DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
The Man Who Dreamed Of Faeryland
by William Butler Yeats

He stood among a crowd at Dromahair;
His heart hung all upon a silken dress,
And he had known at last some tenderness,
Before earth took him to her stony care;
But when a man poured fish into a pile,
It Seemed they raised their little silver heads,
And sang what gold morning or evening sheds
Upon a woven world-forgotten isle
Where people love beside the ravelled seas;
That Time can never mar a lover's vows
Under that woven changeless roof of boughs:
The singing shook him out of his new ease.
He wandered by the sands of Lissadell;
His mind ran all on money cares and fears,
And he had known at last some prudent years
Before they heaped his grave under the hill;
But while he passed before a plashy place,
A lug-worm with its grey and muddy mouth
Sang that somewhere to north or west or south
There dwelt a gay, exulting, gentle race
Under the golden or the silver skies;
That if a dancer stayed his hungry foot
It seemed the sun and moon were in the fruit:
And at that singing he was no more wise.
He mused beside the well of Scanavin,
He mused upon his mockers: without fail
His sudden vengeance were a country tale,
When earthy night had drunk his body in;
But one small knot-grass growing by the pool
Sang where -- unnecessary cruel voice --
Old silence bids its chosen race rejoice,
Whatever ravelled waters rise and fall
Or stormy silver fret the gold of day,
And midnight there enfold them like a fleece
And lover there by lover be at peace.
The tale drove his fine angry mood away.
He slept under the hill of Lugnagall;
And might have known at last unhaunted sleep
Under that cold and vapour-turbaned steep,
Now that the earth had taken man and all:
Did not the worms that spired about his bones
proclaim with that unwearied, reedy cry
That God has laid His fingers on the sky,
That from those fingers glittering summer runs
Upon the dancer by the dreamless wave.
Why should those lovers that no lovers miss
Dream, until God burn Nature with a kiss?
The man has found no comfort in the grave.
Sonnet XXXIII.
by Fernando Ant'nio Nogueira Pessoa

He that goes back does, since he goes, advance,
Though he doth not advance who goeth back,
And he that seeks, though he on nothing chance,
May still by words be said to find a lack.
This paradox of having, that is nought
In the world's meaning of the things it screens,
Is yet true of the substance of pure thought
And there means something by the nought it means.
For thinking nought does on nought being confer,
As giving not is acting not to give,
And, to the same unbribed true thought, to err
Is to find truth, though by its negative.
So why call this world false, if false to be
Be to be aught, and being aught Being to be?
Clouds.
by Robert Herrick

He that ascended in a cloud, shall come
In clouds descending to the public doom.
Opening Doors
by Ben Jonson

He smashed his hand
in opening a door for her,
and less pain than
embarrassment shrieked through him.
Concealing both,
grimacing as if theatrically,
he asked himself
who he thought he was to go
around opening
doors for anyone, much less for her.
He Still'd
by John Frederick Freeman

"----He still'd
All sounds in air; and left so free mine ears
That I might hear the music of the spheres,
And all the angels singing out of heaven,
Whose tunes were solemn, as to passion given."
Burial Of Sarah.
by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper

He stood before the sons of Heth,
And bowed his sorrowing head;
"I've come," he said, "to buy a place
Where I may lay my dead.
"I am a stranger in your land,
My home has lost its light;
Grant me a place where I may lay
My dead away from sight."
Then tenderly the sons of Heth
Gazed on the mourner's face,
And said, "Oh, Prince, amid our dead,
Choose thou her resting-place.
"The sepulchres of those we love,
We place at thy command;
Against the plea thy grief hath made
We close not heart nor hand."
The patriarch rose and bowed his head,
And said, "One place I crave;
'Tis at the end of Ephron's field,
And called Machpelah's cave.
"Entreat him that he sell to me
For her last sleep that cave;
I do not ask for her I loved
The freedom of a grave."
The son of Zohar answered him,
"Hearken, my lord, to me;
Before our sons, the field and cave
I freely give to thee."
"I will not take it as a gift,"
The grand old man then said;
"I pray thee let me buy the place
Where I may lay my dead."
And with the promise in his heart,
His seed should own that land,
He gave the shekels for the field
He took from Ephron's hand.
And saw afar the glorious day
His chosen seed should tread,
The soil where he in sorrow lay
His loved and cherished dead.
Jacques Cartier'S First Visit To Mount Royal.
by Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

He stood on the wood-crowned summit
Of our mountain's regal height,
And gazed on the scene before him,
By October's golden light,
And his dark eyes, earnest, thoughtful,
Lit up with a softer ray
As they dwelt on the scene of beauty
That, outspread, before him lay.
Like a sea of liquid silver,
St. Lawrence, 'neath the sun,
Reflected the forest foliage
And the Indian wigwams dun,
Embracing the fairy islands
That its swift tide loving laves,
Reposing in tranquil beauty
Amid its sapphire waves.
To the eastward, frowning mountains
Rose in solemn grandeur still,
The glittering sunlight glinting
On steep and rugged hill;
Whilst in the far horizon,
Past leafy dell and haunt,
Like a line of misty purple,
Rose the dim hills of Vermont.
Then Cartier's rapt gaze wandered
Where, starred with wild flowers sweet,
In its gorgeous autumn beauty,
Lay the forest at his feet.
With red and golden glory
All the foliage seemed ablaze
Yet with brightness strangely softened
By October's amber haze.
Around him stretched the mountain
Ever lovely - ever young - 
Graceful, softly undulating,
By tall forest trees o'erhung;
'Twas then his thought found utterance,
The words "Mont Royal" came,
And thus our Royal Mountain
Received its fitting name.
Religion And Doctrine.
by John Milton Hay

He stood before the Sanhedrim;
The scowling rabbis gazed at him.
He recked not of their praise or blame;
There was no fear, there was no shame,
For one upon whose dazzled eyes
The whole world poured its vast surprise.
The open heaven was far too near,
His first day's light too sweet and clear,
To let him waste his new-gained ken
On the hate-clouded face of men.
But still they questioned, "Who art thou?
What hast thou been? What art thou now?
Thou art not he who yesterday
Sat here and begged beside the way;
For he was blind."
- "And I am he;
For I was blind, but now I see."
He told the story o'er and o'er;
It was his full heart's only lore:
A prophet on the Sabbath-day
Had touched his sightless eyes with clay,
And made him see who had been blind.
Their words passed by him like the wind,
Which raves and howls, but cannot shock
The hundred-fathom-rooted rock.
Their threats and fury all went wide;
They could not touch his Hebrew pride.
Their sneers at Jesus and His band,
Nameless and homeless in the land,
Their boasts of Moses and his Lord,
All could not change him by one word.
"I know not what this man may be,
Sinner or saint; but as for me,
One thing I know, - that I am he
Who once was blind, and now I see."
They were all doctors of renown,
The great men of a famous town,
With deep brows, wrinkled, broad, and wise,
Beneath their wide phylacteries;
The wisdom of the East was theirs,
And honour crowned their silver hairs.
The man they jeered and laughed to scorn
Was unlearned, poor, and humbly born;
But he knew better far than they
What came to him that Sabbath-day;
And what the Christ had done for him
He knew, and not the Sanhedrim.
Suspicion Makes Secure.
by Robert Herrick

He that will live of all cares dispossess'd,
Must shun the bad, aye, and suspect the best.
Death Of D'Arcy Mcgee
by Nora Pembroke (Margaret Moran Dixon McDougall)

He stood up in the house to speak,
With calm unruffled brow,
And never were his burning words
More eloquent than now
Fresh from the greatest victory
That mortal man can win
The triumph against fearful odds.
Over besetting sin
'Twas this gave to his eloquence
That thrilling trumpet tone
Moving all hearts with those bright thoughts
Vibrating through his own
Thoughts strong, and wise, and statesmanlike,
Warm with the love of Right
That gave his wit its keenest edge,
His words their greatest might
He little thought his last speech closed,
That his career was o'er,
That those who hung upon his words
Should hear his voice no more.
He walked home tranquilly and slow,
Secure, and unaware,
That there was murder in the hush
Of the still midnight air.
"Tis morning," said he, knowing not
That he had done with time;
That a bloody hand would our country stain
With another useless crime.
He stood before a portal closed
To him for evermore,
Behind him with uncreaking hinge
Oped the eternal door.
And ere the east grew red again,
His life blood's purple flow
Had made that pavement holy ground,
And filled the land with woe.
My country! Oh my country!
What is to thee the gain?
Wilt nourish trees of liberty
In blood so foully slain?
Judson's Grave.
by Pamela S. Vining, (J. C. Yule)

He sleeps where the billow
Lifts high its white crest
O'er his lone, sea-weed pillow
On Ocean's dark breast;
No shroud is around him,
No flowers bloom above,
No mourners surround him
With grief-drops of love.
But the limitless ocean
His requiem sings,
As, with tireless motion,
The green billow springs
Toward the infinite heaven,
Blue, bending above,
Where angels are watching
His slumbers in love.
Oh! boundless his tomb is,
Far-reaching, sublime,
Stretching forth in immenseness
To every clime;
Thus boundless his love was,
On every side
Spreading freely wherever
Man sorrowed or died.
Sleep, Judson! no grave-dust
Shall rest on thy head,
In sunlight or starlight
No marble shall shed
Its shadow sepulchral
Above thee, - no tomb
Save Earth's grandest and vastest,
May give to thee room!
Man marks not thy pillow
With yew-tree or stone;
But God, o'er the billow,
Keeps watch of His own;
And glorious thy rising,
O crowned one, will be,
When Jehovah shall summon
His dead from the sea!
The Climber
by Virna Sheard

He stood alone on Fame's high mountain top,
His hands at rest, his forehead bound with bay;
And yet he watched with eyes unsatisfied
The downward winding way.
The great procession of the stars went by
Far overhead, beyond the mountain's rim,
But the unconquered worlds of time and space,
As nothing were to him.
There from his vantage ground, so still and high,
He watched the storm clouds when they rolled below,
And felt the wind mount up to where he stood
Amid eternal snow.
And sometimes in the valleys and the plains
He saw the little children at their play;
In cottage homes he saw the candle-light
Gleam out at close of day.
But he and loneliness kept feast and fast,
The while with weary eyes, by night and day;
They watched the path that led to common things - 
The downward winding way.
"'Twas there," he said, "that gladness passed me by,
In yonder valley, where I sought the truth;
And there, a few leagues up the rocky slope,
I said good-bye to Youth.
"There, where the pine trees catch the sun's last gold,
Love reached its hands to me and bade me stop;
Oh, madness of the ones who climb," he said,
"Up to the mountain top!"
Peace - A Study.
by Charles Stuart Calverley

He stood, a worn-out City clerk -
Who'd toil'd, and seen no holiday,
For forty years from dawn to dark -
Alone beside Caermarthen Bay.
He felt the salt spray on his lips;
Heard children's voices on the sands;
Up the sun's path he saw the ships
Sail on and on to other lands;
And laugh'd aloud. Each sight and sound
To him was joy too deep for tears;
He sat him on the beach, and bound
A blue bandana round his ears:
And thought how, posted near his door,
His own green door on Camden Hill,
Two bands at least, most likely more,
Were mingling at their own sweet will
Verdi with Vance. And at the thought
He laugh'd again, and softly drew
That Morning Herald that he'd bought
Forth from his breast, and read it through.
The Refiner's Gold.
by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper

He stood before my heart's closed door,
And asked to enter in;
But I had barred the passage o'er
By unbelief and sin.
He came with nail-prints in his hands,
To set my spirit free;
With wounded feet he trod a path
To come and sup with me.
He found me poor and brought me gold,
The fire of love had tried,
And garments whitened by his blood,
My wretchedness to hide.
The glare of life had dimmed my eyes,
Its glamour was too bright.
He came with ointment in his hands
To heal my darkened sight.
He knew my heart was tempest-tossed,
By care and pain oppressed;
He whispered to my burdened heart,
Come unto me and rest.
He found me weary, faint and worn,
On barren mountains cold;
With love's constraint he drew me on,
To shelter in his fold.
Oh! foolish heart, how slow wert thou
To welcome thy dear guest,
To change thy weariness and care
For comfort, peace and rest.
Close to his side, oh! may I stay,
Just to behold his face,
Till I shall wear within my soul
The image of his grace.
The grace that changes hearts of stone
To tenderness and love,
And bids us run with willing feet
Unto his courts above.
The Captain
by Alfred Lord Tennyson

A LEGEND OF THE NAVY
He that only rules by terror
Doeth grievous wrong.
Deep as hell I count his error.
Let him hear my song.
Brave the Captain was; the seamen
Made a gallant crew,
Gallant sons of English freemen,
Sailors bold and true.
But they hated his oppression;
Stern he was and rash,
So for every light transgression
Doom'd them to the lash.
Day by day more harsh and cruel
Seem'd the Captain's mood.
Secret wrath like smother'd fuel
Burnt in each man's blood.
Yet he hoped to purchase glory,
Hoped to make the name
Of his vessel great in story,
Wheresoe'er he came.
So they past by capes and islands,
Many a harbor-mouth,
Sailing under palmy highlands
Far within the South.
On a day when they were going
O'er the lone expanse,
In the north, her canvas flowing,
Rose a ship of France.
Then the Captain's color heighten'd,
Joyful came his speech;
But a cloudy gladness lighten'd
In the eyes of each.
'Chase,' he said; the ship flew forward,
And the wind did blow;
Stately, lightly, went she norward,
Till she near'd the foe.
Then they look'd at him they hated,
Had what they desired;
Mute with folded arms they waited'
Not a gun was fired.
But they heard the foeman's thunder
Roaring out their doom;
All the air was torn in sunder,
Crashing went the boom,
Spars were splinter'd, decks were shatter'd,
Bullets fell like rain;
Over mast and deck were scatter'd
Blood and brains of men.
Spars were splinter'd; decks were broken;
Every mother's son'
Down they dropt'no word was spoken'
Each beside his gun.
On the decks as they were lying,
Were their faces grim.
In their blood, as they lay dying,
Did they smile on him.
Those in whom he had reliance
For his noble name
With one smile of still defiance
Sold him unto shame.
Shame and wrath his heart confounded,
Pale he turn'd and red,
Till himself was deadly wounded
Falling on the dead.
Dismal error! fearful slaughter!
Years have wander'd by;
Side by side beneath the water
Crew and Captain lie;
There the sunlit ocean tosses
O'er them mouldering,
And the lonely seabird crosses
With one waft of the wing.
Violet Moore And Bert Moore
by Conrad Potter Aiken

He thinks her little feet should pass
Where dandelions star thickly grass;
Her hands should lift in sunlit air
Sea-wind should tangle up her hair.
Green leaves, he says, have never heard
A sweeter ragtime mockingbird,
Nor has the moon-man ever seen,
Or man in the spotlight, leering green,
Such a beguiling, smiling queen.
Her eyes, he says, are stars at dusk,
Her mouth as sweet as red-rose musk;
And when she dances his young heart swells
With flutes and viols and silver bells;
His brain is dizzy, his senses swim,
When she slants her ragtime eyes at him. . .
Moonlight shadows, he bids her see,
Move no more silently than she.
It was this way, he says, she came,
Into his cold heart, bearing flame.
And now that his heart is all on fire
Will she refuse his heart's desire?
And O! has the Moon Man ever seen
(Or the spotlight devil, leering green)
A sweeter shadow upon a screen?
He Sleeps At Last.
by Freeman Edwin Miller

He sleeps at last! The vales of rest
Are waiting for the war-worn breast,
And glorious angels fondly spread
The sweetest roses for his bed.
While countless millions call him blest.
Fame welcomes him with glad behest,
While garlands on his brow are pressed,
And laurels cluster o'er his head;
He sleeps at last.
O, deep the sorrows here confessed,
Where Freedom makes eternal quest!
The wondrous chief that proudly led
The long, blue lines that fought and bled,
In peace is now no more distressed;
He sleeps at last!
The Poet
by Madison Julius Cawein

He stands above all worldly schism,
And, gazing over life's abysm
Beholds within the starry range
Of heaven laws of death and change,
That, through his soul's prophetic prism,
Are turned to rainbows wild and strange.
Through nature is his hope made surer
Of that ideal, his allurer,
By whom his life is upward drawn
To mount pale pinnacles of dawn,
'Mid which all that is fairer, purer
Of love and lore it come upon.
An alkahest, that makes gold metal
Of dross, his mind is where one petal
Of one wild-rose will all outweigh
The piled-up facts of everyday
Where commonplaces, there that settle,
Are changed to things of heavenly ray.
He climbs by steps of stars and flowers,
Companioned of the dreaming hours,
And sets his feet in pastures where
No merely mortal feet may fare;
And higher than the stars he towers
Though lowlier than the flowers there.
His comrades are his own high fancies
And thoughts in which his soul romances;
And every part of heaven or earth
He visits, lo, assumes new worth;
And touched with loftier traits and trances
Re-shines as with a lovelier birth.
He is the play, likewise the player;
The word that's said, also the sayer;
And in the books of heart and head
There is no thing he has not read;
Of time and tears he is the weigher,
And mouthpiece 'twixt the quick and dead.
He dies: but, mountain ever higher,
Wings Phoenix-like from out his pyre
Above our mortal day and night,
Clothed on with semipiternal light;
And raimented in thought's far fire
Flames on in everlasting flight.
Unseen, yet seen, on heights of visions,
Above all praise and world derisions,
His spirit and his deathless brood
Of dreams fare on, a multitude,
While on the pillar of great missions
His name and place are granite-hewed.
He Touched Me, So I Live To Know
by Emily Elizabeth Dickinson

He touched me, so I live to know
That such a day, permitted so,
I groped upon his breast.
It was a boundless place to me,
And silenced, as the awful sea
Puts minor streams to rest.
And now, I'm different from before,
As if I breathed superior air,
Or brushed a royal gown;
My feet, too, that had wandered so,
My gypsy face transfigured now
To tenderer renown.
Lob Lie By The Fire
by Walter De La Mare

He squats by the fire
On his three-legged stool,
When all in the house
With slumber are full.
And he warms his great hands,
Hanging loose from each knee.
And he whistles as soft
As the night wind at sea.
For his work now is done;
All the water is sweet;
He has turned each brown loaf,
And breathed magic on it.
The milk in the pan,
And the bacon on beam
He has "spelled" with his thumb,
And bewitched has the dream.
Not a mouse, not a moth,
Not a spider but sat,
And quaked as it wondered
What next he'd be at.
But his heart, O, his heart - 
It belies his great nose;
And at gleam of his eye
Not a soul would suppose
He had stooped with great thumbs,
And big thatched head,
To tuck his small mistress
More snugly in bed.
Who would think, now, a throat
So lank and so thin
Might make birds seem to warble
In the dream she is in!
Now hunched by the fire,
While the embers burn low,
He nods until daybreak,
And at daybreak he'll go.
Soon the first cock will 'light
From his perch and point high
His beak at the Ploughboy
Grown pale in the sky;
And crow will he shrill;
Then, meek as a mouse,
Lob will rouse up and shuffle
Straight out of the house.
His supper for breakfast;
For wages his work;
And to warm his great hands
Just an hour in the mirk.
Smiler.
by Richard Hunter

He smiles throughout the morning,
And all the afternoon;
He smiles whene'er the sun shines,
And also at the moon.
He smiles upon the carpet,
Or when you pick him up;
He smiles all through his dinner,
And when he goes to sup.
The Eucharist.
by Robert Herrick

He that is hurt seeks help: sin is the wound;
The salve for this i' th' Eucharist is found.
The Mad Gardener's Song
by Lewis Carroll

He thought he saw an Elephant,
That practiced on a fife:
He looked again, and found it was
A letter from his wife.
'At length I realise,' he said,
The bitterness of Life!'
He thought he saw a Buffalo
Upon the chimney-piece:
He looked again, and found it was
His Sister's Husband's Niece.
'Unless you leave this house,' he said,
"I'll send for the Police!'
He thought he saw a Rattlesnake
That questioned him in Greek:
He looked again, and found it was
The Middle of Next Week.
'The one thing I regret,' he said,
'Is that it cannot speak!'
He thought he saw a Banker's Clerk
Descending from the bus:
He looked again, and found it was
A Hippopotamus.
'If this should stay to dine,' he said,
'There won't be much for us!'
He thought he saw a Kangaroo
That worked a coffee-mill:
He looked again, and found it was
A Vegetable-Pill.
'Were I to swallow this,' he said,
'I should be very ill!'
He thought he saw a Coach-and-Four
That stood beside his bed:
He looked again, and found it was
A Bear without a Head.
'Poor thing,' he said, 'poor silly thing!
It's waiting to be fed!'
He thought he saw an Albatross
That fluttered round the lamp:
He looked again, and found it was
A Penny-Postage Stamp.
'You'd best be getting home,' he said:
'The nights are very damp!'
He thought he saw a Garden-Door
That opened with a key:
He looked again, and found it was
A Double Rule of Three:
'And all its mystery,' he said,
'Is clear as day to me!'
He thought he saw a Argument
That proved he was the Pope:
He looked again, and found it was
A Bar of Mottled Soap.
'A fact so dread,' he faintly said,
'Extinguishes all hope!'
Reincarnation
by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

He slept as weary toilers do,
She gazed up at the moon.
He stirred and said, "Wife, come to bed";
She answered, "Soon, full soon."
(Oh! that strange mystery of the dead moon's face.)
Her cheek was wan, her wistful mouth
Was lifted like a cup,
The moonful night dripped liquid light:
She seemed to quaff it up.
(Oh! that unburied corpse that lies in space.)
Her life had held but drudgery - 
She spelled her Bible thro';
Of books and lore she knew no more
Than little children do.
(Oh! the weird wonder of that pallid sphere.)
Her youth had been a loveless waste,
Starred by no holiday.
And she had wed for roof, and bread;
She gave her work in pay.
(Oh! the moon-memories, vague and strange and dear.)
She drank the night's insidious wine,
And saw another scene:
A stately room - rare flowers in bloom,
Herself in silken sheen.
(Oh! vast the chambers of the moon, and wide.)
A step drew near, a curtain stirred;
She shook with sweet alarms.
Oh! splendid face; oh! manly grace;
Oh! strong impassioned arms.
(Oh! silent moon, what secrets do you hide!)
The warm red lips of thirsting love
On cheek and brow were pressed;
As the bees know where honeys grow,
They sought her mouth, her breast.
(Oh! the dead moon holds many a dead delight.)
The speaker stirred and gruffly spake,
"Come, wife, where have you been?"
She whispered low, "Dear God, I go - 
But 'tis the seventh sin."
(Oh! the sad secrets of that orb of white.)
Eight O'clock
by Alfred Edward Housman

He stood, and heard the steeple
Sprinkle the quarters on the morning town.
One, two, three, four, to market-place and people
It tossed them down.
Strapped, noosed, nighing his hour,
He stood and counted them and cursed his luck;
And then the clock collected in the tower
Its strength, and struck.
Nursery Rhyme. CI. Proverbs.
by Unknown

He that goes to see his wheat in May,
Comes weeping away.