DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
To ----
by John Keats

Hadst thou liv'd in days of old,
O what wonders had been told
Of thy lively countenance,
And thy humid eyes that dance
In the midst of their own brightness;
In the very fane of lightness.
Over which thine eyebrows, leaning,
Picture out each lovely meaning:
In a dainty bend they lie,
Like to streaks across the sky,
Or the feathers from a crow,
Fallen on a bed of snow.
Of thy dark hair that extends
Into many graceful bends:
As the leaves of Hellebore
Turn to whence they sprung before.
And behind each ample curl
Peeps the richness of a pearl.
Downward too flows many a tress
With a glossy waviness;
Full, and round like globes that rise
From the censer to the skies
Through sunny air. Add too, the sweetness
Of thy honied voice; the neatness
Of thine ankle lightly turn'd:
With those beauties, scarce discern'd,
Kept with such sweet privacy,
That they seldom meet the eye
Of the little loves that fly
Round about with eager pry.
Saving when, with freshening lave,
Thou dipp'st them in the taintless wave;
Like twin water lillies, born
In the coolness of the morn.
O, if thou hadst breathed then,
Now the Muses had been ten.
Couldst thou wish for lineage higher
Than twin sister of Thalia?
At least for ever, evermore,
Will I call the Graces four.
Hadst thou liv'd when chivalry
Lifted up her lance on high,
Tell me what thou wouldst have been?
Ah! I see the silver sheen
Of thy broidered, floating vest
Cov'ring half thine ivory breast;
Which, O heavens! I should see,
But that cruel destiny
Has placed a golden cuirass there;
Keeping secret what is fair.
Like sunbeams in a cloudlet nested
Thy locks in knightly casque are rested:
O'er which bend four milky plumes
Like the gentle lilly's blooms
Springing from a costly vase.
See with what a stately pace
Comes thine alabaster steed;
Servant of heroic deed!
O'er his loins, his trappings glow
Like the northern lights on snow.
Mount his back! thy sword unsheath!
Sign of the enchanter's death;
Bane of every wicked spell;
Silencer of dragon's yell.
Alas! thou this wilt never do:
Thou art an enchantress too,
And wilt surely never spill
Blood of those whose eyes can kill.
Light
by John Milton

Hail holy light, ofspring of Heav'n first-born,
Or of th' Eternal Coeternal beam
May I express thee unblam'd? since God is light,
And never but in unapproached light
Dwelt from Eternitie, dwelt then in thee,
Bright effluence of bright essence increate.
Or hear'st thou rather pure Ethereal stream,
Whose Fountain who shall tell? before the Sun,
Before the Heavens thou wert, and at the voice
Of God, as with a Mantle didst invest
The rising world of waters dark and deep,
Won from the void and formless infinite.
Thee I re-visit now with bolder wing,
Escap't the Stygian Pool, though long detain'd
In that obscure sojourn, while in my flight
Through utter and through middle darkness borne
With other notes then to th' Orphean Lyre
I sung of Chaos and Eternal Night,
Taught by the heav'nly Muse to venture down
The dark descent, and up to reascend,
Though hard and rare: thee I revisit safe,
And feel thy sovran vital Lamp; but thou
Revisit'st not these eyes, that rowle in vain
To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn;
So thick a drop serene hath quencht thir Orbs,
Or dim suffusion veild. Yet not the more
Cease I to wander where the Muses haunt
Cleer Spring, or shadie Grove, or Sunnie Hill,
Smit with the love of sacred song; but chief
Thee Sion and the flowrie Brooks beneath
That wash thy hallowd feet, and warbling flow,
Nightly I visit: nor somtimes forget
Those other two equal'd with me in Fate,
So were I equal'd with them in renown.
Blind Thamyris and blind Maeonides,
And Tiresias and Phineus Prophets old.
Then feed on thoughts, that voluntarie move
Harmonious numbers; as the wakeful Bird
Sings darkling, and in shadiest Covert hid
Tunes her nocturnal Note. Thus with the Year
Seasons return, but not to me returns
Day, or the sweet approach of Ev'n or Morn,
Or sight of vernal bloom, or Summers Rose,
Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine;
But cloud in stead, and ever-during dark
Surrounds me, from the chearful waies of men
Cut off, and for the Book of knowledg fair
Presented with a Universal blanc
Of Natures works to mee expung'd and ras'd,
And wisdome at one entrance quite shut out.
So much the rather thou Celestial light
Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers
Irradiate, there plant eyes, all mist from thence
Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell
Of things invisible to mortal sight.
Sonnet To Music.
by Thomas Gent

Hail! Heavenly Maid, my pensive mind,
Invokes thy woe-subduing strain;
For there a shield my soul can find,
Which subjugates each dagger'd pain.
When beauty spurns the lover's sighs,
'Tis thine soft pity to inspire;
And cold indifference vanquish'd lies,
Beneath thy myrtle-vested lyre.
Oh! could contention's demon hear
Thy seraph voice, his blood-lav'd spear
He'd drop, and own thy power;
That smiling o'er each hapless land,
Sweet peace might call her hallow'd band,
To crown the festive hour.
New Year's Day.
by Thomas Frederick Young

Hail! joyous morn. Hail! happy day,
That ushers in another year,
Fraught with what sorrow, none can say,
Nor with what pain, to mortals here.
Another year has roll'd away,
With all its sorrows, joys and fears,
But still the light of hope's glad ray,
Yet beams within our heart, and cheers.
One year, one span of time has pass'd,
So swift to some, to others slow;
But it has gone, and we should cast
Along with it, remorse and woe.
Of things we've done, or only thought,
'Tis useless now the bitter tear,
Of actions unavailing wrought,
Let them repose upon their bier.
We should, indeed, e'en yet atone
For what our reason says we can,
But never let remorse's groan
Degrade us from our state as man.
Let us discharge the debts we owe,
But still some debts will be unpaid;
But we, if we forgive, also,
Should ne'er, despairing, feel afraid.
The future is before us still,
And to that future we should gaze,
With hope renew'd, with firmer will,
To tread life's weary, tangl'd maze.
We ne'er should let the gloomy past,
Bow down our heads in dark despair,
But we should keep those lessons fast,
Which e'en our follies taught us there.
Experience, so dearly bought,
By folly, or by ignorance,
Should, in our inmost system wrought,
Our daily life improve, advance.
Then let us press towards the goal,
The common goal of all mankind,
Go on, while seasons onward roll,
Nor cast one fainting look behind.
And, as we journey through this year,
Let us in watchfulness beware
Of all that brings remorseful tear,
Or future terror and despair.
Let us with thoughtful vision scan
Each step we take, each act we do,
That we may meet our brother man,
With no unrighteous thing to rue.
A happy, happy, bright New Year,
I wish to all the sons of men,
With happy hearts, and merry cheer,
Till it has roll'd its round again.
Birth Of Canada As A Nation, July First, 1867.
by James McIntyre

Hail Britannia's noblest daughter,
Who is surrounded by the water
Of many a lake and broad sea,
Land of beaver and of maple tree.
Her lofty brow is wreathed with smiles,
For from the far Atlantic isles
In pomp have come their delegates,
All seeking to unite their fates.
With Canada great northern queen,
And now throughout the land is seen,
High festival and stately dance,
Triumphant nuptials to advance.
And soon shall Red River valley
And distant Vancouver rally,
To form this Empire gigantic
From Pacific to Atlantic.
The River Duddon - A Series Of Sonnets, 1820. - XIII - Open Prospect
by William Wordsworth

Hail to the fields, with Dwellings sprinkled o'er,
And one small hamlet, under a green hill
Clustering, with barn and byre, and spouting mill!
A glance suffices, should we wish for more,
Gay June would scorn us. But when bleak winds roar
Through the stiff lance-like shoots of pollard ash,
Dread swell of sound! loud as the gusts that lash
The matted forests of Ontario's shore
By wasteful steel unsmitten, then would I
Turn into port; and, reckless of the gale,
Reckless of angry Duddon sweeping by,
While the warm hearth exalts the mantling ale,
Laugh with the generous household heartily
At all the merry pranks of Donnerdale!
Hail, Risen Lord!
by Pamela S. Vining, (J. C. Yule)

Hail, risen Lord, upon whose brow
The crown of victory resteth now,
Unfading as the sun!
Hail, vanquisher of every foe,
Of Sin, dread source of all our woe,
And Death - the last undone!
Hail, risen Lord, - the empty grave
Proclaims aloud thy power to save, - 
Thy high, victorious might!
Hail, Lord of life, and peace, and love,
On thy exalted throne above,
In uncreated light!
Hail, risen Lord, - we bend the knee,
And lift the adoring eye to thee,
And yield thee worship meet! - 
And, while the angelic hosts on high
Shout their hosannas through the sky,
We breathe them at thy feet
For here, 'mid darkness, sin, and death,
Our loudest praise is but a breath, - 
An infant's feeble sigh!
Yet, haply, to thy gracious ear
Our weak hosannas are as dear,
As those that swell on high!
Hail, risen Lord, - exalted King,
Well may the highest heavens ring
With rapture's sweetest lays!
Be ours to add our feeble sigh
To the full chorus of the sky,
In reverential praise!
Hail, Twilight, Sovereign Of One Peaceful Hour
by William Wordsworth

Hail Twilight, sovereign of one peaceful hour!
Not dull art Thou as undiscerning Night;
But studious only to remove from sight
Day's mutable distinctions. Ancient Power!
Thus did the waters gleam, the mountains lower,
To the rude Briton, when, in wolf-skin vest
Here roving wild, he laid him down to rest
On the bare rock, or through a leafy bower
Looked ere his eyes were closed. By him was seen
The self-same Vision which we now behold;
At thy meek bidding, shadowy Power! brought forth
These mighty barriers, and the gulf between;
The flood, the stars, a spectacle as old
As the beginning of the heavens and earth!
Ottawa.
by Nora Pembroke (Margaret Moran Dixon McDougall)

Hail! to the city sitting as a queen
Enthroned a cataract on either hand,
The voice of many waters in her ears,
And the great river tranquil at her feet,
Smoothing his locks and all his foamy mane
After his wild leap from the rifted rocks,
And while he fawns about her feet, she sits
A young Cybele diademed with towers,
So young yet on her sandals there is blood,
And all the river will not wash it out
Spilt at her feet for being true to her,
So young, and well she doth become her state,
We look, and know her born to be a queen,
Before the mother finger o'er the sea
Touched her, and made her royal with a touch;
For, seated where the thundering waters meet,
Spanned by her fingers, she can lay her hand
On two fair provinces, and call them hers;
Greater than those which swell and pride themselves
In long, loud titles in the older world;
The whirl and hum of industry are here,
And all the fragrance of the enriching pine;
And on the river in the wake of boats
That snort and prance like Neptune's battle steeds,
Pawing the water with impatient steps,
Passes our floating wealth that seeks the sea.
Thy Ship
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Hadst thou a ship, in whose vast hold lay stored
The priceless riches of all climes and lands,
Say, wouldst thou let it float upon the seas
Unpiloted, of fickle winds the sport,
And of wild waves and hidden rocks the prey?
Thine is that ship; and in its depths concealed
Lies all the wealth of this vast universe -
Yea, lies some part of God's omnipotence
The legacy divine of every soul.
Thy will, O man, thy will is that great ship,
And yet behold it drifting here and there -
One moment lying motionless in port,
Then on high seas by sudden impulse flung,
Then drying on the sands, and yet again
Sent forth on idle quests to no-man's land
To carry nothing and to nothing bring;
Till worn and fretted by the aimless strife
And buffeted by vacillating winds
It founders on a rock, or springs aleak
With all its unused treasures in the hold.
Go save thy ship, thou sluggard; take the wheel
And steer to knowledge, glory and success.
Great mariners have made the pathway plain
For thee to follow; hold thou to the course
Of Concentration Channel, and all things
Shall come in answer to thy swerveless wish
As comes the needle to the magnet's call,
Or sunlight to the prisoned blade of grass
That yearns all winter for the kiss of spring.
North-West Rebellion, 1885.
by James McIntyre

Hail Canada our young fair land,
The world's respect it doth command;
How quick her sons at war's alarms
Sprang to her rescue with their arms.
In Canada the English rose,
The shamrock and the thistle grows,
United garland they combine
Around the maple tree to twine.
They did march a brave gallant host
From the far East Atlantic coast,
Our Canada so proud and free,
Four thousand miles from sea to sea.
Though skilful rebels did entrench,
But their deadly fires our boys did quench,
And victory it soon was won
By our General Middleton.
And Colonel Williams left a name
For Canada's temple of fame,
A kind and a brave hearted man
In hour of danger led the van.
The ninetieth regiment it fought well,
And Winnipeg doth its glories tell,
London boasts of her volunteers,
For she prides in her Fusiliers.
Toronto troops have gained renown,
And triumph their quick march did crown,
For the relief of Battleford,
And scattering of the Indian horde.
Our volunteers took up their arms,
Each left his home and all its charms;
Though many they were tender reared,
No frost nor snow nor foe they feared.
Alas that youth so true and brave,
So many now do fill a grave,
And others they are maimed for life,
While engaged in glorious strife.
We have sprung from a good brave stock,
Rose, thistle and the shamrock,
Who all in unity agree,
'Neath the shade of the maple tree.
The Indians soon came to grief,
Under their great Poundmaker chief,
And Toronto troops gained fame
And Otter glory to his name.
We all felt proud of our gunboat
And the brave crew of the Northcote,
And of our scouts who captured Riel,
Who in vain for mercy did appeal.
And may all quickly come to grief
Who do not love the maple leaf,
For they spring from a noble tree,
Shades this land of the brave and free.
Hymn on Solitude
by James Thomson

Hail, mildly pleasing Solitude,
Companion of the wise and good,
But from whose holy piercing eye
The herd of fools and villains fly.
Oh! how I love with thee to walk,
And listen to thy whispered talk,
Which innocence and truth imparts,
And melts the most obdurate hearts.
A thousand shapes you wear with ease,
And still in every shape you please.
Now wrapt in some mysterious dream,
A lone philosopher you seem;
Now quick from hill to vale you fly,
And now you sweep the vaulted sky;
A shepherd next, you haunt the plain,
And warble forth your oaten strain;
A lover now, with all the grace
Of that sweet passion in your face;
Then, calmed to friendship, you assume
The gentle looking Hertford's bloom,
As, with her Musidora, she
(Her Musidora fond of thee)
Amid the long-withdrawing vale
Awakes the rivalled nightingale.
Thine is the balmy breath of morn,
Just as the dew-bent rose is born;
And, while meridian fervors beat,
Thine is the woodland dumb retreat;
But chief, when evening scenes decay
And the faint landscape swims away,
Thine is the doubtful soft decline,
And that best hour of musing thine.
Descending angels bless thy train,
Thy virtues of the sage and swain
Plain Innocence, in white arrayed,
Before thee lifts her fearless head;
Religion's beams around thee shine
And cheer thy glooms with light divine;
About thee sports sweet Liberty,
And rapt Urania sings to thee.
Oh, let me pierce thy secret cell,
And in thy deep recesses dwell!
Perhaps from Norwood's oak-clad hill,
When Meditation has her fill,
I just may cast my careless eyes
Where London's spiry turrets rise,
Think of its crimes, it cares, its pain,
Then shield me in the woods again.
The Evening Star.
by Eliza Paul Kirkbride Gurney

Hail, pensile gem, that thus can softly gild
The starry coronal of quiet eve!
What frost-work fabrics man shall vainly build
Ere thou art doomed thy heavenly post to leave!
Bright star! thou seem'st to me a blest retreat,
The wearied pilgrim's paradise of rest;
I love to think long-parted friends shall meet,
Blissful reunion! in thy tranquil breast.
I saw thee shine when life with me was young,
And fresh as fleet-winged time's infantile hour,
When Hope her treacherous chaplet 'round me flung,
And daily twined a new-created flower.
I saw thee shine while yet the sacred smile
Of home and kindred round my path would play,
But Time, who loves our fairest joys to spoil,
Destined this hour of bloom to swift decay.
The buds, that then were wreathed around my heart,
Now breathe their hallowed sweetness there no more;
'Twas thine to see them one by one depart,
And yet thou shinest brightly as before.
So, when this bosom, that 'mid all its woes
Has longed thy little port of rest to win,
In the calm grave shall find at last repose,
Thou'lt beam as fair as though I ne'er had been.
Autumn And Sunset.
by Mary Ann H. T. Bigelow

Hail, sober Autumn! thee I love,
Thy healthful breeze and clear blue sky;
And more than flowers of Spring admire
Thy falling leaves of richer dye.
'Twas even thus when life was young,
I welcomed Autumn with delight;
Although I knew that with it came
The shorter day and lengthened night.
Let others pass October by,
Or dreary call its hours, or chill;
Let poets always sing of Spring,
My praise shall be of Autumn still.
And I have loved the setting sun,
E'en than his rising beams more dear;
'Tis fitting time for serious thought,
It is an hour for solemn prayer.
Before the evening closes in,
Or night's dark curtains round us fall,
See how o'er tree, and spire, and hill,
That setting sun illumines all.
So when my earthly race is run,
When called to bid this world adieu,
Like yonder cloudless orb I see,
May my sun set in glory too.
Oct 8, 1852.
The Medusa Of The Skies
by Clark Ashton Smith

Haggard as if resurgent from a tomb,
The moon uprears her ghastly, shrunken head,
Crowned with such light as flares upon the dead
From pallid skies more death-like than the gloom.
Now fall her beams till slope and plain assume
The whiteness of a land whence life is fled;
And shadows that a sepulcher might shed
Move livid as the stealthy hands of doom.
O'er rigid hills and valleys locked and mute,
A pallor steals as of a world made still
When Death, that erst had crept, stands absolute -
An earth now frozen fast by power of eyes
That malefice and purposed silence fill,
The gaze of that Medusa of the skies.
Analogy. (To D - - L - - .)
by Francis William Lauderdale Adams

Had you lived when a tyrant king
Strove to make all the slaves of one,
With nobles and with churchmen you
Had stood unflinching, pure and true,
To annihilate that hateful thing
Green Runnymeade beat out of John?
Had you lived when a wanton crew,
Flash scoundrels of a day outdone,
Trod down the toilers birth derides,
With Cromwell and his Ironsides
The brave days had discovered you,
Where Naseby saw the gallants run?
And yet you, - this same knight in list
For freedom in her narrow dawn
Against that one, against those few,
Vile king, vile nobles - you, yet you
Stand by the bloody Capitalist,
Fight with the pandar Gentleman!
Ode To A Hat.
by Thomas Moore

--altum aedificat caput."
JUVENAL
1826.
Hail, reverent Hat!--sublime mid all
The minor felts that round thee grovel;--
Thou that the Gods "a Delta" call
While meaner mortals call the "shovel."
When on thy shape (like pyramid,
Cut horizontally in two)[1]
I raptured gaze, what dreams unbid
Of stalls and mitres bless my view!
That brim of brims so sleekly good--
Not flapt, like dull Wesleyans', down,
But looking (as all churchmen's should)
Devoutly upward--towards the crown.
Gods! when I gaze upon that brim,
So redolent of Church all over,
What swarms of Tithes in vision dim,--
Some-pig-tailed, some like cherubim,
With ducklings' wings--around it hover!
Tenths of all dead and living things,
That Nature into being brings,
From calves and corn to chitterlings.
Say, holy Hat, that hast, of cocks,
The very cock most orthodox.
To which of all the well-fed throng
Of Zion,[2] joy'st thou to belong?
Thou'rt not Sir Harcourt Lees's--no-
For hats grow like the heads that wear 'em:
And hats, on heads like his, would grow
Particularly harum-scarum.
Who knows but thou mayst deck the pate
Of that famed Doctor Ad-mth-te,
(The reverend rat, whom we saw stand
On his hind-legs in Westmoreland,)
Who changed so quick from blue to yellow,
And would from yellow back to blue,
And back again, convenient fellow,
If 'twere his interest so to do.
Or haply smartest of triangles,
Thou art the hat of Doctor Owen;
The hat that, to his vestry wrangles,
That venerable priest doth go in,--
And then and there amid the stare
Of all St. Olave's, takes the chair
And quotes with phiz right orthodox
The example of his reverend brothers,
To prove that priests all fleece their flocks
And he must fleece as well as others.
Blest Hat! (whoe'er thy lord may be)
Thus low I take off mine to thee,
The homage of a layman's castor,
To the spruce delta of his pastor.
Oh mayst thou be, as thou proceedest,
Still smarter cockt, still brusht the brighter,
Till, bowing all the way, thou leadest
Thy sleek possessor to a mitre!
To His Saviour's Sepulchre: His Devotion.
by Robert Herrick

Hail, holy and all-honour'd tomb,
By no ill haunted; here I come,
With shoes put off, to tread thy room.
I'll not profane by soil of sin
Thy door as I do enter in;
For I have washed both hand and heart,
This, that, and every other part,
So that I dare, with far less fear
Than full affection, enter here.
Thus, thus I come to kiss Thy stone
With a warm lip and solemn one:
And as I kiss I'll here and there
Dress Thee with flow'ry diaper.
How sweet this place is! as from hence
Flowed all Panchaia's frankincense;
Or rich Arabia did commix,
Here, all her rare aromatics.
Let me live ever here, and stir
No one step from this sepulchre.
Ravish'd I am! and down I lie
Confused in this brave ecstasy.
Here let me rest; and let me have
This for my heaven that was Thy grave:
And, coveting no higher sphere,
I'll my eternity spend here.
July Fourth.
by Freeman Edwin Miller

Hail, glorious morning of Columbia's birth,
Celestial dawn of freedom! There shall be
In recognition of thy wondrous worth
By mighty millions this side of the sea,
Triumphant crowns of laurel wreathed for thee!
Welcome thy mammoth pageants, welcome all
The choral songs and melodies of glee,
The swelling shouts of praise that gladly fall
From mighty multitudes in anthems national!
High hangs the sacred banner, and the stars
Dance in the sunshine, while the breezes play
Around the glory of the hallowed bars
Gleaming in white and crimson; music gay
Floats from the patriot host and cheers array
Great shouts around its foldings. Long in state,
Flag of the brave and free, wave o'er this day
To bring the world rejoicings which await
The natal hours of might, the day we celebrate!
How fears the tyrant in his capital,
As myriad wires throb with the nation's tale!
How despot trembles in his castled hall,
When liberty's wild shouts of power prevail,
And give their gladness unto every gale!
Fetters and chains dissolve in holy trust,
Scepters and swords in puny weakness fail,
While crowns and thrones make monumental dust,
And kingly Might is dead, Oppression downward thrust.
Wide float thy wondrous p'ans; loudly range
Thy songs of holy rapture; and the roars
Of deep-mouthed cannons echo wild and strange
Through shouting cities; Patriotism pours
Her full libations on the trembling shores,
Till earth reels with her triumph; and the voice
Of millions mad with merriment far soars
From sea to ocean with entrancing noise,
Till nations hear the cry and continents rejoice.
Wave on, thou flag of freedom, and this day
Still live in hearts of nations! O, thou Land,
Where Man was first the monarch, where the sway
Of birth exalted first was broken, stand
To guard the helpless with a mighty hand,
And give the weak protection; scout the ban
Which tyrants utter, and with growing band
Of noble freemen serve thy primal plan,
And bind all nations in the Brotherhood of Man!