DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Peddling Round The World
by Henry Lawson

When at first in foreign parts
Was her flag unfurled,
England was a Gipsy lass
Peddling round the world.
Sailing on the Spanish Main,
Everywhere you roam,
Peddling in the Persian Gulf
Things she'd made at home.
Peddling round the world,
Peddling round the world,
England was a Gipsy lass
Peddling round the world.
England never wanted war,
Not on land or sea,
Other nations rising up
Couldn't let her be.
England only wanted peace,
And the ocean's breath;
So there came, in course of time,
Queen Elizabeth.
Queen Elizabeth,
Queen Elizabeth,
Came a plain, bad-tempered queen,
Called Elizabeth.
Queen Elizabeth, she called
Drake, and Raleigh too,
Essex, Howard, and the rest
Of the pirate crew;
'See what you can do,' she said.
'England's feeling sick,
If you don't, I'll hang you all!
Better do it quick.'
'Better do it quick,' she said,
'Better do it quick';
And they knew she'd keep her word,
So they did it quick.
Drake and Raleigh sailed away,
(Only Bess they feared)
Cleared the Spanish Main and singed
The King of Spain his beard,
Singed the King of Spain his beard,
And his hair they curled.
England was a Gipsy's love
Peddling round the world.
Peddling round the world,
Peddling round the world.
England was a Gipsy's love
Peddling round the world.
Once again, when Cromwell came,
England wanted room;
So he lowered Holland's tone,
Smashed the Dutchman's broom.
Sent a message to Algiers;
Made its meaning plain,
On the way they called once more
On the King of Spain.
On the King of Spain,
On the King of Spain:
Called, to jog his memory,
On the King of Spain.
So the years went round and round,
Over hills and flats,
England was a Gipsy wife,
England had her brats;
Peddling in the China Sea,
Far from English ground;
Doing biz with Mrs. Jap,
Peddling all around.
Peddling all around,
Peddling all around;
Making friends with Mrs. Jap,
Peddling all around.
When the war is past and gone,
With its blood and tears;
And the world may count upon
Peace for fifty years,
When the gory battle-flags
Round their sticks are furled,
Then you'll see a Gipsy crone
Peddling round the world.
Peddling round the world,
Peddling round the world.
Then you'll see a Gipsy crone
A-peddling round the world!
Shawl as old as Joseph's coat,
Hair as white as snow,
Mind as bright as Seventeen,
Eyes still like the sloe,
Peddling in the Southern Seas,
Everywhere you roam,
And she'll fill her baskets here
With things we'll make at home.
Things we'll make at home,
Things we'll make at home,
Call to fill her baskets here
With things we'll make at home.
On One Who Lived And Died Where He Was Born
by Thomas Hardy

When a night in November
Blew forth its bleared airs
An infant descended
His birth-chamber stairs
For the very first time,
At the still, midnight chime;
All unapprehended
His mission, his aim. -
Thus, first, one November,
An infant descended
The stairs.
On a night in November
Of weariful cares,
A frail aged figure
Ascended those stairs
For the very last time:
All gone his life's prime,
All vanished his vigour,
And fine, forceful frame:
Thus, last, one November
Ascended that figure
Upstairs.
On those nights in November -
Apart eighty years -
The babe and the bent one
Who traversed those stairs
From the early first time
To the last feeble climb -
That fresh and that spent one -
Were even the same:
Yea, who passed in November
As infant, as bent one,
Those stairs.
Wise child of November!
From birth to blanched hairs
Descending, ascending,
Wealth-wantless, those stairs;
Who saw quick in time
As a vain pantomime
Life's tending, its ending,
The worth of its fame.
Wise child of November,
Descending, ascending
Those stairs!
Language
by Nizar Qabbani

When a man is in love
how can he use old words?
Should a woman
desiring her lover
lie down with
grammarians and linguists?
I said nothing
to the woman I loved
but gathered
love's adjectives into a suitcase
and fled from all languages.
The West's Asleep.
by Thomas Osborne Davis

Air--The Brink of the White Rocks.
I.
When all beside a vigil keep,
The West's asleep, the West's asleep--
Alas! and well may Erin weep,
When Connaught lies in slumber deep.
There lake and plain smile fair and free,
'Mid rocks--their guardian chivalry--
Sing oh! let man learn liberty
From crashing wind and lashing sea.
II.
That chainless wave and lovely land
Freedom and Nationhood demand--
Be sure, the great God never planned,
For slumbering slaves, a home so grand.
And, long, a brave and haughty race
Honoured and sentinelled the place--
Sing oh! not even their sons' disgrace
Can quite destroy their glory's trace.
III.
For often, in O'Connor's van,
To triumph dashed each Connaught clan--
And fleet as deer the Normans ran
Through Corlieu's Pass and Ardrahan.
And later times saw deeds as brave;
And glory guards Clanricarde's grave--
Sing oh! they died their land to save,
At Aughrim's slopes and Shannon's wave.
IV.
And if, when all a vigil keep,
The West's asleep, the West's asleep--
Alas! and well may Erin weep,
That Connaught lies in slumber deep.
But, hark! some voice like thunder spake:
"The West's awake! the West's awake!"--
"Sing oh! hurra! let England quake,
We'll watch till death for Erin's sake!"
Leander's Obsequies.
by Robert Herrick

When as Leander young was drown'd
No heart by Love receiv'd a wound,
But on a rock himself sat by,
There weeping sup'rabundantly.
Sighs numberless he cast about,
And, all his tapers thus put out,
His head upon his hand he laid,
And sobbing deeply, thus he said:
"Ah, cruel sea," and, looking on't,
Wept as he'd drown the Hellespont.
And sure his tongue had more express'd
But that his tears forbade the rest.
The Cricket's Song
by Eugene Field

When all around from out the ground
The little flowers are peeping,
And from the hills the merry rills
With vernal songs are leaping,
I sing my song the whole day long
In woodland, hedge, and thicket--
And sing it, too, the whole night through,
For I 'm a merry cricket.
The children hear my chirrup clear
As, in the woodland straying,
They gather flow'rs through summer hours--
And then I hear them saying:
"Sing, sing away the livelong day,
Glad songster of the thicket--
With your shrill mirth you gladden earth,
You merry little cricket!"
When summer goes, and Christmas snows
Are from the north returning,
I quit my lair and hasten where
The old yule-log is burning.
And where at night the ruddy light
Of that old log is flinging
A genial joy o'er girl and boy,
There I resume my singing.
And, when they hear my chirrup clear,
The children stop their playing--
With eager feet they haste to greet
My welcome music, saying:
"The little thing has come to sing
Of woodland, hedge, and thicket--
Of summer day and lambs at play--
Oh, how we love the cricket!"
Money Makes The Mirth
by Robert Herrick

When all birds else do of their music fail,
Money's the still-sweet-singing nightingale!
The Patriot's Bed (The Rocky Road To Dublin)
by James Stephens

When a son you shall desire,
Pray to water and to fire;
But when you would have a daughter,
Pray to fire and then to water.
Death Of Captain Cooke, - Of "The Bellerophon," Killed In The Same Battle
by William Lisle Bowles

When anxious Spain, along her rocky shore,
From cliff to cliff returned the sea-fight's roar;
When flash succeeding flash, tremendous broke
The haze incumbent, and the clouds of smoke,
As oft the volume rolled away, thy mien,
Thine eye, serenely terrible, was seen,
My gallant friend. Hark! the shrill bugle[1] calls,
Is the day won! alas, he falls he falls!
His soul from pain, from agony release!
Hear his last murmur, Let me die in peace![2]
Yet still, brave Cooke, thy country's grateful tear,
Shall wet the bleeding laurel on thy bier.
But who shall wake to joy, through a long life
Of sadness, thy beloved and widowed wife,
Who now, perhaps, thinks how the green seas foam,
That bear thy victor ship impatient home!
Alas! the well-known views, the swelling plain,
Thy laurel-circled home, endeared in vain,
The brook, the church, those chestnuts darkly-green,[3]
Yon fir-crowned summit,[4] and the village scene,
Wardour's long sweep of woods, the nearer mill,
And high o'er all, the turrets of Font Hill:
These views, when summer comes, shall charm no more
Him o'er whose welt'ring corse the wild waves roar,
Enough: 'twas Honour's voice that awful cried,
Glory to him who for his country died!
Yet dreary is her solitude who bends
And mourns the best of husbands, fathers, friends!
Oh! when she wakes at midnight, but to shed
Fresh tears of anguish on her lonely bed,
Thinking on him who is not; then restrain
The tear, O God, and her sad heart sustain!
Giver of life, may she remember still
Thy chastening hand, and to thy sovereign will
Bow silently; not hopeless, while her eye
She raises to a bright futurity,
And meekly trusts, in heaven, Thou wilt restore
That happiness the world can give no more!
I Love You
by Sara Teasdale

When April bends above me
And finds me fast asleep
Dust need not keep the secret
A live heart died to keep.
When April tells the thrushes,
The meadow-larks will know,
And pipe the three words lightly
To all the winds that blow.
Above his roof the swallows,
In notes like far-blown rain,
Will tell the little sparrow
Beside his window-pane.
O sparrow, little sparrow,
When I am fast asleep,
Then tell my love the secret
That I have died to keep.
When April Comes!
by Virna Sheard

When April comes with softly shining eyes,
And daffodils bound in her wind-blown hair,
Oh, she will coax all clouds from out the skies,
And every day will bring some sweet surprise, - 
The swallows will come swinging through the air
When April comes!
When April comes with tender smile and tear,
Dear dandelions will gild the common ways,
And at the break of morning we will hear
The piping of the robins crystal clear - 
While bobolinks will whistle through the days,
When April comes!
When April comes, the world so wise and old,
Will half forget that it is worn and grey;
Winter will seem but as a tale long told - 
Its bitter winds with all its frost and cold
Will be the by-gone things of yesterday,
When April comes!
Life's Seasons
by Madison Julius Cawein

I
When all the world was Mayday,
And all the skies were blue,
Young innocence made playday
Among the flowers and dew;
Then all of life was Mayday,
And clouds were none or few.
II
When all the world was Summer,
And morn shone overhead,
Love was the sweet newcomer
Who led youth forth to wed;
Then all of life was Summer,
And clouds were golden red.
III
When earth was all October,
And days were gray with mist,
On woodways, sad and sober,
Grave memory kept her tryst;
Then life was all October,
And clouds were twilight-kissed.
IV
Now all the world's December,
And night is all alarm,
Above the last dim ember
Grief bends to keep him warm;
Now all of life's December,
And clouds are driven storm.
April
by Nancy Rebecca Campbell Glass

When April weeps, she wakes the flowers
That slept the winter through.
Oh, did they dream those frosty hours
That she would be untrue
And not awaken them in time
To smile their smiles of love,
To hear the robin's merry chime,
And gentle cooing dove?
And when they feel their mother's tears
So gently o'er them weep,
Will they tell her of their simple fears
And visions while asleep?
And will they tell her that they dreamed,
Beneath their sheets of snow,
Such weary dreamings that it seemed
The winter ne'er would go?
They'll soon be wide-awake and up,
In dainty robes arrayed,
Blue violet, gold buttercup,
And quaker-lady staid.
Wild eglantine and clustering thorn
Will grace the byway lanes,
Whilst woodland flowers the dells adorn
And daisies cheer the plains.
The rippling streamlet soon will be
A crystal mirror bright
For waving branch and mint and tree
That nod in golden light
Of summer sunbeams glad'ning rays
Filling the heart with love,
While nature and earth, uniting, praise
The God who reigns above.
In lowly spots will lilies spring
And scent the summer breeze,
And on the earth there'll be no king
Arrayed like one of these.
So weeping April's tears will bring
Her children from the tomb,
Will dress the earth in robes of spring,
Brightened by fragrant bloom.
A Second Childhood
by Gilbert Keith Chesterton

When all my days are ending
And I have no song to sing,
I think I shall not be too old
To stare at everything;
As I stared once at a nursery door
Or a tall tree and a swing.
Wherein God's ponderous mercy hangs
On all my sins and me,
Because He does not take away
The terror from the tree
And stones still shine along the road
That are and cannot be.
Men grow too old for love, my love,
Men grow too old for wine,
But I shall not grow too old to see
Unearthly daylight shine,
Changing my chamber's dust to snow
Till I doubt if it be mine.
Behold, the crowning mercies melt,
The first surprises stay;
And in my dross is dropped a gift
For which I dare not pray:
That a man grow used to grief and joy
But not to night and day.
Men grow too old for love, my love,
Men grow too old for lies;
But I shall not grow too old to see
Enormous night arise,
A cloud that is larger than the world
And a monster made of eyes.
Nor am I worthy to unloose
The latchet of my shoe;
Or shake the dust from off my feet
Or the staff that bears me through
On ground that is too good to last,
Too solid to be true.
Men grow too old to woo, my love,
Men grow too old to wed:
But I shall not grow too old to see
Hung crazily overhead
Incredible rafters when I wake
And find I am not dead.
A thrill of thunder in my hair:
Though blackening clouds be plain,
Still I am stung and startled
By the first drop of the rain:
Romance and pride and passion pass
And these are what remain.
Strange crawling carpets of the grass,
Wide windows of the sky:
So in this perilous grace of God
With all my sins go I:
And things grow new though I grow old,
Though I grow old and die.
The Contemplative Sentry.
by William Schwenck Gilbert

When all night long a chap remains
On sentry-go, to chase monotony
He exercises of his brains,
That is, assuming that he's got any,
Though never nurtured in the lap
Of luxury, yet I admonish you,
I am an intellectual chap,
And think of things that would astonish you.
I often think it's comical
How Nature always does contrive
That every boy and every gal
That's born into the world alive
Is either a little Liberal,
Or else a little Conservative!
Fal lal la!
When in that house M.P.'s divide,
If they've a brain and cerebellum, too.
They're got to leave that brain outside.
And vote just as their leaders tell 'em to.
But then the prospect of a lot
Of statesmen, all in close proximity.
A-thinking for themselves, is what
No man can face with equanimity.
Then let's rejoice with loud Fal lal
That Nature wisely does contrive
That every boy and every gal
That's born into the world alive,
Is either a little Liberal,
Or else a little Conservative!
Fal lal la!
The Fool By The Roadside
by William Butler Yeats

When all works that have
From cradle run to grave
From grave to cradle run instead;
When thoughts that a fool
Has wound upon a spool
Are but loose thread, are but loose thread;
When cradle and spool are past
And I mere shade at last
Coagulate of stuff
Transparent like the wind,
I think that I may find
A faithful love, a faithful love.
Ecclesiastical Sonnets - Part III. - VII - Persecution Of The Scottish Covenanters
by William Wordsworth

When Alpine Vales threw forth a suppliant cry,
The Majesty of England interposed
And the sword stopped; the bleeding wounds were closed;
And Faith preserved her ancient purity.
How little boots that precedent of good,
Scorned or forgotten, Thou canst testify,
For England's shame, O Sister Realm! from wood,
Mountain, and moor, and crowded street, where lie
The headless martyrs of the Covenant,
Slain by Compatriot-protestants that draw
From councils senseless as intolerant
Their warrant. Bodies fall by wild sword-law;
But who would force the Soul, tilts with a straw
Against a Champion cased in adamant.
Young And Old
by Charles Kingsley

When all the world is young, lad,
And all the trees are green;
And every goose a swan, lad,
And every lass a queen;
Then hey for boot and horse, lad,
And round the world away;
Young blood must have its course, lad,
And every dog his day.
When all the world is old, lad,
And all the trees are brown;
And all the sport is stale, lad,
And all the wheels run down;
Creep home, and take your place there,
The spent and maimed among:
God grant you find one face there,
You loved when all was young.
From The Water-Babies.    1862
Being Once Blind, His Request To Bianca.
by Robert Herrick

When age or chance has made me blind,
So that the path I cannot find,
And when my falls and stumblings are
More than the stones i' th' street by far,
Go thou afore, and I shall well
Follow thy perfumes by the smell;
Or be my guide, and I shall be
Led by some light that flows from thee.
Thus held or led by thee, I shall
In ways confus'd nor slip or fall.
Ideal
by James Elroy Flecker

When all my gentle friends had gone
I wandered in the night alone:
Beneath the green electric glare
I saw men pass with hearts of stone.
Yet still I heard them everywhere,
Those golden voices of the air:
"Friend, we will go to hell with thee,
Thy griefs, thy glories we will share,
And rule the earth, and bind the sea,
And set ten thousand devils free;--"
"What dost thou, stranger, at my side,
Thou gaunt old man accosting me?
Away, this is my night of pride!
On lunar seas my boat will glide
And I shall know the secret things."
The old man answered: "Woe betide!"
Said I "The world was made for kings:
To him who works and working sings
Come joy and majesty and power
And steadfast love with royal wings."
"O watch these fools that blink and cower,"
Said that wise man: "and every hour
A score is born, a dozen dies."
Said I: --"In London fades the flower;
But far away the bright blue skies
Shall watch my solemn walls arise,
And all the glory, all the grace
Of earth shall gather there, and eyes
Will shine like stars in that new place."
Said he. "Indeed of ancient race
Thou comest, with thy hollow scheme.
But sail, O architect of dream,
To lands beyond the Ocean stream.
Where are the islands of the blest,
And where Atlantis, where Theleme?"
When All Is Done
by Paul Laurence Dunbar

When all is done, and my last word is said,
And ye who loved me murmur, "He is dead,"
Let no one weep, for fear that I should know,
And sorrow too that ye should sorrow so.
When all is done and in the oozing clay,
Ye lay this cast-off hull of mine away,
Pray not for me, for, after long despair,
The quiet of the grave will be a prayer.
For I have suffered loss and grievous pain,
The hurts of hatred and the world's disdain,
And wounds so deep that love, well-tried and pure,
Had not the pow'r to ease them or to cure.
When all is done, say not my day is o'er,
And that thro' night I seek a dimmer shore:
Say rather that my morn has just begun,--
I greet the dawn and not a setting sun,
When all is done.
Upon Graciosa, Walking And Talking. (From 'Troy Town'.)
by Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

When as abroad, to greet the morn,
I mark my Graciosa walk,
In homage bends the whisp'ring corn,
Yet to confess
Its awkwardness
Must hang its head upon the stalk.
And when she talks, her lips do heal
The wounds her lightest glances give:--
In pity then be harsh, and deal
Such wounds that I
May hourly die,
And, by a word restored, live.
Sonnet XI
by Alan Seeger

* A paraphrase of Petrarca, 'Quando fra l'altre donne . . .'
When among creatures fair of countenance
Love comes enformed in such proud character,
So far as other beauty yields to her,
So far the breast with fiercer longing pants;
I bless the spot, and hour, and circumstance,
That wed desire to a thing so high,
And say, Glad soul, rejoice, for thou and I
Of bliss unpaired are made participants;
Hence have come ardent thoughts and waking dreams
That, feeding Fancy from so sweet a cup,
Leave it no lust for gross imaginings.
Through her the woman's perfect beauty gleams
That while it gazes lifts the spirit up
To that high source from which all beauty springs.
The Lamp.
by Robert Herrick

When a man's faith is frozen up, as dead;
Then is the lamp and oil extinguished.
When All Is Said
by J. D. C. Fellow

When all is said
And all is done
Beneath the Sun,
And Man lies dead;
When all the earth
Is a cold grave,
And no more brave
Bright things have birth;
When cooling sun
And stone-cold world,
Together hurled,
Flame up as one, 
O Sons of Men,
When all is flame,
What of your fame
And splendour then?
When all is fire
And flaming air,
What of your rare
And high desire
To turn the clod
To a thing divine,
The earth a shrine,
And Man the God?
Young Beauty
by William Henry Davies

When at each door the ruffian winds
Have laid a dying man to groan,
And filled the air on winter nights
With cries of infants left alone;
And every thing that has a bed
Will sigh for others that have none:
On such a night, when bitter cold,
Young Beauty, full of love thoughts sweet,
Can redden in her looking-glass;
With but one gown on, in bare feet,
She from her own reflected charms
Can feel the joy of summer's heat.
When Abroad In The World.
by Thomas Moore

When abroad in the world thou appearest.
And the young and the lovely are there,
To my heart while of all thou'rt the dearest.
To my eyes thou'rt of all the most fair.
They pass, one by one,
Like waves of the sea,
That say to the Sun,
"See, how fair we can be."
But where's the light like thine,
In sun or shade to shine?
No--no, 'mong them all, there is nothing like thee,
Nothing like thee.
Oft, of old, without farewell or warning,
Beauty's self used to steal from the skies;
Fling a mist round her head, some fine morning,
And post down to earth in disguise;
But, no matter what shroud
Around her might be,
Men peeped through the cloud,
And whispered, "'Tis She."
So thou, where thousands are,
Shinest forth the only star,--
Yes, yes, 'mong them all, there is nothing like thee,
Nothing like thee.
To His Worthy Friend, M. Arthur Bartly.
by Robert Herrick

When after many lusters thou shalt be
Wrapt up in sear-cloth with thine ancestry;
When of thy ragg'd escutcheons shall be seen
So little left, as if they ne'er had been;
Thou shalt thy name have, and thy fame's best trust,
Here with the generation of my Just.
Nature The Healer
by Richard Le Gallienne

When all the world has gone awry,
And I myself least favour find
With my own self, and but to die
And leave the whole sad coil behind,
Seems but the one and only way;
Should I but hear some water falling
Through woodland veils in early May,
And small bird unto small bird calling - 
O then my heart is glad as they.
Lifted my load of cares, and fled
My ghosts of weakness and despair,
And, unafraid, I raise my head
And Life to do its utmost dare;
Then if in its accustomed place
One flower I should chance find blowing,
With lovely resurrected face
From Autumn's rust and Winter's snowing - 
I laugh to think of my disgrace.
A simple brook, a simple flower,
A simple wood in green array, - 
What, Nature, thy mysterious power
To bind and heal our mortal clay?
What mystic surgery is thine,
Whose eyes of us seem all unheeding,
That even so sad a heart as mine
Laughs at the wounds that late were bleeding? - 
Yea! sadder hearts, O Power Divine.
I think we are not otherwise
Than all the children of thy knee;
For so each furred and winged one flies,
Wounded, to lay its heart on thee;
And, strangely nearer to thy breast,
Knows, and yet knows not, of thy healing,
Asking but there awhile to rest,
With wisdom beyond our revealing - 
Knows and yet knows not, and is blest.
A Lover's Journey
by Rudyard Kipling

When a lover hies abroad
Looking for his love,
Azrael smiling sheathes his sword,
Heaven smiles above.
Earth and sea
His servants be,
And to lesser compass round,
That his love be sooner found!