DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Endymion  (For Music)
by Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde

The apple trees are hung with gold,
And birds are loud in Arcady,
The sheep lie bleating in the fold,
The wild goat runs across the wold,
But yesterday his love he told,
I know he will come back to me.
O rising moon!    O Lady moon!
Be you my lover's sentinel,
You cannot choose but know him well,
For he is shod with purple shoon,
You cannot choose but know my love,
For he a shepherd's crook doth bear,
And he is soft as any dove,
And brown and curly is his hair.
The turtle now has ceased to call
Upon her crimson-footed groom,
The grey wolf prowls about the stall,
The lily's singing seneschal
Sleeps in the lily-bell, and all
The violet hills are lost in gloom.
O risen moon!    O holy moon!
Stand on the top of Helice,
And if my own true love you see,
Ah! if you see the purple shoon,
The hazel crook, the lad's brown hair,
The goat-skin wrapped about his arm,
Tell him that I am waiting where
The rushlight glimmers in the Farm.
The falling dew is cold and chill,
And no bird sings in Arcady,
The little fauns have left the hill,
Even the tired daffodil
Has closed its gilded doors, and still
My lover comes not back to me.
False moon!    False moon!    O waning moon!
Where is my own true lover gone,
Where are the lips vermilion,
The shepherd's crook, the purple shoon?
Why spread that silver pavilion,
Why wear that veil of drifting mist?
Ah! thou hast young Endymion
Thou hast the lips that should be kissed!
The Hornets And The Bees.
by Jean de La Fontaine

[1]
"The artist by his work is known." - 
A piece of honey-comb, one day,
Discover'd as a waif and stray,
The hornets treated as their own.
Their title did the bees dispute,
And brought before a wasp the suit.
The judge was puzzled to decide,
For nothing could be testified
Save that around this honey-comb
There had been seen, as if at home,
Some longish, brownish, buzzing creatures,
Much like the bees in wings and features.
But what of that? for marks the same,
The hornets, too, could truly claim.
Between assertion, and denial,
The wasp, in doubt, proclaim'd new trial;
And, hearing what an ant-hill swore,
Could see no clearer than before.
'What use, I pray, of this expense?'
At last exclaim'd a bee of sense.
'We've labour'd months in this affair,
And now are only where we were.
Meanwhile the honey runs to waste:
'Tis time the judge should show some haste.
The parties, sure, have had sufficient bleeding,
Without more fuss of scrawls and pleading.
Let's set ourselves at work, these drones and we,
And then all eyes the truth may plainly see,
Whose art it is that can produce
The magic cells, the nectar juice.'
The hornets, flinching on their part,
Show that the work transcends their art.
The wasp at length their title sees,
And gives the honey to the bees.
Would God that suits at laws with us
Might all be managed thus!
That we might, in the Turkish mode,
Have simple common sense for code!
They then were short and cheap affairs,
Instead of stretching on like ditches,
Ingulfing in their course all riches, - 
The parties leaving for their shares,
The shells (and shells there might be moister)
From which the court has suck'd the oyster.[2]
The Auld Carle.
by David Rorie M.D.

The auld man had a girnin' wife,
An' she was aye compleenin',
For a' kin' o' orra things
The body aye was greenin'.
It's "I'll try this," and "I'll try that,"
At ilka adverteesement,
She flang his siller richt an' left
An' niver got nae easement.
The carle he led sic a life,
The haill thing was a scunner,
Sae ae braw day his birse was up,
He fairly roondit on her.
"Ye're aye gaun to dee, gude-wife-
Fowre nichts I hinna sleepit,
Gin it's to be, I wush to peace
Ye'd set a day an' keep it!"
Wow! noo there was a tirravee!
An angry wife was she, than!
"An' is it no' my ain affair
The day I'm gaun to dee, than!
Aha! ye think ye'll tryst the wricht
An' rid him o' his timmer?
Syne haud anither waddin' wi'
Some feckless, thowless limmer!"
Awyte, but noo she's fu' o' life
She's ta'en anither tack o't!
An' aye that she flees oot on him
His words is at the back o't!
Sae keep your tongue atween your teeth
When ettlin' to be cliver,
Ense ye'll be like the auld carle
An' en' waur aff than iver!
The Bairns Gat Out.
by Robert Burns

Tune - "The deuks dang o'er my daddie."
I.
The bairns gat out wi' an unco shout,
The deuks dang o'er my daddie, O!
The fien'-ma-care, quo' the feirrie auld wife,
He was but a paidlin body, O!
He paidles out, an' he paidles in,
An' he paidles late an' early, O!
This seven lang years I hae lien by his side,
An' he is but a fusionless carlie, O!
II.
O, hand your tongue, my feirrie auld wife,
O, haud your tongue, now Nansie, O!
I've seen the day, and sae hae ye,
Ye wadna been sae donsie, O!
I've seen the day ye butter'd my brose,
And cuddled me late and early, O!
But downa do's come o'er me now,
And, oh! I feel it sairly, O!
In An Old Garden.
by Madison Julius Cawein

The Autumn pines and fades
Upon the withered trees;
And over there, a choked despair,
You hear the moaning breeze.
The violets are dead;
Dead the tall hollyhocks,
That hang like rags on the wind-crushed flags,
And the lilies' livid stocks.
The wild gourd clambers free
Where the clematis was wont;
Where nenuphars waxed thick as stars
Rank weeds stagnate the font.
Yet in my dreams I hear
A tinkling mandolin;
In the dark blue light of a fragrant night
Float in and out and in.
And the dewy vine that climbs
To my lady's lattice sways,
And behind the vine there come to shine
Two pleasant eyes and gaze.
And now a perfume comes,
A swift Favonian gust;
And the shrinking grass where it doth pass
Bows slave-like to the dust.
In dreams I see her drift
A mist of drapery;
In her jeweled shawl divinely tall,
A Dian deity.
The moon broods high and full
O'er the broken Psyche cold,
And there she stands her dainty hands
And thin wrists warm with gold.
But lovers now are dead,
The air is stung with frosts;
And naught may you find save the homeless wind,
Dead violets' ghosts and ghosts.
Nursery Rhyme. CVI. Proverbs.
by Unknown

The art of good driving 's a paradox quite,
Though custom has prov'd it so long;
If you go to the left, you're sure to go right,
If you go to the right, you go wrong.
The Married Man
by Rudyard Kipling

The bachelor 'e fights for one
As joyful as can be;
But the married man don't call it fun,
Because 'e fights for three,
For 'Im an' 'Er an' It
(An' Two an' One make Three)
'E wants to finish 'is little bit,
An' e' wants to go 'ome to is tea!
The bachelor pokes up 'is 'ead
To see if you are gone;
But the married man lies down instead,
An' waits till the sights come on,
For 'im an' 'Er an' a hit
(Direct or recochee)
'E wants to finish 'is little bit,
An' 'e wants to go 'ome to 'is tea.
The bachelor will miss you clear
To fight another day;
But the married man, 'e says "No fear!"
'E wants you out of the way
Of 'Im an' 'Er an' It
(An' 'is road to 'is farm or the sea),
'E wants to finish 'is little bit,
An' 'e wants to go 'ome to 'is tea.
The bachelor 'e fights 'is fight
An' streches out an' snores;
But the married man sits up all night,
For 'e don't like out-o'-doors.
'E'll strain an' listen an' peer
An' give the first alarm,
For the sake o' the breathin' 'e's used to 'ear,
An' the 'ead on the thick of 'is arm.
The bachelor may risk 'is 'ide
To 'elp you when you're downed;
But the married man will wait beside
Till the ambulance comes round.
'E'll take your 'ome address
An' all you've time to say,
Or if 'e sees there's 'ope, 'e'll press
Your art'ry 'alf the day,
For 'Im an' 'Er an' It
(An' One from Three leaves Two),
For 'e knows you wanted to finish your bit,
An' 'e knows 'oo's wantin' you.
Yes, 'Im an' 'Er an' It
(Our 'only One in Three),
We're all of us anxious to finish our bit,
An' we want to get 'ome to our tea!
Yes, It an' 'Er an' 'Im,
Which often makes me think
The married man must sink or swim
An', 'e can't afford to sink!
Oh, 'Im an' It an' 'Er
Since Adam an' Eve began!
So I'd rather fight with the bachelor
An' be nursed by the married man!
The Flight Of The Crows
by Emily Pauline Johnson

The autumn afternoon is dying o'er
The quiet western valley where I lie
Beneath the maples on the river shore,
Where tinted leaves, blue waters and fair sky
Environ all; and far above some birds are flying by
To seek their evening haven in the breast
And calm embrace of silence, while they sing
Te Deums to the night, invoking rest
For busy chirping voice and tired wing - 
And in the hush of sleeping trees their sleeping cradles swing.
In forest arms the night will soonest creep,
Where sombre pines a lullaby intone,
Where Nature's children curl themselves to sleep,
And all is still at last, save where alone
A band of black, belated crows arrive from lands unknown.
Strange sojourn has been theirs since waking day,
Strange sights and cities in their wanderings blend
With fields of yellow maize, and leagues away
With rivers where their sweeping waters wend
Past velvet banks to rocky shores, in canyons bold to end.
O'er what vast lakes that stretch superbly dead,
Till lashed to life by storm-clouds, have they flown?
In what wild lands, in laggard flight have led
Their aerial career unseen, unknown,
'Till now with twilight come their cries in lonely monotone?
The flapping of their pinions in the air
Dies in the hush of distance, while they light
Within the fir tops, weirdly black and bare,
That stand with giant strength and peerless height,
To shelter fairy, bird and beast throughout the closing night.
Strange black and princely pirates of the skies,
Would that your wind-tossed travels I could know!
Would that my soul could see, and, seeing, rise
To unrestricted life where ebb and flow
Of Nature's pulse would constitute a wider life below!
Could I but live just here in Freedom's arms,
A kingly life without a sovereign's care!
Vain dreams! Day hides with closing wings her charms,
And all is cradled in repose, save where
Yon band of black, belated crows still frets the evening air.
Death
by Victor James Daley

The awful seers of old, who wrote in words
Like drops of blood great thoughts that through the night
Of ages burn, as eyes of lions light
Deep jungle-dusks; who smote with songs like swords
The soul of man on its most secret chords,
And made the heart of him a harp to smite,
Where are they? where that old man lorn of sight,
The king of song among these laurelled lords?
But where are all the ancient singing-spheres
That burst through chaos like the summer's breath
Through ice-bound seas where never seaman steers?
Burnt out. Gone down. No star remembereth
These stars and seers well-silenced through the years
The songless years of everlasting death.
An Abandoned Quarry
by Madison Julius Cawein

The barberry burns, the rose-hip crimsons warm,
And haw and sumach hedge the hill with fire,
Down which the road winds, worn of hoof and tire,
Only the blueberry-picker plods now from the farm.
Here once the quarry-driver, brown of arm,
Wielded the whip when, deep in mud and mire,
The axle strained, and earned his daily hire,
Labouring bareheaded in both sun and storm.
Wild-cherry now and blackberry and bay
Usurp the place: the wild-rose, undisturbed,
Riots, where once the workman earned his wage,
Whose old hands rest now, like this granite grey,
These rocks, whose stubborn will whilom he curbed,
Hard as the toil that was his heritage.
Marston Moor
by Joseph Horatio Chant

The armies met on Marston Moor,
'Midst lightning's flash and thunder's roar;
As murky clouds sweep o'er the sky,
God's cannonade with man's will vie.
The Royalists in phalanx strong,
By fiery Rupert led along,
From Bolton's cruel massacre
Towards York, in hope to keep it free
From the Roundheads at any cost.
"If York be lost, my crown is lost"--
Wrote Charles to this trusted chief,
And he must bring it prompt relief.
The foe's true strength he did not know,
But dazzled much by victory's glow
He hoped with ease to overthrow
The untrained volunteers;
Nor did he for brave Cromwell care,
Tho' he had asked "is Cromwell there?"
Would not his grenadiers
Scatter those yeomen to their fields,
To hold their ploughs instead of shields?
Thus confident of great success
He asked his chaplain now to bless
From God's own word their going out,
And seemed to hear the victor's shout,
While from the ranks of Roundheads rose
Triumphant hymns, ere came the blows.
Now Rupert madly dashes out,
"God and the King!" his battle shout;
Charges the parliamentary ranks
In centre, heedless of the flanks,
Defeats Lord Fairfax and Leven,
Scatters like leaves their untrained men.
Remorselessly he hewed them down,
And chased their leaders far from town.
But Cromwell kept his men restrained
Till Rupert thought the victory gained.
His eye was all ablaze with fire,
And burned his soul with righteous ire;
Then sharp and passionate came the cry,
"Charge, in the name of the Most High!"
His features now most clearly show
A strange, enthusiastic glow.
With zeal he wraps himself about,
And fires men's hearts with glance and shout.
"For God and king," is Rupert's cry.
"For truth and peace we dare to die!"
Shouts Cromwell, all the lines along,
Which holds as with a mighty thong
Th' immortal hosts of Puritans,
While on them fall the Royal bans.
As Roundheads, Rupert them derides;
Not Roundheads now, but Ironsides.
The heavens were black, the storm still raged,
As tho' with earth a war it waged,
But raged a fiercer war just then,
Not forces blind, but men with men;
For two score thousand men were there;
And booming cannon rent the air.
The Cavaliers were scattered wide,
Brought to the dust their haughty pride;
Across the beanfield Rupert fled,
His standard gone, his garments red;
His men by many hundreds turned
To ask for mercy, nor were spurned;
While he left all and to York sped,
Heedless of stores, or Royal dead.
To Cromwell's swords as stubble they,
And Truth and Peace had gained the day.
But Not To Me
by Sara Teasdale

The April night is still and sweet
With flowers on every tree;
Peace comes to them on quiet feet,
But not to me.
My peace is hidden in his breast
Where I shall never be;
Love comes to-night to all the rest,
But not to me.
Limitations Of Genius
by James Whitcomb Riley

The audience entire seemed pleased - indeed
Extremely pleased. And little Maymie, freed
From her task of instructing, ran to show
Her wondrous colored picture to and fro
Among the company.
"And how comes it," said
Some one to Mr. Hammond, "that, instead
Of the inventor's life you did not choose
The artist's? - since the world can better lose
A cutting-box or reaper than it can
A noble picture painted by a man
Endowed with gifts this drawing would suggest" - 
Holding the picture up to show the rest.
"There now!" chimed in the wife, her pale face lit
Like winter snow with sunrise over it, - 
"That's what I'm always asking him. - But he - 
Well, as he's answering you, he answers me, - 
With that same silent, suffocating smile
He's wearing now!"
For quite a little while
No further speech from anyone, although
All looked at Mr. Hammond and that slow,
Immutable, mild smile of his. And then
The encouraged querist asked him yet again
Why was it, and etcetera - with all
The rest, expectant, waiting 'round the wall, - 
Until the gentle Mr. Hammond said
He'd answer with a "parable," instead - 
About "a dreamer" that he used to know - 
"An artist" - "master" - all - in embryo.
The Enemies
by John Frederick Freeman

The angry wind
That cursed at me
Was nothing but an evil sprite
Vexed with any man's delight.
And strange it seemed
That a dark wind
Should run down from a mountain steep
And shout as though the world were asleep.
But when he ceased
And silence was--
Who could but fear what evil sprite
Crept through the tunnels of the night?
A New Year's Plaint
by James Whitcomb Riley

In words like weeds, I'll wrap me o'er,
Like coarsest clothes against the cold;
But that large grief which these enfold
Is given in outline and no more.
- TENNYSON.
The bells that lift their yawning throats
And lolling tongues with wrangling cries
Flung up in harsh, discordant notes,
As though in anger, at the skies, -
Are filled with echoings replete,
With purest tinkles of delight -
So I would have a something sweet
Ring in the song I sing to-night.
As when a blotch of ugly guise
On some poor artist's naked floor
Becomes a picture in his eyes,
And he forgets that he is poor, -
So I look out upon the night,
That ushers in the dawning year,
And in a vacant blur of light
I see these fantasies appear.
I see a home whose windows gleam
Like facets of a mighty gem
That some poor king's distorted dream
Has fastened in his diadem.
And I behold a throng that reels
In revelry of dance and mirth,
With hearts of love beneath their heels,
And in their bosoms hearts of earth.
O Luxury, as false and grand
As in the mystic tales of old,
When genii answered man's command,
And built of nothing halls of gold!
O Banquet, bright with pallid jets,
And tropic blooms, and vases caught
In palms of naked statuettes,
Ye can not color as ye ought!
For, crouching in the storm without,
I see the figure of a child,
In little ragged roundabout,
Who stares with eyes that never smiled -
And he, in fancy can but taste
The dainties of the kingly fare,
And pick the crumbs that go to waste
Where none have learned to kneel in prayer.
Go, Pride, and throw your goblet down -
The "merry greeting" best appears
On loving lips that never drown
Its worth but in the wine of tears;
Go, close your coffers like your hearts,
And shut your hearts against the poor,
Go, strut through all your pretty parts
But take the "Welcome" from your door.
In Memoriam. - Miss Alice Beckwith,
by Lydia Howard Sigourney

Died at Hartford, September 23d, 1859.
The beautiful hath fled
To join the spirit-train;
Earth interposed with strong array,
Love stretch'd his arms to bar her way,
All,--all in vain.
There was a bridal hope
Before her crown'd with flowers;
The orange blossoms took the hue
With which the cypress dank with dew
Darkeneth our bowers.
Affections strong and warm
Sprang round her gentle way,
Young Childhood, with a moisten'd eye,
And Friendship's tenderest sympathy
Watch'd her decay.
Disease around her couch
Long held a tyrant sway,
Till vanished from her cheek, the rose,
And the fair flesh like vernal snows
Wasted away.
Yet the dark Angel's touch
Dissolv'd that dire control,
And where the love-knot cannot break
Nor pain nor grief intrusion make,
Bore the sweet soul.
Christine.
by John Milton Hay

The beauty of the Northern dawns,
Their pure, pale light is thine;
Yet all the dreams of tropic nights
Within thy blue eyes shine.
Not statelier in their prisoning seas
The icebergs grandly move,
But in thy smile is youth and joy,
And in thy voice is love.
Thou art like Hecla's crest that stands
So lonely, proud, and high,
No earthly thing may come between
Her summit and the sky.
The sun in vain may strive to melt
Her crown of virgin snow -
But the great heart of the mountain glows
With deathless fire below.
Sonnets - Sir Walter Scott
by Henry Kendall

The Bard of ancient lore! Like one forlorn,
He turned, enamoured, to the silent Past;
And searching down its mazes gray and vast,
As you might find the blossom by the thorn,
He found fair things in barren places cast
And brought them up into the light of morn.
Lo! Truth, resplendent, as a tropic dawn,
Shines always through his wond'rous pictures! Hence
The many quick emotions which are born
Of an Imagination so intense!
The chargers' hoofs come tearing up the sward
The claymores rattle in the restless sheath;
You close his page, and almost look abroad
For Highland glens and windy leagues of heath.
To Mrs. King, On Her Kind Present To The Author, A Patchwork Counterpane Of Her Own Making.
by William Cowper

The bard, if e'er he feel at all,
Must sure be quicken'd by a call
Both on his heart and head,
To pay with tuneful thanks the care
And kindness of a lady fair,
Who deigns to deck his bed.
A bed like this, in ancient time,
On Ida's barren top sublime
(As Homer's epic shows),
Composed of sweetest vernal flowers,
Without the aid of sun or showers,
For Jove and Juno rose.
Less beautiful, however gay,
Is that which in the scorching day
Receives the weary swain,
Who, laying his long scythe aside,
Sleeps on some bank with daisies pied,
Till roused to toil again.
What labours of the loom I see!
Looms numberless have groan'd for me!
Should every maiden come
To scramble for the patch that bears
The impress of the robe she wears,
The bell would toll for some.
And oh, what havoc would ensue!
This bright display of every hue
All in a moment fled!
As if a storm should strip the bowers
Of all their tendrils, leaves, and flowers'
Each pocketing a shred.
Thanks then to every gentle fair
Who will not come to peck me bare
As bird of borrow'd feather,
And thanks to one above them all,
The gentle fair of Pertenhall,
Who put the whole together.
Range-Finding
by Robert Lee Frost

The battle rent a cobweb diamond-strung
And cut a flower beside a ground bird's nest
Before it stained a single human breast.
The stricken flower bent double and so hung.
And still the bird revisited her young.
A butterfly its fall had dispossessed
A moment sought in air his flower of rest,
Then lightly stooped to it and fluttering clung.
On the bare upland pasture there had spread
O'ernight 'twixt mullein stalks a wheel of thread
And straining cables wet with silver dew.
A sudden passing bullet shook it dry.
The indwelling spider ran to greet the fly,
But finding nothing, sullenly withdrew.
Her Passing
by William Henry Drummond

The beauty and the life
Of life's and beauty's fairest paragon
O tears! O grief! hung at a feeble thread
To which pale Atropos had set her knife;
The soul with many a groan
Had left each outward part,
And now did take his last leave of the heart:
Naught else did want, save death, ev'n to be dead;
When the afflicted band about her bed,
Seeing so fair him come in lips, cheeks, eyes,
Cried, 'Ah! and can Death enter Paradise?'
The Lion.
by William Morris

The Beasts that be
In wood and waste,
Now sit and see,
Nor ride nor haste.