rats have eaten thy greyhound light,
That was so fair and free.'
Mary Mother she stooped from heaven;
She wakened Earl Harold out of his sweven,
To don his harness on;
And over the land and over the sea
He wended abroad to his own countrie,
A weary way to gon.
Oh but his beard was white with eld,
Oh but his hair was gray;
He stumbled on by stock and stone,
And as he journeyed he made his moan
Along that weary way.
Earl Harold came to his castle wall;
The gate was burnt with fire;
Roof and rafter were fallen down,
The folk were strangers all in the town,
And strangers all in the shire.
Earl Harold came to a house of nuns,
And he heard the dead-bell toll;
He saw the sexton stand by a grave;
'Now Christ have mercy, who did us save,
Upon yon fair nun's soul.'
The nuns they came from the convent gate
By one, by two, by three;
They sang for the soul of a lady bright
Who died for the love of a traitor knight:
It was his own lady.
He stayed the corpse beside the grave;
'A sign, a sign!' quod he.
'Mary Mother who rulest heaven,
Send me a sign if I be forgiven
By the woman who so loved me.'
A white dove out of the coffin flew;
Earl Harold's mouth it kist;
He fell on his face, wherever he stood;
And the white dove carried his soul to God
Or ever the bearers wist.
Durham, 1840.
The Frog That Wished To Be As Big As The Ox.[1]
by Jean de La Fontaine

The tenant of a bog,
An envious little frog,
Not bigger than an egg,
A stately bullock spies,
And, smitten with his size,
Attempts to be as big.
With earnestness and pains,
She stretches, swells, and strains,
And says, 'Sis Frog, look here! see me!
Is this enough?' 'No, no.'
'Well, then, is this?' 'Poh! poh!
Enough! you don't begin to be.'
And thus the reptile sits,
Enlarging till she splits.
The world is full of folks
Of just such wisdom; - 
The lordly dome provokes
The cit to build his dome;
And, really, there is no telling
How much great men set little ones a swelling.
Bee An Apple
by Paul Cameron Brown

The taste of an apple,
the cringing of a bee
as sun stops turning
a ladle over their skins;
the fire gold stains
on apple's skin,
the honey yellow, black bits
a hornet wrinkles in.
The Tailor.
by Robert Burns

Tune - "The Tailor fell thro' the bed, thimbles an' a'."
I.
The Tailor fell thro' the bed, thimbles an' a',
The Tailor fell thro' the bed, thimbles an' a';
The blankets were thin, and the sheets they were sma',
The Tailor fell thro' the bed, thimbles an' a'.
II.
The sleepy bit lassie, she dreaded nae ill,
The sleepy bit lassie, she dreaded nae ill;
The weather was cauld, and the lassie lay still,
She thought that a tailor could do her nae ill.
III.
Gie me the groat again, canny young man;
Gie me the groat again, canny young man;
The day it is short, and the night it is lang,
The dearest siller that ever I wan!
IV.
There's somebody weary wi' lying her lane;
There's somebody weary wi' lying her lane;
There's some that are dowie, I trow would be fain
To see the bit tailor come skippin' again.
A More Ancient Mariner.
by Bliss Carman (William)

The swarthy bee is a buccaneer,
A burly velveted rover,
Who loves the booming wind in his ear
As he sails the seas of clover.
A waif of the goblin pirate crew,
With not a soul to deplore him,
He steers for the open verge of blue
With the filmy world before him.
His flimsy sails abroad on the wind
Are shivered with fairy thunder;
On a line that sings to the light of his wings
He makes for the lands of wonder.
He harries the ports of the Hollyhocks,
And levies on poor Sweetbrier;
He drinks the whitest wine of Phlox,
And the Rose is his desire.
He hangs in the Willows a night and a day;
He rifles the Buckwheat patches;
Then battens his store of pelf galore
Under the tautest hatches.
He woos the Poppy and weds the Peach,
Inveigles Daffodilly,
And then like a tramp abandons each
For the gorgeous Canada Lily.
There's not a soul in the garden world
But wishes the day were shorter,
When Mariner B. puts out to sea
With the wind in the proper quarter.
Or, so they say! But I have my doubts;
For the flowers are only human,
And the valor and gold of a vagrant bold
Were always dear to woman.
He dares to boast, along the coast,
The beauty of Highland Heather,--
How he and she, with night on the sea,
Lay out on the hills together.
He pilfers from every port of the wind,
From April to golden autumn;
But the thieving ways of his mortal days
Are those his mother taught him.
His morals are mixed, but his will is fixed;
He prospers after his kind,
And follows an instinct, compass-sure,
The philosophers call blind.
And that is why, when he comes to die,
He'll have an easier sentence
Than some one I know who thinks just so,
And then leaves room for repentance.
He never could box the compass round;
He doesn't know port from starboard;
But he knows the gates of the Sundown Straits,
Where the choicest goods are harbored.
He never could see the Rule of Three,
But he knows a rule of thumb
Better than Euclid's, better than yours,
Or the teachers' yet to come.
He knows the smell of the hydromel
As if two and two were five;
And hides it away for a year and a day
In his own hexagonal hive.
Out in the day, hap-hazard, alone,
Booms the old vagrant hummer,
With only his whim to pilot him
Through the splendid vast of summer.
He steers and steers on the slant of the gale,
Like the fiend or Vanderdecken;
And there's never an unknown course to sail
But his crazy log can reckon.
He drones along with his rough sea-song
And the throat of a salty tar,
This devil-may-care, till he makes his lair
By the light of a yellow star.
He looks like a gentleman, lives like a lord,
And works like a Trojan hero;
Then loafs all winter upon his hoard,
With the mercury at zero.
The Swallow And The Red-Breast. (From The Villager's Verse-Book.) An Apologue.
by William Lisle Bowles

The swallows, at the close of day,
When autumn shone with fainter ray,
Around the chimney circling flew,
Ere yet they bade a long adieu,
To climes where soon the winter drear
Shall close the unrejoicing year.
Now with swift wing they skim aloof,
Now settle on the crowded roof,
As counsel and advice to take,
Ere they the chilly north forsake.
Then one, disdainful, turned his eye,
Upon a red-breast twittering nigh,
And thus began, with taunting scorn:
Thou household imp, obscure, forlorn,
Through the deep winter's dreary day,
Here, dull and shivering, shalt thou stay;
Whilst we, who make the world our home,
To softer climes impatient roam,
Where summer, still on some green isle
Rests, with her sweet and lovely smile?
Thus speeding, far and far away,
We leave behind the shortening day.
'Tis true (the red-breast answered, meek)
No other scenes I ask, or seek;
To every change alike resigned,
I fear not the cold winter's wind.
When spring returns, the circling year
Shall find me still contented here;
But whilst my warm affections rest
Within the circle of my nest,
I learn to pity those that roam,
And love the more my humble home.
At Day-Close In November
by Thomas Hardy

The ten hours' light is abating,
And a late bird flies across,
Where the pines, like waltzers waiting,
Give their black heads a toss.
Beech leaves, that yellow the noon-time,
Float past like specks in the eye;
I set every tree in my June time,
And now they obscure the sky.
And the children who ramble through here
Conceive that there never has been
A time when no tall trees grew here,
A time when none will be seen.