DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
M * * *
by Abram Joseph Ryan

When I am dead, and all will soon forget
My words, and face, and ways --
I, somehow, think I'll walk beside thee yet
Adown thy after days.
I die first, and you will see my grave;
But child! you must not cry;
For my dead hand will brightest blessings wave
O'er you from yonder sky.
You must not weep; I believe I'd hear your tears
Tho' sleeping in a tomb:
My rest would not be rest, if in your years
There floated clouds of gloom.
For -- from the first -- your soul was dear to mine,
And dearer it became,
Until my soul, in every prayer, would twine
Thy name -- my child! thy name.
You came to me in girlhood pure and fair,
And in your soul -- and face --
I saw a likeness to another there
In every trace and grace.
You came to me in girlhood -- and you brought
An image back to me;
No matter what -- or whose -- I often sought
Another's soul in thee.
Didst ever mark how, sometimes, I became --
Gentle though I be --
Gentler than ever when I called thy name,
Gentlest to thee?
You came to me in girlhood; as your guide
I watched your spirit's ways;
We walked God's holy valleys side by side,
And so went on the days.
And so went on the years -- 'tis five and more;
Your soul is fairer now;
A light as of a sunset on a shore
Is falling on my brow --
Is falling, soon to fade; when I am dead
Think this, my child, of me:
I never said -- I never could have said --
Ungentle words to thee.
I treated you as I would treat a flower,
I watched you with such care;
And from my lips God heard in many an hour
Your name in many a prayer.
I watched the flower's growth; so fair it grew,
On not a leaf a stain;
Your soul to purest thoughts so sweetly true;
I did not watch in vain.
I guide you still -- in my steps you tread still;
Towards God these ways are set;
'Twill soon be over: child! when I am dead
I'll watch and guide you yet.
'Tis better far that I should go before,
And you awhile should stay;
But I will wait upon the golden shore
To meet my child some day.
When I am dead; in some lone after time,
If crosses come to thee,
You'll think -- remembering this simple rhyme --
"He holds a crown for me."
I guide you here -- I go before you there;
But here or there -- I know --
Whether the roses, or the thorny crown you wear
I'll watch where'er you go,
And wait until you come; when I am dead
Think, sometimes, child, of this:
You must not weep -- follow where I led,
I wait for you in bliss.
A Request
by Edward Powys Mathers (As Translator)

When I am cold and undesirous and my lids lie dead,
Come to watch by the body that loved you and say:
This is Rondagui, whom I killed and my heart regrets for ever.
From the Persian of Rondagui (tenth century).
Herse
by Algernon Charles Swinburne

When grace is given us ever to behold
A child some sweet months old,
Love, laying across our lips his finger, saith,
Smiling, with bated breath,
Hush! for the holiest thing that lives is here,
And heaven's own heart how near!
How dare we, that may gaze not on the sun,
Gaze on this verier one?
Heart, hold thy peace; eyes, be cast down for shame;
Lips, breathe not yet its name.
In heaven they know what name to call it; we,
How should we know? For, see!
The adorable sweet living marvellous
Strange light that lightens us
Who gaze, desertless of such glorious grace,
Full in a babe's warm face!
All roses that the morning rears are nought,
All stars not worth a thought,
Set this one star against them, or suppose
As rival this one rose.
What price could pay with earth's whole weight of geld
One least flushed roseleafs fold
Of all this dimpling store of smiles that shine
From each warm curve and line,
Each charm of flower-sweet flesh, to reillume
The dappled rose-red bloom
Of all its dainty body, honey-sweet
Clenched hands and curled-up feet,
That on the roses of the dawn have trod
As they came down from God,
And keep the flush and colour that the sky
Takes when the sun comes nigh,
And keep the likeness of the smile their grace
Evoked on God's own face
When, seeing this work of his most heavenly mood,
He saw that it was good?
For all its warm sweet body seems one smile,
And mere men's love too vile
To meet it, or with eyes that worship dims
Read o'er the little limbs,
Read all the book of all their beauties o'er,
Rejoice, revere, adore,
Bow down and worship each delight in turn,
Laugh, wonder, yield, and yearn.
But when our trembling kisses dare, yet dread,
Even to draw nigh its head,
And touch, and scarce with touch or breath surprise
Its mild miraculous eyes
Out of their viewless vision, O, what then,
What may be said of men?
What speech may name a new-born child? what word
Earth ever spake or heard?
The best men's tongue that ever glory knew
Called that a drop of dew
Which from the breathing creature's kindly womb
Came forth in blameless bloom.
We have no word, as had those men most high,
To call a baby by.
Rose, ruby, lily, pearl of stormless seas,
A better word than these,
A better sign it was than flower or gem
That love revealed to them:
They knew that whence comes light or quickening flame,
Thence only this thing came,
And only might be likened of our love
To somewhat born above,
Not even to sweetest things dropped else on earth,
Only to dew's own birth.
Nor doubt we but their sense was heavenly true,
Babe, when we gaze on you,
A dew-drop out of heaven whose colours are
More bright than sun or star,
As now, ere watching love dare fear or hope,
Lips, hands, and eyelids ope,
And all your life is mixed with earthly leaven.
O child, what news from heaven?
The Dance
by R. C. Lehmann

When good-nights have been prattled, and prayers have been said,
And the last little sunbeam is tucked up in bed,
Then, skirting the trees on a carpet of snow,
The elves and the fairies come out in a row.
With a preening of wings
They are forming in rings;
Pirouetting and setting they cross and advance
In a ripple of laughter, and pair for a dance.
And it's oh for the boom of the fairy bassoon,
And the oboes and horns as they strike up a tune,
And the twang of the harps and the sigh of the lutes,
And the clash of the cymbals, the purl of the flutes;
And the fiddles sail in
To the musical din,
While the chief all on fire, with a flame for a hand,
Rattles on the gay measure and stirs up his band.
With a pointing of toes and a lifting of wrists
They are off through the whirls and the twirls and the twists;
Thread the mazes of marvellous figures, and chime
With a bow to a curtsey, and always keep time:
All the gallant and girls
In their diamonds and pearls,
And their gauze and their sparkles, designed for a dance
By the leaders of fairy-land fashion in France.
But the old lady fairies sit out by the trees,
And the old beaux attend them as pert as you please.
They quiz the young dancers and scorn their display,
And deny any grace to the dance of to-day;
"In Oberon's reign,"
So they're heard to complain,
"When we went out at night we could temper our fun
With some manners in dancing, but now there are none."
But at last, though the music goes gallantly on,
And the dancers are none of them weary or gone,
When the gauze is in rags and the hair is awry,
Comes a light in the East and a sudden cock-cry.
With a scurry of fear
Then they all disappear,
Leaving never a trace of their gay little selves
Or the winter-night dance of the fairies and elves.
Memorials Of A Tour In Italy, 1837 - XII. - Near The Lake Of Thrasymene
by William Wordsworth

When here with Carthage Rome to conflict came,
An earthquake, mingling with the battle's shock,
Checked not its rage; unfelt the ground did rock,
Sword dropped not, javelin kept its deadly aim.
Now all is sun-bright peace. Of that day's shame,
Or glory, not a vestige seems to endure,
Save in this Rill that took from blood the name
Which yet it bears, sweet Stream! as crystal pure.
So may all trace and sign of deeds aloof
From the true guidance of humanity,
Thro' Time and Nature's influence, purify
Their spirit; or, unless they for reproof
Or warning serve, thus let them all, on ground
That gave them being, vanish to a sound.
Pastor Cum
by Adam Lindsay Gordon

Translation from Horace
When he, that shepherd false, 'neath Phrygian sails,
Carried his hostess Helen o'er the seas,
In fitful slumber Nereus hush'd the gales,
That he might sing their future destinies.
A curse to your ancestral home you take
With her, whom Greece, with many a soldier bold
Shall seek again, in concert sworn to break
Your nuptial ties and Priam's kingdom old.
Alas! what sweat from man and horse must flow,
What devastation to the Trojan realm
You carry, even now doth Pallas show
Her wrath, preparing buckler, car, and helm.
In vain, secure in Aphrodite's care,
You comb your locks, and on the girlish lyre
Select the strains most pleasant to the fair;
In vain, on couch reclining, you desire
To shun the darts that threaten, and the thrust
Of Cretan lance, the battle's wild turmoil,
And Ajax swift to follow, in the dust
Condemned, though late, your wanton curls to soil.
Ah! see you not where (fatal to your race)
Laertes' son comes with the Pylean sage;
Fearless alike, with Teucer joins the chase
Stenelaus, skill'd the fistic strife to wage,
Nor less expert the fiery steeds to quell;
And Meriones, you must know. Behold
A warrior, than his sire more fierce and fell,
To find you rages, Diomed the bold,
Whom like the stag that, far across the vale,
The wolf being seen, no herbage can allure,
So fly you, panting sorely, dastard pale!
Not thus you boasted to your paramour.
Achilles' anger for a space defers
The day of wrath to Troy and Trojan dame;
Inevitable glide the allotted years,
And Dardan roofs must waste in Argive flame.
The Shepherd Wind
by Virna Sheard

When hills and plains are powdered white,
And bitter cold the north wind blows,
Upon my window in the night
A fairy-garden grows.
Here poppies that no hand hath sown
Bloom white as foam upon the sea,
And elfin bells to earth unknown
Hold frost-bound melody.
And here are blossoms like to stars
Tangled in nets of silver lace - 
My very breath their beauty mars,
Or stirs them from their place.
Perchance the echoes of old songs
Found here a resting place at last
With drifting perfume that belongs
To roses of the past.
Or all the moonbeams that were lost
On summer nights the world forgets
May here be prisoned by the frost
With souls of violets.
The wind doth shepherd many things - 
And when the nights are long and cold,
Who knows how strange a flock he brings
All safely to the fold.
The Young Churchwarden
by Thomas Hardy

When he lit the candles there,
And the light fell on his hand,
And it trembled as he scanned
Her and me, his vanquished air
Hinted that his dream was done,
And I saw he had begun
To understand.
When Love's viol was unstrung,
Sore I wished the hand that shook
Had been mine that shared her book
While that evening hymn was sung,
His the victor's, as he lit
Candles where he had bidden us sit
With vanquished look.
Now her dust lies listless there,
His afar from tending hand,
What avails the victory scanned?
Does he smile from upper air:
"Ah, my friend, your dream is done;
And 'tis YOU who have begun
To understand!
Insufficiency
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

When I attain to utter forth in verse
Some inward thought, my soul throbs audibly
Along my pulses, yearning to be free
And something farther, fuller, higher, rehearse
To the individual, true, and the universe,
In consummation of right harmony:
But, like a wind-exposed distorted tree,
We are blown against for ever by the curse
Which breathes through Nature. Oh, the world is weak!
The effluence of each is false to all,
And what we best conceive we fail to speak.
Wait, soul, until thine ashen garments fall,
And then resume thy broken strains, and seek
Fit peroration without let or thrall.
Content
by Madison Julius Cawein

When I behold how some pursue
Fame, that is Care's embodiment
Or fortune, whose false face looks true,
An humble home with sweet content
Is all I ask for me and you.
An humble home, where pigeons coo,
Whose path leads under breezy lines
Of frosty-berried cedars to
A gate, one mass of trumpet-vines,
Is all I ask for me and you.
A garden, which all summer through,
The roses old make redolent,
And morning-glories, gay of hue,
And tansy, with its homely scent,
Is all I ask for me and you.
An orchard, that the pippins strew,
From whose bruised gold the juices spring;
A vineyard, where the grapes hang blue,
Wine-big and ripe for vintaging,
Is all I ask for me and you.
A lane that leads to some far view
Of forest or of fallow-land,
Bloomed o'er with rose and meadow-rue,
Each with a bee in its hot hand,
Is all I ask for me and you.
At morn, a pathway deep with dew,
And birds to vary time and tune;
At eve, a sunset avenue,
And whippoorwills that haunt the moon,
Is all I ask for me and you.
Dear heart, with wants so small and few,
And faith, that's better far than gold,
A lowly friend, a child or two,
To care for us when we are old,
Is all I ask for me and you.
Sonnets. XVI
by John Milton

When I consider how my light is spent,
E're half my days, in this dark world and wide,
And that one Talent which is death to hide,
Lodg'd with me useless, though my Soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, least he returning chide,
Doth God exact day-labour, light deny'd,
I fondly ask; But patience to prevent
That murmur, soon replies, God doth not need
Either man's work or his own gifts, who best
Bear his milde yoak, they serve him best, his State
Is Kingly. Thousands at his bidding speed
And post o're Land and Ocean without rest:
They also serve who only stand and waite.
His Anthem To Christ On The Cross.
by Robert Herrick

When I behold Thee, almost slain,
With one and all parts full of pain:
When I Thy gentle heart do see
Pierced through and dropping blood for me,
I'll call, and cry out, thanks to Thee.
Vers. But yet it wounds my soul to think
That for my sin Thou, Thou must drink,
Even Thou alone, the bitter cup
Of fury and of vengeance up.
Chor. Lord, I'll not see Thee to drink all
The vinegar, the myrrh, the gall:
Vers. Chor. But I will sip a little wine;
Which done, Lord, say: The rest is Mine.
The South Country
by Hilaire Belloc

When I am living in the Midlands
That are sodden and unkind,
I light my lamp in the evening:
My work is left behind;
And the great hills of the South Country
Come back into my mind.
The great hills of the South Country
They stand along the sea;
And it's there walking in the high woods
That I could wish to be,
And the men that were boys when I was a boy
Walking along with me.
The men that live in North England
I saw them for a day:
Their hearts are set upon the waste fells,
Their skies are fast and grey;
From their castle-walls a man may see
The mountains far away.
The men that live in West England
They see the Severn strong,
A-rolling on rough water brown
Light aspen leaves along.
They have the secret of the Rocks,
And the oldest kind of song.
But the men that live in the South Country
Are the kindest and most wise,
They get their laughter from the loud surf,
And the faith in their happy eyes
Comes surely from our Sister the Spring
When over the sea she flies;
The violets suddenly bloom at her feet,
She blesses us with surprise.
I never get between the pines
But I smell the Sussex air;
Nor I never come on a belt of sand
But my home is there.
And along the sky the line of the Downs
So noble and so bare.
A lost thing could I never find,
Nor a broken thing mend:
And I fear I shall be all alone
When I get towards the end.
Who will there be to comfort me
Or who will be my friend?
I will gather and carefully make my friends
Of the men of the Sussex Weald;
They watch the stars from silent folds,
They stiffly plough the field.
By them and the God of the South Country
My poor soul shall be healed.
If I ever become a rich man,
Or if ever I grow to be old,
I will build a house with deep thatch
To shelter me from the cold,
And there shall the Sussex songs be sung
And the story of Sussex told.
I will hold my house in the high wood
Within a walk of the sea,
And the men that were boys when I was a boy
Shall sit and drink with me.
On His Blindness
by John Milton

When I consider how my light is spent
Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,
And that one talent which is death to hide
Lodg'd with me useless, though my soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, lest he returning chide,
"Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?"
I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies: "God doth not need
Either man's work or his own gifts: who best
Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state
Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed
And post o'er land and ocean without rest:
They also serve who only stand and wait."
A Reverie.
by Jean Ingelow

When I do sit apart
And commune with my heart,
She brings me forth the treasures once my own;
Shows me a happy place
Where leaf-buds swelled apace,
And wasting rims of snow in sunlight shone.
Rock, in a mossy glade,
The larch-trees lend thee shade,
That just begin to feather with their leaves;
From out thy crevice deep
White tufts of snowdrops peep,
And melted rime drips softly from thine eaves.
Ah, rock, I know, I know
That yet thy snowdrops grow,
And yet doth sunshine fleck them through the tree,
Whose sheltering branches hide
The cottage at its side,
That nevermore will shade or shelter me.
I know the stockdoves' note
Athwart the glen doth float:
With sweet foreknowledge of her twins oppressed,
And longings onward sent,
She broods before the event,
While leisurely she mends her shallow nest.
Once to that cottage door,
In happy days of yore,
My little love made footprints in the snow.
She was so glad of spring,
She helped the birds to sing,
I know she dwells there yet - the rest I do not know.
They sang, and would not stop,
While drop, and drop, and drop,
I heard the melted rime in sunshine fall;
And narrow wandering rills,
Where leaned the daffodils,
Murmured and murmured on, and that was all.
I think, but cannot tell,
I think she loved me well,
And some dear fancy with my future twined.
But I shall never know,
Hope faints, and lets it go,
That passionate want forbid to speak its mind.
Loveliness.
by Madison Julius Cawein

I.
When I fare forth to kiss the eyes of Spring,
On ways, which arch gold sunbeams and pearl buds
Embraced, two whispers we search - wandering
By goblin forests and by girlish floods
Deep in the hermit-holy solitudes - 
For stalwart Dryads romping in a ring;
Firm limbs an oak-bark-brown, and hair - wild woods
Have perfumed - loops of radiance; and they,
Most coyly pleasant, as we linger by,
Pout dimpled cheeks, more rose than rosiest sky,
Honeyed; and us good-hearted laughter fling
Like far-out reefs that flute melodious spray.
II.
Then we surprise each Naiad ere she slips - 
Nude at her toilette - in her fountain's glass,
With damp locks dewy, and large godlike hips
Cool-glittering; but discovered, when - alas!
From green, indented moss and plushy grass, - 
Her great eyes' pansy-black reproaching, - dips
She white the cloven waters ere we pass:
And a broad, orbing ripple makes to hide
From our desirous gaze provoked what path
She gleaming took; what haunt she bashful hath
In minnowy freshness, where her murmurous lips
Bubbling make merry 'neath the rocky tide.
III.
Oft do we meet the Oread whose eyes
Are dew-drops where twin heavens shine confessed;
She, all the maiden modesty's surprise
Blushing her temples, - to deep loins and breast
Tempestuous, brown bewildering tresses pressed, - 
Stands one scared moment's moiety, in wise
Of some delicious dream, then shrinks distressed,
Like some weak wind that, haply heard, is gone,
In rapport with shy Silence to make sound;
So, like storm sunlight, bares clean limbs to bound
A thistle's flashing to a woody rise,
A graceful glimmer up the ferny lawn.
IV.
Hear Satyrs and Sylvanus in sad shades
Of dozy dells pipe: Pan and Fauns hark dance
With rattling hoofs dim in low, mottled glades:
Hidden in spice-bush-bowered banks, perchance,
Mark Slyness waiting with an animal glance
The advent of some Innocence, who wades
Thro' thigh-deep flowers, naked as Romance,
In braided shadows, when two hairy arms
Hug her unconscious beauty panting white;
Till tearful terror, struggling into might,
Beats the brute brow resisting; yields and fades,
Exhausted, to the grim Lust her rich charms.
In Tempore Senectutis
by Ernest Christopher Dowson

When I am old,
And sadly steal apart,
Into the dark and cold,
Friend of my heart!
Remember, if you can,
Not him who lingers, but that other man,
Who loved and sang, and had a beating heart,--
When I am old!
When I am old,
And all Love's ancient fire
Be tremulous and cold:
My soul's desire!
Remember, if you may,
Nothing of you and me but yesterday,
When heart on heart we bid the years conspire
To make us old.
When I am old,
And every star above
Be pitiless and cold:
My life's one love!
Forbid me not to go:
Remember nought of us but long ago,
And not at last, how love and pity strove
When I grew old!
His Parting From Mrs. Dorothy Kennedy.
by Robert Herrick

When I did go from thee I felt that smart
Which bodies do when souls from them depart.
Thou did'st not mind it; though thou then might'st see
Me turn'd to tears; yet did'st not weep for me.
'Tis true, I kiss'd thee; but I could not hear
Thee spend a sigh t'accompany my tear.
Methought 'twas strange that thou so hard should'st prove,
Whose heart, whose hand, whose every part spake love.
Prithee, lest maids should censure thee, but say
Thou shed'st one tear, whenas I went away;
And that will please me somewhat: though I know,
And Love will swear't, my dearest did not so.
At Candle-Lightin' Time
by Paul Laurence Dunbar

When I come in f'om de co'n-fiel' aftah wo'kin' ha'd all day,
It 's amazin' nice to fin' my suppah all erpon de way;
An' it 's nice to smell de coffee bubblin' ovah in de pot,
An' it 's fine to see de meat a-sizzlin' teasin'-lak an' hot.
But when suppah-time is ovah, an' de t'ings is cleahed away;
Den de happy hours dat foller are de sweetes' of de day.
When my co'ncob pipe is sta'ted, an' de smoke is drawin' prime,
My ole 'ooman says, "I reckon, Ike, it 's candle-lightin' time."
Den de chillun snuggle up to me, an' all commence to call,
"Oh, say, daddy, now it 's time to mek de shadders on de wall."
So I puts my han's togethah--evah daddy knows de way,--
An' de chillun snuggle closer roun' ez I begin to say:--
"Fus' thing, hyeah come Mistah Rabbit; don' you see him wo'k his eahs?
Huh, uh! dis mus' be a donkey,--look, how innercent he 'pears!
Dah 's de ole black swan a-swimmin'--ain't she got a' awful neck?
Who 's dis feller dat 's a-comin'? Why, dat 's ole dog Tray, I 'spec'!"
Dat 's de way I run on, tryin' fu' to please 'em all I can;
Den I hollahs, "Now be keerful--dis hyeah las' 's de buga-man!"
An' dey runs an' hides dey faces; dey ain't skeered--dey 's lettin' on:
But de play ain't raaly ovah twell dat buga-man is gone.
So I jes' teks up my banjo, an' I plays a little chune,
An' you see dem haids come peepin' out to listen mighty soon.
Den my wife says, "Sich a pappy fu' to give you sich a fright!
Jes, you go to baid, an' leave him: say yo' prayers an' say good-night."
The Winter Soldier: The Dead Poet.
by Edward Shanks

When I grow old they'll come to me and say:
Did you then know him in that distant day?
Did you speak with him, touch his hand, observe
The proud eyes' fire, soft voice and light lips' curve?
And I shall answer: This man was my friend;
Call to my memory, add, improve, amend
And count up all the meetings that we had
And note his good and touch upon his bad.
When I grow older and more garrulous,
I shall discourse on the dead poet thus:
I said to him ... he answered unto me...
He dined with me one night in Trinity...
I supped with him in King's ... Ah, pitiful
The twisted memories of an ancient fool
And sweet the silence of a young man dead!
Now far in Lemnos sleeps that golden head,
Unchanged, serene, for ever young and strong,
Lifted above the chances that belong
To us who live, for he shall not grow old
And only of his youth there shall be told
Magical stories, true and wondrous tales,
As of a god whose virtue never fails,
Whose limbs shall never waste, eyes never fall,
And whose clear brain shall not be dimmed at all.