DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Songs Of The Autumn Nights
by George MacDonald

I.
O night, send up the harvest moon
To walk about the fields,
And make of midnight magic noon
On lonely tarns and wealds.
In golden ranks, with golden crowns,
All in the yellow land,
Old solemn kings in rustling gowns,
The shocks moon-charmed stand.
Sky-mirror she, afloat in space,
Beholds our coming morn:
Her heavenly joy hath such a grace,
It ripens earthly corn;
Like some lone saint with upward eyes,
Lost in the deeps of prayer:
The people still their prayers and sighs,
And gazing ripen there.
II.
So, like the corn moon-ripened last,
Would I, weary and gray,
On golden memories ripen fast,
And ripening pass away.
In an old night so let me die;
A slow wind out of doors;
A waning moon low in the sky;
A vapour on the moors;
A fire just dying in the gloom;
Earth haunted all with dreams;
A sound of waters in the room;
A mirror's moony gleams;
And near me, in the sinking night,
More thoughts than move in me--
Forgiving wrong, and loving right,
And waiting till I see.
III.
Across the stubble glooms the wind;
High sails the lated crow;
The west with pallid green is lined;
Fog tracks the river's flow.
My heart is cold and sad; I moan,
Yet care not for my grief;
The summer fervours all are gone;
The roses are but leaf.
Old age is coming, frosty, hoar;
The snows of time will fall;
My jubilance, dream-like, no more
Returns for any call!
O lapsing heart! thy feeble strain
Sends up the blood so spare,
That my poor withering autumn brain
Sees autumn everywhere!
IV.
Lord of my life! if I am blind,
I reck not--thou canst see;
I well may wait my summer mind,
When I am sure of thee!
I made no brave bright suns arise,
Veiled up no sweet gray eves;
I hung no rose-lamps, lit no eyes,
Sent out no windy leaves!
I said not "I will cast a charm
These gracious forms around;"
My heart with unwilled love grew warm;
I took but what I found!
When cold winds range my winter-night,
Be thou my summer-door;
Keep for me all my young delight,
Till I am old no more.
Another, At Holyhead [1] (Epigrams On Windows)
by Jonathan Swift

O Neptune! Neptune! must I still
Be here detain'd against my will?
Is this your justice, when I'm come
Above two hundred miles from home;
O'er mountains steep, o'er dusty plains,
Half choked with dust, half drown'd with rains,
Only your godship to implore,
To let me kiss your other shore?
A boon so small! but I may weep,
While you're like Baal, fast asleep.
Sonnets. I.
by John Milton

O Nightingale, that on yon bloomy Spray
Warbl'st at eeve, when all the Woods are still,
Thou with fresh hope the Lovers heart dost fill,
While the jolly hours lead on propitious May,
Thy liquid notes that close the eye of Day,
First heard before the shallow Cuccoo's bill
Portend success in love; O if Jove's will
Have linkt that amorous power to thy soft lay,
Now timely sing, ere the rude Bird of Hate
Foretell my hopeles doom in som Grove ny:
As thou from yeer to yeer hast sung too late
For my relief; yet hadst no reason why,
Whether the Muse, or Love call thee his mate,
Both them I serve, and of their train am I.
To A Canadian Lad Killed In The War
by Duncan Campbell Scott

O noble youth that held our honour in keeping,
And bore it sacred through the battle flame,
How shall we give full measure of acclaim
To thy sharp labour, thy immortal reaping?
For though we sowed with doubtful hands, half sleeping,
Thou in thy vivid pride hast reaped a nation,
And brought it in with shouts and exultation,
With drums and trumpets, with flags flashing and leaping.
Let us bring pungent wreaths of balsam, and tender
Tendrils of wild-flowers, lovelier for thy daring,
And deck a sylvan shrine, where the maple parts
The moonlight, with lilac bloom, and the splendour
Of suns unwearied; all unwithered, wearing
Thy valor stainless in our heart of hearts.
The Two Thieves; Or, The Last Stage Of Avarice
by William Wordsworth

O now that the genius of Bewick were mine,
And the skill which he learned on the banks of the Tyne.
Then the Muses might deal with me just as they chose,
For I'd take my last leave both of verse and of prose.
What feats would I work with my magical hand!
Book-learning and books should be banished the land:
And, for hunger and thirst and such troublesome calls,
Every ale-house should then have a feast on its walls.
The traveller would hang his wet clothes on a chair;
Let them smoke, let them burn, not a straw would he care!
For the Prodigal Son, Joseph's Dream and his sheaves,
Oh, what would they be to my tale of two Thieves?
The One, yet unbreeched, is not three birthdays old,
His Grandsire that age more than thirty times told;
There are ninety good seasons of fair and foul weather
Between them, and both go a-pilfering together.
With chips is the carpenter strewing his floor?
Is a cart-load of turf at an old woman's door?
Old Daniel his hand to the treasure will slide!
And his Grandson's as busy at work by his side.
Old Daniel begins; he stops short and his eye,
Through the lost look of dotage, is cunning and sly:
'Tis a look which at this time is hardly his own,
But tells a plain tale of the days that are flown.
He once had a heart which was moved by the wires
Of manifold pleasures and many desires:
And what if he cherished his purse? 'Twas no more
Than treading a path trod by thousands before.
'Twas a path trod by thousands; but Daniel is one
Who went something farther than others have gone,
And now with old Daniel you see how it fares;
You see to what end he has brought his grey hairs.
The pair sally forth hand in hand: ere the sun
Has peered o'er the beeches, their work is begun:
And yet, into whatever sin they may fall,
This child but half knows it, and that, not at all.
They hunt through the streets with deliberate tread,
And each, in his turn, becomes leader or led;
And, wherever they carry their plots and their wiles,
Every face in the village is dimpled with smiles.
Neither checked by the rich nor the needy they roam;
For the grey-headed Sire has a daughter at home,
Who will gladly repair all the damage that's done;
And three, were it asked, would be rendered for one.
Old Man! whom so oft I with pity have eyed,
I love thee, and love the sweet Boy at thy side:
Long yet may'st thou live! for a teacher we see
That lifts up the veil of our nature in thee.
Qui Laborat, Orat
by Arthur Hugh Clough

O only Source of all our light and life,
Whom as our truth, our strength, we see and feel,
But whom the hours of mortal moral strife
Alone aright reveal!
Mine inmost soul, before Thee inly brought,
Thy presence owns ineffable, divine;
Chastised each rebel self-encentered thought,
My will adoreth Thine.
With eye down-dropt, if then this earthly mind
Speechless remain, or speechless e'en depart;
Nor seek to see, for what of earthly kind
Can see Thee as Thou art?
If well-assured 'tis but profanely bold
In thought's abstractest forms to seem to see,
It dare not dare the dread communion hold
In ways unworthy Thee,
O not unowned, thou shalt unnamed forgive,
In worldly walks the prayerless heart prepare;
And if in work its life it seem to live,
Shalt make that work be prayer.
Nor times shall lack, when while the work it plies,
Unsummoned powers the blinding film shall part,
And scarce by happy tears made dim, the eyes
In recognition start.
But, as thou wiliest, give or e'en forbear
The beatific supersensual sight,
So, with Thy blessing blest, that humbler prayer
Approach Thee morn and night.
To The Clouds.
by John Clare

O painted clouds ! sweet beauties of the sky,
How have I view'd your motion and your rest,
When like fleet hunters ye have left mine eye,
In your thin gauze of woolly-fleecing drest;
Or in your threaten'd thunder's grave black vest,
Like black deep waters slowly moving by,
Awfully striking the spectator's breast
With your Creator's dread sublimity,
As admiration mutely views your storms.
And I do love to see you idly lie,
Painted by heav'n as various as your forms,
Pausing upon the eastern mountain high,
As morn awakes with spring's wood-harmony;
And sweeter still, when in your slumbers sooth
You hang the western arch o'er day's proud eye:
Still as the even-pool, uncurv'd and smooth,
My gazing soul has look'd most placidly;
And higher still devoutly wish'd to strain,
To wipe your shrouds and sky's blue blinders by,
With all the warmness of a moon-struck brain,--
To catch a glimpse of Him who bids you reign,
And view the dwelling of all majesty.
Aeolian Harp
by William Allingham

O pale green sea, 
With long, pale, purple clouds above 
What lies in me like weight of love ? 
What dies in me 
With utter grief, because there comes no sign 
Through the sun-raying West, or the dim sea-line ? 
O salted air, 
Blown round the rocky headland still, 
What calls me there from cove and hill? 
What calls me fair 
From thee, the first-born of the youthful night, 
Or in the waves is coming through the dusk twilight ? 
O yellow Star, 
Quivering upon the rippling tide
Sendest so far to one that sigh'd? 
Bendest thou, Star, 
Above, where the shadows of the dead have rest 
And constant silence, with a message from the blest?
O Nightingale! Thou Surely Art
by William Wordsworth

O Nightingale! thou surely art
A creature of a "fiery heart":
These notes of thine, they pierce and pierce;
Tumultuous harmony and fierce!
Thou sing'st as if the God of wine
Had helped thee to a Valentine;
A song in mockery and despite
Of shades, and dews, and silent night;
And steady bliss, and all the loves
Now sleeping in these peaceful groves.
I heard a Stock-dove sing or say
His homely tale, this very day;
His voice was buried among trees,
Yet to be come at by the breeze:
He did not cease; but cooed, and cooed;
And somewhat pensively he wooed:
He sang of love, with quiet blending,
Slow to begin, and never ending;
Of serious faith, and inward glee;
That was the song, the song for me!
The Forest Maid
by John Clare

O once I loved a pretty girl, and dearly love her still;
I courted her in happiness for two short years or more.
And when I think of Mary it turns my bosom chill,
For my little of life's happiness is faded and is o'er.
O fair was Mary Littlechild, and happy as the bee,
And sweet was bonny Mary as the song of forest bird;
And the smile upon her red lips was very dear to me,
And her tale of love the sweetest that my ear has ever heard.
O the flower of all the forest was Mary Littlechild;
There's few could be so dear to me and none could be so fair.
While many love the garden flowers I still esteem the wild,
And Mary of the forest is the fairest blossom there.
She's fairer than the may flowers that bloom among the thorn,
She's dearer to my eye than the rose upon the brere;
Her eye is brighter far than the bonny pearls of morn,
And the name of Mary Littlechild is to me ever dear.
O once I loved a pretty girl. The linnet in its mirth
Was never half so blest as I with Mary Littlechild--
The rose of the creation, and the pink of all the earth,
The flower of all the forest, and the best for being wild.
O sweet are dews of morning, ere the Autumn blows so chill,--
And sweet are forest flowers in the hawthorn's mossy shade,
But nothing is so fair, and nothing ever will
Bloom like the rosy cheek of my bonny Forest Maid.
Sonnet to the Nightingale
by John Milton

O nightingale that on yon blooming spray
Warblest at eve, when all the woods are still,
Thou with fresh hopes the Lover's heart dost fill,
While the jolly Hours lead on propitious May.
Thy liquid notes that close the eye of Day,
First heard before the shallow cuckoo's bill,
Portend success in love. O if Jove's will
Have linked that amorous power to thy soft lay,
Now timely sing, ere the rude bird of hate
Foretell my hopeless doom, in some grove nigh;
As thou from year to year hast sung too late
For my relief, yet had'st no reason why.
Whether the Muse or Love call thee his mate,
Both them I serve, and of their train am I.
The Burial Of The Scout.
by Kate Seymour Maclean

O not with arms reversed,
And the slow beating of the muffled drum,
And funeral marches, bring our hero home
These stormy woods where his young heart was nursed
Ring with a trumpet burst
Of jubilant music, as if he who lies
With shrouded face, and lips all white and dumb
Were a crowned conqueror entering paradise,--
This is his welcome home!
Along the reedy marge of the dim lake,
I hear the gathering horsemen of the North,
The cavalry of night and tempest wake,--
Blowing keen bugles as they issue forth,
To guard his homeward march in frost and cold,
A thousand spearmen bold!
And the deep-bosomed woods,
With their dishevelled locks all wildly spread,
Stretch ghostly arms to clasp the immortal dead,
Back to their solitudes
While through their rocking branches overhead,
And all their shuddering pulses underground
shiver runs, as if a voice had said--
And every farthest leaf had felt the wound--
He comes--but he is dead!
The dainty-fingered May
with gentle hand shall fold and put away
The snow-white curtains of his winter tent,
and spread above him her green coverlet,
'Broidered with daisies, sweet to sight and scent
and Summer, from her outposts in the hills,
Under the boughs with heavy night-dews wet,
shall place her gold and purple sentinels,
And in the populous woods sound reveille,
falling from field and fen her sweet deserters back--
But he,--no long roll of the impatient drum,
for battle trumpet eager for the fray,
From the far shores of blue Lake Erie blown,
shall rouse the soldier's last long bivouac.
To The Thirty-Ninth Congress
by John Greenleaf Whittier

O people-chosen! are ye not
Likewise the chosen of the Lord,
To do His will and speak His word?
From the loud thunder-storm of war
Not man alone hath called ye forth,
But He, the God of all the earth!
The torch of vengeance in your hands
He quenches; unto Him belongs
The solemn recompense of wrongs.
Enough of blood the land has seen,
And not by cell or gallows-stair
Shall ye the way of God prepare.
Say to the pardon-seekers: Keep
Your manhood, bend no suppliant knees,
Nor palter with unworthy pleas.
Above your voices sounds the wail
Of starving men; we shut in vain
Our eyes to Pillow's ghastly stain.
What words can drown that bitter cry?
What tears wash out the stain of death?
What oaths confirm your broken faith?
From you alone the guaranty
Of union, freedom, peace, we claim;
We urge no conqueror's terms of shame.
Alas! no victor's pride is ours;
We bend above our triumphs won
Like David o'er his rebel son.
Be men, not beggars. Cancel all
By one brave, generous action; trust
Your better instincts, and be just!
Make all men peers before the law,
Take hands from off the negro's throat,
Give black and white an equal vote.
Keep all your forfeit lives and lands,
But give the common law's redress
To labor's utter nakedness.
Revive the old heroic will;
Be in the right as brave and strong
As ye have proved yourselves in wrong.
Defeat shall then be victory,
Your loss the wealth of full amends,
And hate be love, and foes be friends.
Then buried be the dreadful past,
Its common slain be mourned, and let
All memories soften to regret.
Then shall the Union's mother-heart
Her lost and wandering ones recall,
Forgiving and restoring all,
And Freedom break her marble trance
Above the Capitolian dome,
Stretch hands, and bid ye welcome home!
To My Wife--A Valentine
by John Clare

O once I had a true love,
As blest as I could be:
Patty was my turtle dove,
And Patty she loved me.
We walked the fields together,
By roses and woodbine,
In Summer's sunshine weather,
And Patty she was mine.
We stopped to gather primroses,
And violets white and blue,
In pastures and green closes
All glistening with the dew.
We sat upon green mole-hills,
Among the daisy flowers,
To hear the small birds' merry trills,
And share the sunny hours.
The blackbird on her grassy nest
We would not scare away,
Who nuzzling sat with brooding breast
On her eggs for half the day.
The chaffinch chirruped on the thorn,
And a pretty nest had she;
The magpie chattered all the morn
From her perch upon the tree.
And I would go to Patty's cot,
And Patty came to me;
Each knew the other's very thought
Under the hawthorn tree.
And Patty had a kiss to give,
And Patty had a smile,
To bid me hope and bid me love,
At every stopping stile.
We loved one Summer quite away,
And when another came,
The cowslip close and sunny day,
It found us much the same.
We both looked on the selfsame thing,
Till both became as one;
The birds did in the hedges sing,
And happy time went on.
The brambles from the hedge advance,
In love with Patty's eyes:
On flowers, like ladies at a dance,
Flew scores of butterflies.
I claimed a kiss at every stile,
And had her kind replies.
The bees did round the woodbine toil,
Where sweet the small wind sighs.
Then Patty was a slight young thing;
Now she's long past her teens;
And we've been married many springs,
And mixed in many scenes.
And I'll be true for Patty's sake,
And she'll be true for mine;
And I this little ballad make,
To be her valentine.
Hymn
by John Greenleaf Whittier

SUNG AT CHRISTMAS BY THE SCHOLARS OF ST. HELENA'S ISLAND, S. C.
O none in all the world before
Were ever glad as we!
We're free on Carolina's shore,
We're all at home and free.
Thou Friend and Helper of the poor,
Who suffered for our sake,
To open every prison door,
And every yoke to break!
Bend low Thy pitying face and mild,
And help us sing and pray;
The hand that blessed the little child,
Upon our foreheads lay.
We hear no more the driver's horn,
No more the whip we fear,
This holy day that saw Thee born
Was never half so dear.
The very oaks are greener clad,
The waters brighter smile;
Oh, never shone a day so glad
On sweet St. Helen's Isle.
We praise Thee in our songs to-day,
To Thee in prayer we call,
Make swift the feet and straight the way
Of freedom unto all.
Come once again, O blessed Lord!
Come walking on the sea!
And let the mainlands hear the word
That sets the islands free!
The River Duddon - A Series Of Sonnets, 1820. - XIV - O Mountain Stream
by William Wordsworth

O Mountain Stream! the Shepherd and his Cot
Are privileged Inmates of deep solitude;
Nor would the nicest Anchorite exclude
A field or two of brighter green, or plot
Of tillage-ground, that seemeth like a spot
Of stationary sunshine: thou hast viewed
These only, Duddon! with their paths renewed
By fits and starts, yet this contents thee not.
Thee hath some awful Spirit impelled to leave,
Utterly to desert, the haunts of men,
Though simple thy companions were and few;
And through this wilderness a passage cleave
Attended but by thy own voice, save when
The clouds and fowls of the air thy way pursue!
Saint Peter
by George MacDonald

O Peter, wherefore didst thou doubt?
Indeed the spray flew fast about,
But he was there whose walking foot
Could make the wandering hills take root;
And he had said, "Come down to me,"
Else hadst thou not set foot on sea!
Christ did not call thee to thy grave!
Was it the boat that made thee brave?
"Easy for thee who wast not there
To think thou more than I couldst dare!
It hardly fits thee though to mock
Scared as thou wast that railway shock!
Who saidst this morn, 'Wife, we must go--
The plague will soon be here, I know!'
Who, when thy child slept--not to death--
Saidst, 'Life is now not worth a breath!'"
Saint Peter, thou rebukest well!
It needs no tempest me to quell,
Not even a spent lash of its spray!
Things far too little to affray
Will wake the doubt that's worst of all--
Is there a God to hear me call?
But if he be, I never think
That he will hear and let me sink!
Lord of my little faith, my Lord,
Help me to fear nor fire nor sword;
Let not the cross itself appall
Which bore thee, Life and Lord of all;
Let reeling brain nor fainting heart
Wipe out the soreness that thou art;
Dwell farther in than doubt can go,
And make I hope become I know.
Then, sure, if thou should please to say,
"Come to my side," some stormy way,
My feet, atoning to thy will,
Shall, heaved and tossed, walk toward thee still;
No heart of lead shall sink me where
Prudence lies crowned with cold despair,
But I shall reach and clasp thy hand,
And on the sea forget the land!
The Captain's Lady.
by Robert Burns

Tune - "O mount and go."
Chorus.
O mount and go,
Mount and make you ready;
O mount and go,
And be the Captain's Lady.
I.
When the drums do beat,
And the cannons rattle,
Thou shall sit in state,
And see thy love in battle.
II.
When the vanquish'd foe
Sues for peace and quiet,
To the shades we'll go,
And in love enjoy it.
O mount and go,
Mount and make you ready;
O mount and go,
And be the Captain's Lady.
To The Duke Of Argyll
by Alfred Lord Tennyson

O Patriot Statesman, be thou wise to know
The limits of resistance, and the bounds
Determining concession; still be bold
Not only to slight praise but suffer scorn;
And be thy heart a fortress to maintain
The day against the moment, and the year
Against the day; thy voice, a music heard
Thro' all the yells and counter-yells of feud
And faction, and thy will, a power to make
This ever-changing world of circumstance,
In changing, chime with never-changing Law.
When Love Goes
by Sara Teasdale

I
O mother, I am sick of love,
I cannot laugh nor lift my head,
My bitter dreams have broken me,
I would my love were dead.
"Drink of the draught I brew for thee,
Thou shalt have quiet in its stead."
II
Where is the silver in the rain,
Where is the music in the sea,
Where is the bird that sang all day
To break my heart with melody?
"The night thou badst Love fly away,
He hid them all from thee."
The Pink Frock
by Thomas Hardy

"O my pretty pink frock,
I sha'n't be able to wear it!
Why is he dying just now?
I hardly can bear it!
"He might have contrived to live on;
But they say there's no hope whatever:
And must I shut myself up,
And go out never?
"O my pretty pink frock,
Puff-sleeved and accordion-pleated!
He might have passed in July,
And not so cheated!"
Handsome Nell.
by Robert Burns

Tune. - "I am a man unmarried."
I.
O once I lov'd a bonnie lass,
Ay, and I love her still;
And whilst that honour warms my breast,
I'll love my handsome Nell.
II.
As bonnie lasses I hae seen,
And mony full as braw;
But for a modest gracefu' mien
The like I never saw.
III.
A bonnie lass, I will confess,
Is pleasant to the e'e,
But without some better qualities
She's no a lass for me.
IV.
But Nelly's looks are blithe and sweet,
And what is best of a',
Her reputation is complete,
And fair without a flaw.
V.
She dresses ay sae clean and neat,
Both decent and genteel:
And then there's something in her gait
Gars ony dress look weel.
VI.
A gaudy dress and gentle air
May slightly touch the heart;
But it's innocence and modesty
That polishes the dart.
VII.
'Tis this in Nelly pleases me,
'Tis this enchants my soul;
For absolutely in my breast
She reigns without control
A Lament.
by Victor-Marie Hugo

("Sentiers o' l'herbe se balance.")
[Bk. III. xi., July, 1853.]
O paths whereon wild grasses wave!
O valleys! hillsides! forests hoar!
Why are ye silent as the grave?
For One, who came, and comes no more!
Why is thy window closed of late?
And why thy garden in its sear?
O house! where doth thy master wait?
I only know he is not here.
Good dog! thou watchest; yet no hand
Will feed thee. In the house is none.
Whom weepest thou? child! My father. And
O wife! whom weepest thou? The Gone.
Where is he gone? Into the dark. - 
O sad, and ever-plaining surge!
Whence art thou? From the convict-bark.
And why thy mournful voice? A dirge.
EDWIN ARNOLD, C.S.I.