DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
St. Stephen
by Abram Joseph Ryan

First champion of the Crucified!
Who, when the fight began
Between the Church and worldly pride
So nobly fought, so nobly died,
The foremost in the van;
While rallied to your valiant side
The red-robed martyr-band;
To-night with glad and high acclaim
We venerate thy saintly name;
Accept, Saint Stephen, to thy praise
And glory, these our lowly lays.
The chosen twelve with chrismed hand
And burning zeal within,
Led forth their small yet fearless band
On Pentecost, and took their stand
Against the world and sin --
While rang aloud the battle-cry:
"The hated Christians all must die!
As died the Nazarene before,
The God they believe in and adore."
Yet Stephen's heart quailed not with fear
At persecution's cry;
But loving, as he did, the cause
Of Jesus and His faith and laws,
Prepared himself to die.
He faced his foes with burning zeal,
Such zeal as only saints can feel;
He told them how the Lord had stood
Within their midst, so great and good,
How he had through Judea trod,
How wonders marked his way -- the God,
How he had cured the blind, the lame,
The deaf, the palsied, and the maimed,
And how, with awful, wondrous might,
He raised the dead to life and light;
And how his people knew Him not --
Had eyes and still had seen Him not,
Had ears and still had heard Him not,
Had hearts and comprehended not.
Then said he, pointing to the right,
Where darkly rose Golgotha's height:
"There have ye slain the Holy One,
Your Saviour and God's only Son."
They gnashed their teeth in raging ire,
Those dark and cruel men;
They vowed a vengeance deep and dire
Against Saint Stephen then.
Yet he was calm; a radiant light
Around his forehead gleamed;
He raised his eyes, a wondrous sight
He saw, so grand it was and bright,
His soul was filled with such delight
That he an angel seemed.
Then spoke the Saint: "A vision grand
Bursts on me from above:
The doors of heaven open stand,
And at the Father's own right hand
I see the Lord I love."
"Away with him," the rabble cry,
With swelling rage and hate,
But Stephen still gazed on the sky,
His heart was with his Lord on high,
He heeded not his fate.
The gathering crowd in fury wild
Rush on the 'raptured Saint,
And seize their victim, mute and mild,
Who, like his master, though reviled,
Still uttered no complaint.
With angry shouts they rend the air;
They drag him to the city gate;
They bind his hands and feet and there,
While whispered he for them a prayer,
The martyr meets his fate.
First fearless witness to his belief
In Jesus Crucified,
The red-robed martyrs' noble chief,
Thus for his Master died.
And to the end of time his name
Our Holy Church shall e'er proclaim,
And with a mother's pride shall tell
How her great proto-martyr fell.
The Goblet Of Life
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Filled is Life's goblet to the brim;
And though my eyes with tears are dim,
I see its sparkling bubbles swim,
And chant a melancholy hymn
With solemn voice and slow.
No purple flowers,--no garlands green,
Conceal the goblet's shade or sheen,
Nor maddening draughts of Hippocrene,
Like gleams of sunshine, flash between
Thick leaves of mistletoe.
This goblet, wrought with curious art,
Is filled with waters, that upstart,
When the deep fountains of the heart,
By strong convulsions rent apart,
Are running all to waste.
And as it mantling passes round,
With fennel is it wreathed and crowned,
Whose seed and foliage sun-imbrowned
Are in its waters steeped and drowned,
And give a bitter taste.
Above the lowly plants it towers,
The fennel, with its yellow flowers,
And in an earlier age than ours
Was gifted with the wondrous powers,
Lost vision to restore.
It gave new strength, and fearless mood;
And gladiators, fierce and rude,
Mingled it in their daily food;
And he who battled and subdued,
A wreath of fennel wore.
Then in Life's goblet freely press,
The leaves that give it bitterness,
Nor prize the colored waters less,
For in thy darkness and distress
New light and strength they give!
And he who has not learned to know
How false its sparkling bubbles show,
How bitter are the drops of woe,
With which its brim may overflow,
He has not learned to live.
The prayer of Ajax was for light;
Through all that dark and desperate fight
The blackness of that noonday night
He asked but the return of sight,
To see his foeman's face.
Let our unceasing, earnest prayer
Be, too, for light,--for strength to bear
Our portion of the weight of care,
That crushes into dumb despair
One half the human race.
O suffering, sad humanity!
O ye afflicted one; who lie
Steeped to the lips in misery,
Longing, and yet afraid to die,
Patient, though sorely tried!
I pledge you in this cup of grief,
Where floats the fennel's bitter leaf!
The Battle of our Life is brief
The alarm,--the struggle,--the relief,
Then sleep we side by side.
The Quest
by Madison Julius Cawein

I
First I asked the honeybee,
Busy in the balmy bowers;
Saying, "Sweetheart, tell it me:
Have you seen her, honeybee?
She is cousin to the flowers - 
All the sweetness of the south
In her wild-rose face and mouth."
But the bee passed silently.
II
Then I asked the forest bird,
Warbling by the woodland waters;
Saying, "Dearest, have you heard?
Have you heard her, forest bird?
She is one of music's daughters - 
Never song so sweet by half
As the music of her laugh."
But the bird said not a word.
III
Next I asked the evening sky,
Hanging out its lamps of fire;
Saying, "Loved one, passed she by?
Tell me, tell me, evening sky!
She, the star of my desire - 
Sister whom the Pleiads lost,
And my soul's high pentecost."
But the sky made no reply.
IV
Where is she? ah, where is she?
She to whom both love and duty
Bind me, yea, immortally. - 
Where is she? ah, where is she?
Symbol of the Earth-Soul's beauty.
I have lost her. Help my heart
Find her! her, who is a part
Of the pagan soul of me.
Sun And Moon.
by George MacDonald

First came the red-eyed sun as I did wake;
He smote me on the temples and I rose,
Casting the night aside and all its woes;
And I would spurn my idleness, and take
My own wild journey even like him, and shake
The pillars of all doubt with lusty blows,
Even like himself when his rich glory goes
Right through the stalwart fogs that part and break.
But ere my soul was ready for the fight,
His solemn setting mocked me in the west;
And as I trembled in the lifting night,
The white moon met me, and my heart confess'd
A mellow wisdom in her silent youth,
Which fed my hope with fear, and made my strength a truth.
On Violet's Wafers, Sent Me When I Was Ill.
by Sidney Lanier

Fine-tissued as her finger-tips, and white
As all her thoughts; in shape like shields of prize,
As if before young Violet's dreaming eyes
Still blazed the two great Theban bucklers bright
That swayed the random of that furious fight
Where Palamon and Arcite made assize
For Emily; fresh, crisp as her replies,
That, not with sting, but pith, do oft invite
More trial of the tongue; simple, like her,
Well fitting lowlihood, yet fine as well,
- The queen's no finer; rich (though gossamer)
In help to him they came to, which may tell
How rich that him SHE'LL come to; thus men see,
Like Violet's self e'en Violet's wafers be.
Baltimore, 1881.
Chiarascuro: Rose
by Conrad Potter Aiken

He
Fill your bowl with roses: the bowl, too, have of crystal.
Sit at the western window. Take the sun
Between your hands like a ball of flaming crystal,
Poise it to let it fall, but hold it still,
And meditate on the beauty of your existence;
The beauty of this, that you exist at all.
She
The sun goes down, but without lamentation.
I close my eyes, and the stream of my sensation
In this, at least, grows clear to me:
Beauty is a word that has no meaning.
Beauty is naught to me.
He
The last blurred raindrops fall from the half-clear sky,
Eddying lightly, rose-tinged, in the windless wake of the sun.
The swallow ascending against cold waves of cloud
Seems winging upward over huge bleak stairs of stone.
The raindrop finds its way to the heart of the leaf-bud.
But no word finds its way to the heart of you.
She
This also is clear in the stream of my sensation:
That I am content, for the moment, Let me be.
How light the new grass looks with the rain-dust on it!
But heart is a word that has no meaning,
Heart means nothing to me.
He
To the end of the world I pass and back again
In flights of the mind; yet always find you here,
Remote, pale, unattached . . . O Circe-too-clear-eyed,
Watching amused your fawning tiger-thoughts,
Your wolves, your grotesque apes, relent, relent!
Be less wary for once: it is the evening.
She
But if I close my eyes what howlings greet me!
Do not persuade. Be tranquil. Here is flesh
With all its demons. Take it, sate yourself.
But leave my thoughts to me.
Fill For Me A Brimming Bowl
by John Keats

Fill for me a brimming bowl
And in it let me drown my soul:
But put therein some drug, designed
To Banish Women from my mind:
For I want not the stream inspiring
That fills the mind with'fond desiring,
But I want as deep a draught
As e'er from Lethe's wave was quaff'd;
From my despairing heart to charm
The Image of the fairest form
That e'er my reveling eyes beheld,
That e'er my wandering fancy spell'd.
In vain! away I cannot chace
The melting softness of that face,
The beaminess of those bright eyes,
That breast'earth's only Paradise.
My sight will never more be blest;
For all I see has lost its zest:
Nor with delight can I explore,
The Classic page, or Muse's lore.
Had she but known how beat my heart,
And with one smile reliev'd its smart
I should have felt a sweet relief,
I should have felt "the joy of grief."
Yet as the Tuscan mid the snow
Of Lapland dreams on sweet Arno,
Even so for ever shall she be
The Halo of my Memory.
Cocker, On Church Reform.
by Thomas Moore

FOUNDED UPON SOME LATE CALCULATIONS.
Fine figures of speech let your orators follow,
Old Cocker has figures that beat them all hollow.
Tho' famed for his rules Aristotle may be,
In but half of this Sage any merit I see,
For, as honest Joe Hume says, the "tottle" for me!
For instance, while others discuss and debate,
It is thus about Bishops I ratiocinate.
In England, where, spite of the infidel's laughter,
'Tis certain our souls are lookt very well after,
Two Bishops can well (if judiciously sundered)
Of parishes manage two thousand two hundred.--
Said number of parishes, under said teachers,
Containing three millions of Protestant creatures,--
So that each of said Bishops full ably controls
One million and five hundred thousands of souls.
And now comes old Cocker. In Ireland we're told,
Half a million includes the whole Protestant fold;
If, therefore, for three million souls, 'tis conceded
Two proper-sized Bishops are all that is needed,
'Tis plain, for the Irish half million who want 'em,
One-third of one Bishop is just the right quantum.
And thus, by old Cocker's sublime Rule of Three,
The Irish Church question's resolved to a T;
Keeping always that excellent maxim in view,
That, in saving men's souls, we must save money too.
Nay, if--as St. Roden complains is the case--
The half million of soul is decreasing apace,
The demand, too, for bishop will also fall off,
Till the tithe of one, taken in kind be enough.
But, as fractions imply that we'd have to dissect,
And to cutting up Bishops I strongly object.
We've a small, fractious prelate whom well we could spare,
Who has just the same decimal worth, to a hair,
And, not to leave Ireland too much in the lurch.
We'll let her have Exeter, sole, as her Church.
Gravity
by Harold Edward Monro

I
Fit for perpetual worship is the power
That holds our bodies safely to the earth.
When people talk of their domestic gods,
Then privately I think of You.
We ride through space upon your shoulders
Conveniently and lightly set,
And, so accustomed, we relax our hold,
Forget the gentle motion of your body -
But You do not forget.
Sometimes you breathe a little faster,
Or move a muscle:
Then we remember you, O Master.
II
When people meet in reverent groups
And sing to their domestic God,
You, all the time, dear tyrant, (How I laugh!)
Could, without effort, place your hand among them,
And sprinkle them about the desert.
But all your ways are carefully ordered,
For you have never questioned duty.
We watch your everlasting combinations;
We call them Fate; we turn them to our pleasure,
And when they most delight us, call them beauty.
III
I rest my body on your grass,
And let my brain repose in you;
I feel these living moments pass,
And, from within myself to those far places
To be imagined in your times and spaces,
Deliberate the various acts you do: -
Sorting and re-arranging worlds of Matter
Keenly and wisely. Thus you brought our earth
Through stages, and from purpose back to purpose,
From fire to fog, to dust, to birth
Through beast to man, who led himself to brain -
Then you invoked him back to dust again.
By leave of you he places stone on stone;
He scatters seed: you are at once the prop
Among the long roots of his fragile crop.
You manufacture for him, and insure
House, harvest, implement and furniture,
And hold them all secure.
IV
The hill ... The trees ... From underneath
I feel You pull me with your hand:
Through my firm feet up to my heart
You hold me, - You are in the land,
Reposing underneath the hill.
You keep my balance and my growth.
I lift a foot, but where I go
You follow: you, the ever-strong,
Control the smallest thing I do.
I have some little human power
To turn your purpose to my end,
For which I thank you every hour.
I stand at worship, while you send
Thrills up my body to my heart,
And I am all in love to know
How by your strength you keep me part
Of earth, which cannot let me go;
How everything I see around,
Whether it can or cannot move,
Is granted liberty of ground,
And freedom to enjoy your love;
Though you are silent always, and, alone
To You yourself, your power remains unknown.
Sonnets Upon The Punishment Of Death - In Series, 1839 ' VIII - Fit Retribution, By The Moral Code
by William Wordsworth

Fit retribution, by the moral code
Determined, lies beyond the State's embrace,
Yet, as she may, for each peculiar case
She plants well-measured terrors in the road
Of wrongful acts. Downward it is and broad,
And, the main fear once doomed to banishment,
Far oftener then, bad ushering worse event,
Blood would be spilt that in his dark abode
Crime might lie better hid. And, should the change
Take from the horror due to a foul deed,
Pursuit and evidence so far must fail,
And, guilt escaping, passion then might plead
In angry spirits for her old free range,
And the "wild justice of revenge" prevail.
The Baptism Of Clovis
by Joseph Horatio Chant

Five hundred years have nearly passed away
Since that glad morn, when o'er fair Bethl'hem's plain
A light resplendent as the glow of day,
Shone down from heaven, and holy angels deign
To sing the sweetest song e'er heard by mortal ear,
Which fills sad hearts with joy and drives away their fear.
Clovis, of the brave Franks, the king, and sheen,
Heard from Aurelian of a maid to wed,
Matchless in feature, and of graceful mein--
"Zenobia, of the Alps," Aurelian said,
"The daughter of Chilperic, the Burgundian king,
Clotilda is her name; fair maids her praises sing.
"She dwells among the Alps, in forest glade,
And by the shore of its most famous lake;
But fairer than that land is this fair maid;
And brighter than its peaks at morn's awake;
A Christian girl is she, whose heart God has renewed,
And her fine, comely mind with grace and truth embued."
Then Clovis, by Aurelian, sent a ring
To this fair damsel, whom he hoped to wed;
She took the ring; and soon fair songsters sing
The marriage hymn, as he to altar led
This lovely Christian maid. They plight their nuptial vows;
And the old priest invoked a blessing on their brows.
Then on her head a coronet was placed,
And she sat down by Clovis on his throne;
And never was a throne so highly graced,
Nor ever monarch felt less sad and lone;
He found in her a bride, and counsellor, as well,
And happy are the men who in her palace dwell.
In tones of eloquence and words of power,
The wond'rous story of the cross she told;
Christ's lowly birth, pure life, and of the hour
When He, to bring us to the heavenly fold,
Bore on the cross our sins, and opened mercy's door,
Then from the dead arose to reign for evermore.
Soon on Tolbiac's bloody field the king
Led on his troops against a mighty foe;
A foe too strong; for soon, though no weakling,
Clovis retreats--his men returned no blow;
But fled as timid sheep before a beast of prey;
The conquering Alemanni will surely win the day.
"O king! cry on Clotilda's Christ for aid!"
Shouted Aurelian, as the monarch fled;
Then, on his helmet, Clovis his hand laid,
And lifting it, these words the monarch said:
"My gods have failed to help: O Christ, Clotilda's God,
Grant me Thy mighty aid, and I will kiss Thy rod."
On the French pennons triumph perches now;
The foe is routed by Clotilda's God;
And Clovis wished to have upon his brow
The symbol of her faith; for 'neath the rod
Of the eternal King he bows his regal will,
And waits, with heart devout, Christ's purpose to fulfil.
On Rheims now dawns a cloudless Christmas morn;
And flags of silk and satin grace each tower;
This is the day Clotilda's Christ was born,
And to His cause a great triumphal hour,
For see, on carpet stretched from church to palace door,
A grand procession march, of two-score priests or more!
Remigius had led the way, and then,
Assisted by his priests, on monarch's brow,
And on the brows of full six thousand men,
As they before the holy altar bow;
The water from the font he sprinkled down like rain,
Thankful that his blest Lord so many hearts should gain.
To Elizabeth Ray
by Nora Pembroke (Margaret Moran Dixon McDougall)

First of women, best of friends
Take what a village rhymer sends,
A tear wet trifle sent to tell
The giver must bid thee farewell!
And shall I then when o'er the sea
Forget thee? No, it cannot be
When thinking of much loved Grace Hill,
[1] Its drops of joy, its drafts of ill
I shed the fond regretting tear,
For those I did I do hold dear,
First shall mid those I parted with
Stand Friendship's Ray Elizabeth
[Footnote 1: Burns]
1844
Union And Liberty
by Oliver Wendell Holmes

Flag of the heroes who left us their glory,
Borne through their battle-fields' thunder and flame,
Blazoned in song and illumined in story,
Wave o'er us all who inherit their fame!
Up with our banner bright,
Sprinkled with starry light,
Spread its fair emblems from mountain to shore,
While through the sounding sky
Loud rings the Nation's cry, - 
UNION AND LIBERTY! ONE EVERMORE!
Light of our firmament, guide of our Nation,
Pride of her children, and honored afar,
Let the wide beams of thy full constellation
Scatter each cloud that would darken a star
Up with our banner bright, etc.
Empire unsceptred! what foe shall assail thee,
Bearing the standard of Liberty's van?
Think not the God of thy fathers shall fail thee,
Striving with men for the birthright of man!
Up with our banner bright, etc.
Yet if, by madness and treachery blighted,
Dawns the dark hour when the sword thou must draw,
Then with the arms of thy millions united,
Smite the bold traitors to Freedom and Law!
Up with our banner bright, etc.
Lord of the Universe! shield us and guide us,
Trusting Thee always, through shadow and sun!
Thou hast united us, who shall divide us?
Keep us, oh keep us the MANY IN ONE!
Up with our banner bright,
Sprinkled with starry light,
Spread its fair emblems from mountain to shore,
While through the sounding sky
Loud rings the Nation's cry, - 
UNION AND LIBERTY! ONE EVERMORE!
Epigram. On Hearing that Morse Did Not "Invent" the Telegraph
by George Pope Morris

First they said it would not do;
But, when he got through it,
Then they vowed they always knew
That he didn't do it!
Lies are rolling stones, of course,
But they can't adhere to MORSE.
Cases - Hampden V. Walsh
by James Williams

(1 Queen's Bench Division, 189)
"Five hundred pounds as stake I'll lay,"
Says Hampden, "that by such a day
No man of science proves to me
That earth not flat but round must be;
The earth is flat, and flats are they."
The sum Walsh holds right willingly;
But Wallace by philosophy
Proves roundness, and would take away
Five hundred pounds.
"Proof me no proofs," quoth Hampden, "Nay,
Let Wallace get it if he may,
I'll sue Walsh for it." So sues he.
"Let Wallace," hold the judges three,
"Take nought, let Walsh to Hampden pay
Five hundred pounds."
Within my House
by Fay Inchfawn

First, there's the entrance, narrow, and so small,
The hat-stand seems to fill the tiny hall;
That staircase, too, has such an awkward bend,
The carpet rucks, and rises up on end!
Then, all the rooms are cramped and close together;
And there's a musty smell in rainy weather.
Yes, and it makes the daily work go hard
To have the only tap across a yard.
These creaking doors, these draughts, this battered paint,
Would try, I think, the temper of a saint,
How often had I railed against these things,
With envies, and with bitter murmurings
For spacious rooms, and sunny garden plots!
Until one day,
Washing the breakfast dishes, so I think,
I paused a moment in my work to pray;
And then and there
All life seemed suddenly made new and fair;
For, like the Psalmist's dove among the pots
(Those endless pots, that filled the tiny sink!),
My spirit found her wings.
"Lord" (thus I prayed), "it matters not at all
That my poor home is ill-arranged and small:
I, not the house, am straitened; Lord, 'tis I!
Enlarge my foolish heart, that by-and-by
I may look up with such a radiant face
Thou shalt have glory even in this place.
And when I trip, or stumble unawares
In carrying water up these awkward stairs,
Then keep me sweet, and teach me day by day
To tread with patience Thy appointed way.
As for the house . . . . Lord, let it be my part
To walk within it with a perfect heart."
Life
by William Schwenck Gilbert

First you're born - and I'll be bound you
Find a dozen strangers round you.
"Hallo," cries the new-born baby,
"Where's my parents? which may they be?"
Awkward silence - no reply -
Puzzled baby wonders why!
Father rises, bows politely -
Mother smiles (but not too brightly) -
Doctor mumbles like a dumb thing -
Nurse is busy mixing something. -
Every symptom tends to show
You're decidedly DE TROP -
Ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! he! ho! ho!
Time's teetotum,
If you spin it,
Give its quotum
Once a minute:
I'll go bail
You hit the nail,
And if you fail
The deuce is in it!
You grow up, and you discover
What it is to be a lover.
Some young lady is selected -
Poor, perhaps, but well-connected,
Whom you hail (for Love is blind
As the Queen of Fairy-kind.
Though she's plain - perhaps unsightly,
Makes her face up - laces tightly,
In her form your fancy traces
All the gifts of all the graces.
Rivals none the maiden woo,
So you take her and she takes you!
Ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! ho!
Joke beginning,
Never ceases,
Till your inning
Time releases;
On your way
You blindly stray,
And day by day
The joke increases!
Ten years later - Time progresses -
Sours your temper - thins your tresses;
Fancy, then, her chain relaxes;
Rates are facts and so are taxes.
Fairy Queen's no longer young -
Fairy Queen has such a tongue!
Twins have probably intruded -
Quite unbidden - just as you did;
They're a source of care and trouble -
Just as you were - only double.
Comes at last the final stroke -
Time has had his little joke!
Ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! ho!
Daily driven
(Wife as drover)
Ill you've thriven -
Ne'er in clover:
Lastly, when
Threescore and ten
(And not till then),
The joke is over!
Ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! ho! ho!
Then - and then
The joke is over!