DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Waking
by John Frederick Freeman

Lying beneath a hundred seas of sleep
With all those heavy waves flowing over me,
And I unconscious of the rolling night
Until, slowly, from deep to lesser deep
Risen, I felt the wandering seas no longer cover me
But only air and light....
It was a sleep
So dark and so bewilderingly deep
That only death's were deeper or completer,
And none when I awoke stranger or sweeter.
Awake, the strangeness still hung over me
As I with far-strayed senses stared at the light.
I--and who was I?
Saw--oh, with what unaccustomed eye!
The room was strange and everything was strange
Like a strange room entered by wild moonlight;
And yet familiar as the light swept over me
And I rose from the night.
Strange--yet stranger I.
And as one climbs from water up to land
Fumbling for weedy steps with foot and hand,
So I for yesterdays whereon to climb
To this remote and new-struck isle of time.
But I found not myself nor yesterday--
Until, slowly, from deep to lesser deep
Risen, I felt the seas no longer over me
But only air and light.
Yes, like one clutching at a ring I heard
The household noises as they stirred,
And holding fast I wondered. What were they?
I felt a strange hand lying at my side,
Limp and cool. I touched it and knew it mine.
A murmur, and I remembered how the wind died
In the near aspens. Then
Strange things were no more strange.
I travelled among common thoughts again;
And felt the new forged links of that strong chain
That binds me to myself, and this to-day
To yesterday. I heard it rattling near
With a no more astonished ear.
And I had lost the strangeness of that sleep,
No more the long night rolled its great seas over me.
--O, too anxious I!
For in this press of things familiar
I have lost all that clung
Round me awaking of strangeness and such sweetness
Nothing now is strange
Except the man that woke and then was I.
Nursery Rhyme. CCCCLXXIX. Love And Matrimony.
by Unknown

"Madam, I am come to court you,
If your favour I can gain."
"Ah, Ah!" said she, "you are a bold fellow,
If I e'er see your face again!"
"Madam, I have rings and diamonds,
Madam, I have houses and land,
Madam, I have a world of treasure,
All shall be at your command."
"I care not for rings and diamonds,
I care not for houses and lands,
I care not for a world of treasure,
So that I have but a handsome man."
"Madam, you think much of beauty,
Beauty hasteneth to decay,
For the fairest of flowers that grow in summer
Will decay and fade away."
Masked.
by Madison Julius Cawein

Lying alone I dreamed a dream last night:
Methought that Joy had come to comfort me
For all the past, its suffering and slight,
Yet in my heart I felt this could not be.
All that he said unreal seemed and strange,
Too beautiful to last beyond to-morrow;
Then suddenly his features seemed to change,
The mask of joy dropped from the face of Sorrow.
Marcia
by Edgar Lee Masters

Madeline's hair is straight and yours
Is just as curly as tendril vines;
And she is fair, but a deeper color
Your cheeks of olive incarnadines.
A serious wisdom burns and glows
Steadily in your dark-eyed look.
Already a wit and a little stoic - 
Perhaps you are going to write a book,
Or paint a picture, or sing or act
The part of Katherine or Juliet.
I believe you were born with the gift of knowing
When to remember and when to forget.
And when to stifle and kill a grief,
And clutch your heart when it beats in vain.
The heart that has most strength for feeling
Must have the strength to conquer the pain.
You understand? It seems that you do - 
Though you cannot utter a word to me.
Marcia, Marcia, look at Madeline
Building a doll-house under the tree!
September Midnights
by Sara Teasdale

Lyric night of the lingering Indian Summer,
Shadowy fields that are scentless but full of singing,
Never a bird, but the passionless chant of insects,
Ceaseless, insistent.
The grasshopper's horn, and far-off, high in the maples,
The wheel of a locust leisurely grinding the silence
Under a moon waning and worn, broken,
Tired with summer.
Let me remember you, voices of little insects,
Weeds in the moonlight, fields that are tangled with asters,
Let me remember, soon will the winter be on us,
Snow-hushed and heavy.
Over my soul murmur your mute benediction,
While I gaze, O fields that rest after harvest,
As those who part look long in the eyes they lean to,
Lest they forget them.
Verses - Spoken to Lady Henrietta Cavendish Holles-Harley, Countess of Oxford
by Matthew Prior

Madam, Since Anna visited the muse's seat,
(Around her tomb let weeping angels wait)
Hail, thou, the brightest of thy sex, and best,
Most gracious neighbour and most welcome guest:
Not Harley's self, to Cam and Isis dear,
In virtues and in arts great Oxford's heir,
Not he such present honour shall receive
As to his consort we aspire to give.
Writings of men our thought to-day neglects,
To pay due homage to the softer sex:
Plato and Tully we forbear to read,
And their great followers whom this house has bred,
To study lessons from thy morals given,
And shining characters impress'd by Heaven.
Science in books no longer we pursue,
Minerva's self in Harriet's face we view;
For when with Beauty we can Virtue join,
We paint the semblance of a form divine.
Their pious incense let our neighbours bring
To the kind memory of some bounteous king:
With grateful hand due altars let them raise
To some good knight's or holy prelate's praise;
We tune our voices to a nobler theme,
Your eyes we bless, your praises we proclaim;
Saint John's was founded in a woman's name.
Enjoin'd by statute, to the fair we bow;
In spite of time we keep our ancient vow;
What Marg'ret Tudor was, in Harriet Harley now.
Lying In Me
by Anna Akhmatova

Lying in me, as though it were a white
Stone in the depths of a well, is one
Memory that I cannot, will not, fight:
It is happiness, and it is pain.
Anyone looking straight into my eyes
Could not help seeing it, and could not fail
To become thoughtful, more sad and quiet
Than if he were listening to some tragic tale.
I know the gods changed people into things,
Leaving their consciousness alive and free.
To keep alive the wonder of suffering,
You have been metamorphosed into me.
To Her Royal Highness The Duchess,[1]
by John Dryden

On The Memorable Victory Gained By The Duke Over The Hollanders, June 3, 1665. And On Her Journey Afterwards Into The North.
Madam,
When, for our sakes, your hero you resign'd
To swelling seas, and every faithless wind;
When you released his courage, and set free
A valour fatal to the enemy;
You lodged your country's cares within your breast
(The mansion where soft love should only rest):
And, ere our foes abroad were overcome,
The noblest conquest you had gain'd at home.
Ah, what concerns did both your souls divide!
Your honour gave us what your love denied:
And 'twas for him much easier to subdue
Those foes he fought with, than to part from you.
That glorious day, which two such navies saw,
As each unmatch'd might to the world give law.
Neptune, yet doubtful whom he should obey,
Held to them both the trident of the sea:
The winds were hush'd, the waves in ranks were cast,
As awfully as when God's people pass'd;
Those, yet uncertain on whose sails to blow,
These, where the wealth of nations ought to flow.
Then with the duke your highness ruled the day:
While all the brave did his command obey,
The fair and pious under you did pray.
How powerful are chaste vows! the wind and tide
You bribed to combat on the English, side.
Thus to your much-loved lord you did convey
An unknown succour, sent the nearest way.
New vigour to his wearied arms you brought
(So Moses was upheld while Israel fought),
While, from afar, we heard the cannon play,[2]
Like distant thunder on a shiny day.
For absent friends we were ashamed to fear
When we consider'd what you ventured there.
Ships, men, and arms, our country might restore,
But such a leader could supply no more.
With generous thoughts of conquest he did burn,
Yet fought not more to vanquish than return.
Fortune and victory he did pursue,
To bring them as his slaves to wait on you.
Thus beauty ravish'd the rewards of fame,
And the fair triumph'd when the brave o'ercame.
Then, as you meant to spread another way
By land your conquests, far as his by sea,
Leaving our southern clime you march'd along
The stubborn North, ten thousand Cupids strong.
Like commons the nobility resort
In crowding heaps, to fill your moving court:
To welcome your approach the vulgar run,
Like some new envoy from the distant sun;
And country beauties by their lovers go,
Blessing themselves, and wondering at the show.
So when the new-born Phoenix first is seen,
Her feather'd subjects all adore their queen;
And while she makes her progress through the east,
From every grove her numerous train's increased;
Each poet of the air her glory sings,
And round him the pleased audience clap their wings.
The Great Calamity
by Banjo Paterson (Andrew Barton)

MacFierce'un came to Whiskeyhurst
When summer days were hot,
And bided there wi' Jock MacThirst,
A brawny brother Scot.
Good faith! They made the whisky fly
Like Highland chieftains true,
And when they'd drunk the beaker dry
They sang, "We are nae fou!
There's nae folk like oor ain folk,
Sae gallant and sae true."
They sang the only Scottish joke
Which is, "We are nae fou".
Said bold MacThirst, "Let Saxons jaw
Aboot their great concerns,
But Bonnie Scotland beats them a',
The Land o' Cakes and Burns,
The land of pairtridge, deer, and grouse;
Fill up your glass, I beg,
There's muckle whiskey i' the house,
Forbye what's in the keg."
And here a hearty laugh he laughed,
"Just come wi' me, I beg."
MacFierce'un saw with pleasure daft
A fifty-gallon keg.
"Losh, man, that's graund," MacFierce'un cried,
"Saw ever man the like,
Moo, wi' the daylicht, I maun ride
To meet a Southron tyke,
But I'll be back ere summer's gone,
So bide for me, I beg;
We'll mak' a graund assault upon
Yon deevil of a keg."
*             *             *             *             *             *
MacFierce'un rode to Whiskeyhurst
When summer days were gone,
And there he met with Jock MacThirst
Was greetin' all alone.
"MacThirst, what gars ye look sae blank?
Hae all your wuts gane daft?
Has that accursed Southron bank
Called up your overdraft?
Is all your grass burnt up wi' drouth?
Is wool and hides gane flat?"
MacThirst replied, "Guid friend, in truth,
'Tis muckle waur than that."
"Has sair misfortune cursed your life
That you should weep sae free?
Is harm upon your bonnie wife,
The children at your knee?
Is scaith upon your house and hame?"
MacThirst upraised his head:
"My bairns hae done the deed of shame,
'Twere better they were dead.
To think my bonnie infant son
Should do the deed o' guilt,
He let the whiskey spigot run,
And a' the whiskey's spilt!"
*             *             *             *             *             *
Upon them both these words did bring
A solemn silence deep;
Good faith, it is a fearsome thing
To see two strong men weep.
Dough Face
by Madison Julius Cawein

Made a face of biscuit-dough,
Which our black cook gave me once;
And this girl named So-and-So
Said 't was funnier than a dunce.
And she took it; put it on
Like a false-face. Had it drawn
Over all her face. "Ain't it,"
So she said, "a perfect fit?"
She looked funny as a clown;
And I called her Dough Face; she
Laughed and said, "Let's saunter down
Where the people, too, can see.
Maybe one will recognize,
In these features, nose and eyes,
Some long-lost belov'd child,
And for very joy go wild."
It was getting dusk; and there
At the corner stood some girls;
When they saw us, I declare,
They just hollered, tossed their curls,
Ran away; and Dough Face fast
After them. And running past
Came some boys who, when they saw,
Shouted at her, "Mardi Graw!"
And one said, "That looks to me
Like that Girlie Good Enough.
Just as dough-faced, is n't she?
Get some dirt. Let's treat her rough."
And they got soft mud to throw.
Then she cried, "I'm So-and-So";
And the boys all shouted; for
You must know she's popular.
Then we had great times, we did:
First one boy he tried it on,
Then another; and he hid
In a house where folks were gone;
Stood there at a window where
People passing in the square
Saw him; and a nigger-man,
Scared to death, just yelled and ran.
Then another fellow clomb
A back-fence, and put the face
Over his. My! he looked rum.
Like a scarecrow in a place
Where he never ought to be.
And he rose up suddenly
By the window with a yell,
And the cook she shrieked and fell.
But the house-man, who was there
In the kitchen, was n't scared;
He just jumped up from his chair,
Banged the door wide; out he flared,
Caught that boy and cried"police!"
Tore the dough-mask, piece by piece,
From his face: then So-and-So
Screamed at him, "You let him go!"
On the hydrant was a hose;
Quick she took it; turned it on;
Streamed it in his mouth and nose:
In a moment we were gone,
Left him spluttering at our backs
Blind with water. We made tracks
Home. And So-and-So just crowed,
"End of Dough Face ep-i-sode."
Sonnet C. Written December 1790.
by Anna Seward

Lyre of the Sonnet, that full many a time
Amus'd my lassitude, and sooth'd my pains,
When graver cares forbade the lengthen'd strains,
To thy brief bound, and oft-returning chime
A long farewell! - the splendid forms of Rhyme
When Grief in lonely orphanism reigns,
Oppress the drooping Soul. - DEATH's dark domains
Throw mournful shadows o'er the Aonian clime;
For in their silent bourne my filial bands
Lie all dissolv'd; - and swiftly-wasting pour
From my frail glass of life, health's sparkling sands.
Sleep then, my LYRE, thy tuneful tasks are o'er,
Sleep! for my heart bereav'd, and listless hands
Wake with rapt touch thy glowing strings no more!
In The Poppy Field
by James Stephens

Mad Patsy said, he said to me,
That every morning he could see
An angel walking on the sky;
Across the sunny skies of morn
He threw great handfuls far and nigh
Of poppy seed among the corn;
And then, he said, the angels run
To see the poppies in the sun.
A poppy is a devil weed,
I said to him, he disagreed;
He said the devil had no hand
In spreading flowers tall and fair
Through corn and rye and meadow land,
By garth and barrow everywhere:
The devil has not any flower,
But only money in his power.
And then he stretched out in the sun
And rolled upon his back for fun:
He kicked his legs and roared for joy
Because the sun was shining down,
He said he was a little boy
And would not work for any clown:
He ran and laughed behind a bee,
And danced for very ecstasy.
To A Madonna
by Charles Baudelaire

Madonna, mistress, I would build for thee
An altar deep in the sad soul of me;
And in the darkest corner of my heart,
From mortal hopes and mocking eyes apart,
Carve of enamelled blue and gold a shrine
For thee to stand erect in, Image divine!
And with a mighty Crown thou shalt be crowned
Wrought of the gold of my smooth Verse, set round
With starry crystal rhymes; and I will make,
O mortal maid, a Mantle for thy sake,
And weave it of my jealousy, a gown
Heavy, barbaric, stiff, and weighted down
With my distrust, and broider round the hem
Not pearls, but all my tears in place of them.
And then thy wavering, trembling robe shall be
All the desires that rise and fall in me
From mountain-peaks to valleys of repose,
Kissing thy lovely body's white and rose.
For thy humiliated feet divine,
Of my Respect I'll make thee Slippers fine
Which, prisoning them within a gentle fold,
Shall keep their imprint like a faithful mould.
And if my art, unwearying and discreet,
Can make no Moon of Silver for thy feet
To have for Footstool, then thy heel shall rest
Upon the snake that gnaws within my breast,
Victorious Queen of whom our hope is born!
And thou shalt trample down and make a scorn
Of the vile reptile swollen up with hate.
And thou shalt see my thoughts, all consecrate,
Like candles set before thy flower-strewn shrine,
O Queen of Virgins, and the taper-shine
Shall glimmer star-like in the vault of blue,
With eyes of flame for ever watching you.
While all the love and worship in my sense
Will be sweet smoke of myrrh and frankincense.
Ceaselessly up to thee, white peak of snow,
My stormy spirit will in vapours go!
And last, to make thy drama all complete,
That love and cruelty may mix and meet,
I, thy remorseful torturer, will take
All the Seven Deadly Sins, and from them make
In darkest joy, Seven Knives, cruel-edged and keen,
And like a juggler choosing, O my Queen,
That spot profound whence love and mercy start,
I'll plunge them all within thy panting heart!
Lyman, Frederick, And Jim
by Eugene Field

(FOR THE FELLOWSHIP CLUB)
Lyman and Frederick and Jim, one day,
Set out in a great big ship--
Steamed to the ocean adown the bay
Out of a New York slip.
"Where are you going and what is your game?"
The people asked those three.
"Darned if we know; but all the same
Happy as larks are we;
And happier still we're going to be!"
Said Lyman
And Frederick
And Jim.
The people laughed "Aha, oho!
Oho, aha!" laughed they;
And while those three went sailing so
Some pirates steered that way.
The pirates they were laughing, too--
The prospect made them glad;
But by the time the job was through
Each of them pirates, bold and bad,
Had been done out of all he had
By Lyman
And Frederick
And Jim.
Days and weeks and months they sped,
Painting that foreign clime
A beautiful, bright vermilion red--
And having a ---- of a time!
'T was all so gaudy a lark, it seemed
As if it could not be,
And some folks thought it a dream they dreamed
Of sailing that foreign sea,
But I'll identify you these three--
Lyman
And Frederick
And Jim.
Lyman and Frederick are bankers and sich
And Jim is an editor kind;
The first two named are awfully rich
And Jim ain't far behind!
So keep your eyes open and mind your tricks,
Or you are like to be
In quite as much of a Tartar fix
As the pirates that sailed the sea
And monkeyed with the pardners three,
Lyman
And Frederick
And Jim!
The Monk Maelanfaid
by Michael Earls

Maelanfaid saw a tiny bird
A-grieving on the ground,
And O, the sad lament he heard,
That sorrow's self might sound:
He could not read a note or word
The song of grief inwound.
Maelanfaid went within his cell
To keep a fast and pray,
To listen to a voice would tell
The mystery away:
What was the red long pain befell
The bird of grief all day?
"Maelanfaid," airy voices call,
"MacOcha Molv is dead,
Who killed no creature great or small,
Who helped all life instead:
Now griefs of bird and blossom fall
Around his funeral bed."
Indian Summer
by Sara Teasdale

Lyric night of the lingering Indian summer,
Shadowy fields that are scentless but full of singing,
Never a bird, but the passionless chant of insects,
Ceaseless, insistent.
The grasshopper's horn, and far off, high in the maples
The wheel of a locust slowly grinding the silence,
Under a moon waning and warn and broken,
Tired with summer.
Let me remember you, voices of little insects,
Weeds in the moonlight, fields that are tangled with asters,
Let me remember you, soon the winter will be on us,
Snow-hushed and heartless.
Over my soul murmur your mute benediction
While I gaze, oh fields that rest after harvest,
As those who part look long in the eyes they lean to,
Lest they forget them.
Nursery Rhyme. CXC. Riddles.
by Unknown

Made in London,
Sold at York,
Stops a bottle
And is a cork.
Lyre! Though Such Power Do In Thy Magic Live
by William Wordsworth

Lyre! though such power do in thy magic live
As might from India's farthest plain
Recall the not unwilling Maid,
Assist me to detain
The lovely Fugitive:
Check with thy notes the impulse which, betrayed
By her sweet farewell looks, I longed to aid.
Here let me gaze enrapt upon that eye,
The impregnable and awe-inspiring fort
Of contemplation, the calm port
By reason fenced from winds that sigh
Among the restless sails of vanity.
But if no wish be hers that we should part,
A humbler bliss would satisfy my heart.
Where all things are so fair,
Enough by her dear side to breathe the air
Of this Elysian weather;
And, on or in, or near, the brook, espy
Shade upon the sunshine lying
Faint and somewhat pensively;
And downward Image gaily vying
With its upright living tree
'Mid silver clouds, and openings of blue sky
As soft almost and deep as her cerulean eye.
Nor less the joy with many a glance
Cast up the Stream or down at her beseeching,
To mark its eddying foam-balls prettily distrest
By ever-changing shape and want of rest;
Or watch, with mutual teaching,
The current as it plays
In flashing leaps and stealthy creeps
Adown a rocky maze;
Or note (translucent summer's happiest chance!)
In the slope-channel floored with pebbles bright,
Stones of all hues, gem emulous of gem,
So vivid that they take from keenest sight
The liquid veil that seeks not to hide them.
Marzo Pazzo
by Algernon Charles Swinburne

Mad March, with the wind in his wings wide-spread,
Leaps from heaven, and the deep dawn's arch
Hails re-risen again from the dead
Mad March.
Soft small flames on rowan and larch
Break forth as laughter on lips that said
Nought till the pulse in them beat love's march.
But the heartbeat now in the lips rose-red
Speaks life to the world, and the winds that parch
Bring April forth as a bride to wed
Mad March.
To W. R. (Madam Life's A Piece In Bloom)
by William Ernest Henley

Madam Life's a piece in bloom
Death goes dogging everywhere:
She's the tenant of the room,
He's the ruffian on the stair.
You shall see her as a friend,
You shall bilk him once and twice;
But he'll trap you in the end,
And he'll stick you for her price.
With his kneebones at your chest,
And his knuckles in your throat,
You would reason - plead - protest!
Clutching at her petticoat;
But she's heard it all before,
Well she knows you've had your fun,
Gingerly she gains the door,
And your little job is done.
1877