DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Lo! Victress On The Peaks
by Walt Whitman

Lo! Victress on the peaks!
Where thou, with mighty brow, regarding the world,
(The world, O Libertad, that vainly conspired against thee;)
Out of its countless beleaguering toils, after thwarting them all;
Dominant, with the dazzling sun around thee,
Flauntest now unharm'd, in immortal soundness and bloom - lo! in these hours supreme,
No poem proud, I, chanting, bring to thee - nor mastery's rapturous verse;
But a book, containing night's darkness, and blood-dripping wounds,
And psalms of the dead.
The Sonnets VII - Lo! in the orient when the gracious light
by William Shakespeare

Lo! in the orient when the gracious light
Lifts up his burning head, each under eye
Doth homage to his new-appearing sight,
Serving with looks his sacred majesty;
And having climb'd the steep-up heavenly hill,
Resembling strong youth in his middle age,
Yet mortal looks adore his beauty still,
Attending on his golden pilgrimage:
But when from highmost pitch, with weary car,
Like feeble age, he reeleth from the day,
The eyes, 'fore duteous, now converted are
From his low tract, and look another way:
So thou, thyself outgoing in thy noon:
Unlook'd, on diest unless thou get a son.
The Conqueror Worm
by Edgar Allan Poe

Lo! 'tis a gala night
Within the lonesome latter years!
An angel throng, bewinged, bedight
In veils, and drowned in tears,
Sit in a theatre, to see
A play of hopes and fears,
While the orchestra breathes fitfully
The music of the spheres.
Mimes, in the form of God on high,
Mutter and mumble low,
And hither and thither fly 
Mere puppets they, who come and go
At bidding of vast formless things
That shift the scenery to and fro,
Flapping from out their Condor wings
Invisible Wo!
That motley drama oh, be sure
It shall not be forgot!
With its Phantom chased for evermore,
By a crowd that seize it not,
Through a circle that ever returneth in
To the self-same spot,
And much of Madness, and more of Sin,
And Horror the soul of the plot.
But see, amid the mimic rout
A crawling shape intrude!
A blood-red thing that writhes from out
The scenic solitude!
It writhes! it writhes! with mortal pangs
The mimes become its food,
And the angels sob at vermin fangs
In human gore imbued.
Out out are the lights out all!
And, over each quivering form,
The curtain, a funeral pall,
Comes down with the rush of a storm,
And the angels, all pallid and wan,
Uprising, unveiling, affirm
That the play is the tragedy, "Man,"
And its hero the Conqueror Worm.
Prologue
by Thomas Oldham

Lo! Time, at last, has brought, with tardy flight,
The long-anticipated, wish'd-for night;
How on this blissful night, while yet remote,
Did Hope and Fancy with fond rapture doat!
Like eagles, oft, in glory's dazzling sky,
With full-stretch'd pinions have they soar'd on high,
To greet the appearance of the poet's name,
Dawning conspicuous mid the stars of fame.
Alas! they soar not now; the demon, Fear,
Has hurl'd the cherubs from their heavenly sphere:
Fancy, o'erwhelm'd with terror, grovelling lies;
The world of torment opens on her eyes,
Darkness and hissing all she sees and hears;
("The speaker pauses the audience are
supposed to clap, when he continues,")
But Hope, returning to dispel her fears,
Claps her bright wings; the magic sound and light
At once have forced their dreaded foe to flight,
Silenced the hissing, chased the darkness round,
And charm'd up marvelling Fancy from the ground.
Say, shall the cherubs dare once more to fly?
Not, as of late, in glory's dazzling sky,
To greet the appearance of the poet's name,
Dawning conspicuous mid the stars of fame;
Presumptuous flight! but let them dare to rise,
Cheer'd by the light of your propitious eyes,
Within this roof, glory's contracted sphere,
On fluttering pinions, unsubdued by Fear;
O! let them dare, ere yet the curtain draws,
Fondly anticipate your kind applause.
The Train Misser
by James Whitcomb Riley

At Union Station
'Ll where in the world my eyes has bin -
Ef I hain't missed that train ag'in!
Chuff! And whistle! And toot! And ring!
But blast and blister the dasted train!
How it does it I can't explain!
Git here thirty-five minutes before
The durn things due! And, drat the thing
It'll manage to git past-shore!
The more I travel around, the more
I got no sense! To stand right here
And let it beat me! 'Ll ding my melts!
I got no gumption, ner nothin' else!
Ticket Agent's a dad-burned bore!
Sell you a tickets all they keer!
Ticket Agents ort to all be
Prosecuted - and that's jes what!
How'd I know which train's fer me?
And how'd I know which train was not?
Goern and comin' and gone astray,
And backin' and switchin' ever'-which-way!
Ef I could jes sneak round behind
Myse'f, where I could git full swing,
I'd lift my coat, and kick, by jing!
Till I jes got jerked up and fined!
Fer here I stood, as a durn fool's apt
To, and let that train jes chuff and choo
Right apast me - and mouth jes gapped
Like a blamed old sandwitch warped in two!
Charge to the Knight of Malta
by Harriet Annie Wilkins

Air--Stephenos
Lo, a knight in armour standing,
Ready for the foe;
Thee we greet, belov'd Companion,
Thee we know.
Keep thine oath, oh new made soldier,
Pledged in heaven's sight;
Nor forget the vow thou'st taken,
Malta's knight.
By the banner, o'er us waving,
By thy lance at rest,
Chiefly by that Cross emblazoned
On thy breast.
In the heat of danger's trial,
Dare the fiercest fight;
No desertion, no denial,
Right or life!
See thou turn not from the conflict,
On the battle field,
Though men bear a dying soldier
On thy shield.
Let thy strong arm shield the helpless,
And the feeble save;
Mercy's voice the true knight knoweth,
And the brave.
Welcome, dear Sir Knight, thrice welcome!
To our tented field;
God will aid us till the final
Foe shall yield.
We are pledged unto His kingdom,
Who for us hath borne
Cross and spear, for us did suffer
Crown of thorn.
Then, for Him who rose triumphant
To the heavenly Lamp,
Gird thy sword though night surround thee,
Wild and damp.
When at last, in mortal weakness,
Sword and spear must fall,
Christ, unto Thy Grand Encampment,
Take us all.
Sachal. A Waif Of Battle.
by Eric Mackay

I.
Lo! at my feet,
A something pale of hue;
A something sad to view;
Dead or alive I dare not call it sweet.
II.
Not white as snow;
Not transient as a tear!
A warrior left it here,
It was his passport ere he met the foe.
III.
Here is a name,
A word upon the book;
If ye but kneel to look,
Ye'll find the letters "Sachal" on the same.
IV.
His Land to cherish,
He died at twenty-seven.
There are no wars in Heaven,
But when he fought he gain'd the right to perish.
V.
Where was he born?
In France, at Puy le D'me.
A wanderer from his home,
He found a Fatherland beyond the morn.
VI.
'Twas France's plan;
The cause he did not ask.
His life was but a mask,
And he upraised it, martyr'd at Sedan.
VII.
And prone in death,
Beyond the name of France,
Beyond his hero-glance, -
He thought, belike, of her who gave him breath.
VIII.
O thou dead son!
O Sachal! far away,
But not forgot to-day,
I had a mother, too, but now have none.
IX.
Our hopes are brave.
Our faiths are braver still.
The soul shall no man kill;
For God will find us, each one in his grave.
X.
A land more vast
Than Europe's kingdoms are, -
A brighter, nobler star
Than victory's fearful light, - is thine at last.
XI.
And should'st thou meet
Yon Germans up on high, -
Thy foes when death was nigh, -
Nor thou nor they will sound the soul's retreat.
XII.
For all are just,
Yea, all are patriots there,
And thou, O Fils de Pierre!
Hast found thy marshal's baton in the dust.
XIII.
Oh, farewell, friend;
My friend, albeit unknown,
Save in thy death alone,
Oh, fare thee well till sin and sorrow end.
XIV.
In realms of joy
We'll meet; aye, every one:
Mother and sire and son, -
And my poor mother, too, will claim her boy.
XV.
Death leads to God.
Death is the Sword of Fate,
Death is the Golden Gate
That opens up to glory, through the sod.
XVI.
And thou that road,
O Sachal! thou hast found;
A king is not so crown'd
As thou art, soldier! in thy blest abode.
XVII.
Deathless in death,
Exalted, not destroy'd,
Thou art in Heaven employ'd
To swell the songs of angels with thy breath.
Arakoon
by Henry Kendall

LO! in storms, the triple-headed
Hill, whose dreaded
Bases battle with the seas,
Looms across fierce widths of fleeting
Waters beating
Evermore on roaring leas!
Arakoon, the black, the lonely!
Housed with only
Cloud and rain-wind, mist and damp;
Round whose foam-drenched feet and nether
Depths, together
Sullen sprites of thunder tramp!
There the East hums loud and surly,
Late and early,
Through the chasms and the caves,
And across the naked verges
Leap the surges!
White and wailing waifs of waves.
Day by day the sea-fogs gathered
Tempest-fathered
Pitch their tents on yonder peak,
Yellow drifts and fragments lying
Where the flying
Torrents chafe the cloven creek!
And at nightfall, when the driven
Bolts of heaven
Smite the rock and break the bluff,
Thither troop the elves whose home is
Where the foam is,
And the echo and the clough.
Ever girt about with noises,
Stormy voices,
And the salt breath of the Strait,
Stands the steadfast Mountain Giant,
Grim, reliant,
Dark as Death, and firm as Fate.
So when trouble treads, like thunder,
Weak men under
Treads and breaks the thews of these
Set thyself to bear it bravely,
Greatly, gravely,
Like the hill in yonder seas;
Since the wrestling and endurance
Give assurance
To the faint at bay with pain,
That no soul to strong endeavour
Yoked for ever,
Works against the tide in vain.
Night.
by Madison Julius Cawein

Lo! where the car of Day down slopes of flame
On burnished axle quits the drowsy skies!
And as his snorting steeds of glowing brass
Rush 'neath the earth, a glimmering dust of gold
From their fierce hoofs o'er heaven's azure meads
Rolls to yon star that burns beneath the moon.
With solemn tread and holy-stoled, star-bound,
The Night steps in, sad votaress, like a nun,
To pace lone corridors of th' ebon-arch'd sky.
How sad! how beautiful! her raven locks
Pale-filleted with stars that dance their sheen
On her deep, holy eyes, and woo to sleep,
Sleep or the easeful slumber of white Death!
How calm o'er this great water, in its flow
Silent and vast, smoothes yon cold sister sphere,
Her lucid chasteness feathering the wax-white foam!
As o'er a troubled brow falls calm content:
As clear-eyed chastity in this bleak world
Tinges and softens all the darker dross.
See, where the roses blow at the wood's edge
In many a languid bloom, bowed to the moon
And the dim river's lisp; sleep droops their lids
With damask lashes trimmed and fragile rayed,
Which the mad, frolic bee - rough paramour - 
So often kissed beneath th' enlivening sun.
How cool the breezes touch the tired head
With unseen fingers long and soft! and there
From its white couch of thorn-tree blossoms sweet,
Pillowed with one milk cluster, floating, swooning,
Drops the low nocturne of a dreaming bird,
Ave Maria, nun-like, slumb'ring sung.
See, there the violet mound in many an eye,
A deep-blue eye, meek, delicate, and sad,
As Sorrow's own sad eyes, great with far dreams,
When haltingly she bends o'er Lethe's waves
Falt'ring to drink, and falt'ring still remains,
The Night with feet of moon-tinged mist swept o'er
Them now, but as she passed she bent and kissed
Each modest orb that selfless hung as tho'
Thought-freighted low; then groped her train of jet
Which billowing by did merely waft the sound
Of a brief gust to each wild violet,
To kiss each eye and laugh; then shed a tear
Upon each downward face which nestled there.
She weeping from her silent vigil turns,
As some pale mother from her cradled child,
Frail, sick, and wan, with kisses warm and songs
Wooed to a peaceful ease and tranquil rest,
When the rathe cock crows to the graying East.
London Types - VI. 'Liza
by William Ernest Henley

'LIZA'S old man's perhaps a little shady,
'LIZA'S old woman's prone to booze and cringe;
But 'LIZA deems herself a perfect lady,
And proves it in her feathers and her fringe.
For 'LIZA has a bloke her heart to cheer,
With pearlies and a barrer and a jack,
So all the vegetables of the year
Are duly represented on her back.
Her boots are sacrifices to her hats,
Which knock you speechless - like a load of bricks!
Her summer velvets dazzle WANSTEAD FLATS,
And cost, at times, a good eighteen-and-six.
Withal, outside the gay and giddy whirl,
'LIZA'S a stupid, straight, hard-working girl.
The Old Man
by James Whitcomb Riley

Lo! steadfast and serene,
In patient pause between
The seen and the unseen,
What gentle zephyrs fan
Your silken silver hair, -
And what diviner air
Breathes round you like a prayer,
Old Man?
Can you, in nearer view
Of Glory, pierce the blue
Of happy Heaven through;
And, listening mutely, can
Your senses, dull to us,
Hear Angel-voices thus,
In chorus glorious -
Old Man?
In your reposeful gaze
The dusk of Autumn days
Is blent with April haze,
As when of old began
The bursting of the bud
Of rosy babyhood -
When all the world was good,
Old Man.
And yet I find a sly
Little twinkle in your eye;
And your whisperingly shy
Little laugh is simply an
Internal shout of glee
That betrays the fallacy
You'd perpetrate on me,
Old Man.
So just put up the frown
That your brows are pulling down!
Why, the fleetest boy in town,
As he bared his feet and ran,
Could read with half a glance -
And of keen rebuke, perchance -
Your secret countenance,
Old Man.
Now, honestly, confess:
Is an old man any less
Than the little child we bless
And caress when we can?
Isn't age but just a place
Where you mask the childish face
To preserve its inner grace,
Old Man?
Hasn't age a truant day,
Just as that you went astray
In the wayward, restless way,
When, brown with dust and tan,
Your roguish face essayed,
In solemn masquerade,
To hide the smile it made,
Old Man?
Now, fair, and square, and true,
Don't your old soul tremble through,
As in youth it used to do
When it brimmed and overran
With the strange, enchanted sights,
And the splendors and delights
Of the old "Arabian Nights,"
Old Man?
When, haply, you have fared
Where glad Aladdin shared
His lamp with you, and dared
The Afrite and his clan;
And, with him, clambered through
The trees where jewels grew -
And filled your pockets, too,
Old Man?
Or, with Sinbad, at sea -
And in veracity
Who has sinned as bad as he,
Or would, or will, or can? -
Have you listened to his lies,
With open mouth and eyes,
And learned his art likewise,
Old Man?
And you need not deny
That your eyes were wet as dry,
Reading novels on the sly!
And review them, if you can
And the same warm tears will fall -
Only faster, that is all -
Over Little Nell and Paul,
Old Man!
Oh, you were a lucky lad -
Just as good as you were bad!
And the host of friends you had -
Charley, Tom, and Dick, and Dan;
And the old School-Teacher, too,
Though he often censured you;
And the girls in pink and blue,
Old Man.
And - as often you have leant,
In boyish sentiment,
To kiss the letter sent
By Nelly, Belle, or Nan -
Wherein the rose's hue
Was red, the violet blue -
And sugar sweet - and you,
Old Man, -
So, to-day, as lives the bloom,
And the sweetness, and perfume
Of the blossoms, I assume,
On the same mysterious plan
The Master's love assures,
That the selfsame boy endures
In that hale old heart of yours,
Old Man.
The Tourist.
by Hattie Howard

Lo! carpet-bag and bagger occupy the land,
And prove the touring season actively begun;
His personnel and purpose can none misunderstand,
For each upon his frontlet bears his honest brand - 
The fool-ish one!
By caravan and car, from country and from town,
A great grasshopper army fell foraging the land;
Like bumblebees that know not where to settle down,
Impossible it is to curb or scare or drown
The tourist band.
With guidebook, camera, with rod and gun, to shoot,
To lure the deer, the hare, the bird, the speckled trout,
The pauper or the prince unbidden they salute,
And everywhere their royal right dare none dispute - 
To roam about.
From dark immuring walls and dingy ways of trade,
From high society's luxurious stately homes,
From lounging places by the park or promenade,
From rural dwellings canopied in sylvan shade,
The tourist comes.
To every mountain peak within the antipodes,
To sweet, sequestered spots no other mortal knows;
To every island fair engirt by sunny seas,
To forest-centers unexplored by birds or bees,
The tourist goes.
For Summer's fingers all the land have richly dressed,
Resplendent in regalia of scent and bloom,
And stirred in every heart the spirit of unrest,
Like that of untamed fledglings in the parent nest
For ampler room.
What is it prompts the roving mania - is it love
Of wild adventure fanciful, unique, and odd?
Is it to be in fashion, and to others prove
One's social standing, that impels the madness of
The tramp abroad?
The question hangs unanswered, like an unwise prayer,
Importunate, but powerless response to bring;
Go ask the voyagers, the rovers everywhere - 
They only say it is their rest-time, outing, their
Vacationing.
So is the world's eccentric round of joy complete
When happy tourist-traveler, no more to roam,
His fascinating, thrilling story shall repeat
To impecunious, luckless multitudes who greet
The tourist home.
The Evening Star
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Lo! in the painted oriel of the West,
Whose panes the sunken sun incarnadines,
Like a fair lady at her casement, shines
The evening star, the star of love and rest!
And then anon she doth herself divest
Of all her radiant garments, and reclines
Behind the sombre screen of yonder pines,
With slumber and soft dreams of love oppressed.
O my beloved, my sweet Hesperus!
My morning and my evening star of love!
My best and gentlest lady! even thus,
As that fair planet in the sky above,
Dost thou retire unto thy rest at night,
And from thy darkened window fades the light.
In Examination
by Rupert Brooke

Lo! from quiet skies
In through the window my Lord the Sun!
And my eyes
Were dazzled and drunk with the misty gold,
The golden glory that drowned and crowned me
Eddied and swayed through the room . . .
Around me,
To left and to right,
Hunched figures and old,
Dull blear-eyed scribbling fools, grew fair,
Ringed round and haloed with holy light.
Flame lit on their hair,
And their burning eyes grew young and wise,
Each as a God, or King of kings,
White-robed and bright
(Still scribbling all);
And a full tumultuous murmur of wings
Grew through the hall;
And I knew the white undying Fire,
And, through open portals,
Gyre on gyre,
Archangels and angels, adoring, bowing,
And a Face unshaded . . .
Till the light faded;
And they were but fools again, fools unknowing,
Still scribbling, blear-eyed and stolid immortals.
Specimen Of An Induction To A Poem
by John Keats

Lo! I must tell a tale of chivalry;
For large white plumes are dancing in mine eye.
Not like the formal crest of latter days:
But bending in a thousand graceful ways;
So graceful, that it seems no mortal hand,
Or e'en the touch of Archimago's wand,
Could charm them into such an attitude.
We must think rather, that in playful mood,
Some mountain breeze had turned its chief delight,
To show this wonder of its gentle might.
Lo! I must tell a tale of chivalry;
For while I muse, the lance points slantingly
Athwart the morning air: some lady sweet,
Who cannot feel for cold her tender feet,
From the worn top of some old battlement
Hails it with tears, her stout defender sent:
And from her own pure self no joy dissembling,
Wraps round her ample robe with happy trembling.
Sometimes, when the good Knight his rest would take,
It is reflected, clearly, in a lake,
With the young ashen boughs, 'gainst which it rests,
And th' half seen mossiness of linnets' nests.
Ah! shall I ever tell its cruelty,
When the fire flashes from a warrior's eye,
And his tremendous hand is grasping it,
And his dark brow for very wrath is knit?
Or when his spirit, with more calm intent,
Leaps to the honors of a tournament,
And makes the gazers round about the ring
Stare at the grandeur of the ballancing?
No, no! this is far off: then how shall I
Revive the dying tones of minstrelsy,
Which linger yet about lone gothic arches,
In dark green ivy, and among wild larches?
How sing the splendour of the revelries,
When but[t]s of wine are drunk off to the lees?
And that bright lance, against the fretted wall,
Beneath the shade of stately banneral,
Is slung with shining cuirass, sword, and shield?
Where ye may see a spur in bloody field.
Light-footed damsels move with gentle paces
Round the wide hall, and show their happy faces;
Or stand in courtly talk by fives and sevens:
Like those fair stars that twinkle in the heavens.
Yet must I tell a tale of chivalry:
Or wherefore comes that knight so proudly by?
Wherefore more proudly does the gentle knight,
Rein in the swelling of his ample might?
Spenser! thy brows are arched, open, kind,
And come like a clear sun-rise to my mind;
And always does my heart with pleasure dance,
When I think on thy noble countenance:
Where never yet was ought more earthly seen
Than the pure freshness of thy laurels green.
Therefore, great bard, I not so fearfully
Call on thy gentle spirit to hover nigh
My daring steps: or if thy tender care,
Thus startled unaware,
Be jealous that the foot of other wight
Should madly follow that bright path of light
Trac'd by thy lov'd Libertas; he will speak,
And tell thee that my prayer is very meek;
That I will follow with due reverence,
And start with awe at mine own strange pretence.
Him thou wilt hear; so I will rest in hope
To see wide plains, fair trees and lawny slope:
The morn, the eve, the light, the shade, the flowers;
Clear streams, smooth lakes, and overlooking towers.
Azrael's Count
by Rudyard Kipling

"Uncovenanted Mercies" - From "Limits and Renewals" [1930]
Lo! The Wild Cow of the Desert, her yeanling estrayed from her,
Lost in the wind-plaited sand-dunes, athirst in the maze of them.
Hot-foot she follows those foot-prints, the thrice-tangled ways of them.
Her soul is shut save to one thing, the love-quest consuming her
Fearless she lows past the camp, our fires affright her not.
Ranges she close to the tethered ones, the mares by the lances held. 
Noses she softly apart the veil in the women's tent.
Next, withdrawn under moonlight, a shadow afar off,
Fades. Ere men cry, "Hold her fast! darkness recovers her.
She the all-crazed and forlorn, when the dogs threaten her,
Only a side-tossed horn, as though a fly troubled her,
Shows she hath heard, till a lance in the heart of her quivereth.
Lo, from that carcass aheap, where speeds the soul of it?
Where is the tryst it must keep? Who is her pandar? Death!
Men I dismiss to the Mercy greet me not willingly;
Crying, "When seekest Thou me first? Are not my kin unslain?
Shrinking aside from the Sword-edge, blinking the glare of it,
Sinking the chin in the neck-bone. How shall that profit them? 
Yet, among men a ten thousand, few meet me otherwise.
Yet, among women a thousand, one comes to me mistress-wise.
Arms open, breasts open, mouth open, hot is her need on her.
Crying, "Ho, Servant, acquit me, the bound by Love's promises! 
Haste Thou! He Waits! I would go! Handle me lustily!"
Lo! her eyes stare past my wings, as things unbeheld by her.
Lo! her lips summoning part. I am not whom she calls!
Lo! My sword sinks and returns. At no time she heedeth it,
More than the dust of a journey, her garments brushed clear of it.
Lo! Ere the blood-gush has ceased, forward her soul rushes.
She is away to her tryst. Who is her pandar? Death!
The Flowering Orchard.
by William Morris

Silk Embroidery.
Lo silken my garden,
and silken my sky,
And silken my apple-boughs
hanging on high;
All wrought by the Worm
in the peasant carle's cot
On the Mulberry leafage
when summer was hot!