DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Solitude In September.
by Edward Woodley Bowling

O BEATA SOLITUDO; O SOLA BEATITUDO.
(Inscription in the Grounds of Burg Birseck, near Basel.)
Sweet Solitude where dost thou linger?
When and where shall I look in thy face?
Feel the soft magic touch of thy finger,
The glow of thy silent embrace?
Stern Civilization has banished
Thy charms to a region unknown;
The spell of thy beauty has vanished - 
Sweet Solitude, where hast thou flown?
I have sought thee on pampas and prairie,
By blue lake and bluer crevasse,
On shores that are arid and airy,
Lone peak, and precipitous pass.
I have sought thee, sweet Solitude, ever
Regardless of peril and pain;
But in spite of my utmost endeavour
I have sought thee, fair charmer, in vain.
To the Alps, to the Alps in September,
Unconducted by Cook, did I rush;
Full well even now I remember
How my heart with emotion did gush.
Here at least in these lonely recesses
With thee I shall cast in my lot;
Shall feel thy endearing caresses,
Forgetting all else and forgot.
But I met a young couple "proposing"
On the top of the sunny Languard;
I surprised an old gentleman dozing,
"Times" in hand, on the heights of Fort Bard.
In the fir woods of sweet Pontresina
Picnic papers polluted the walks;
On the top of the frosty Bernina
I found a young mountain of - corks.
I trod, by the falls of the Handeck,
On the end of a penny cigar;
As I roamed in the woods above Landeck
A hair-pin my pleasure did mar:
To the Riffel in vain I retreated,
Mr. Gaze and the Gazers were there;
On the top of the Matterhorn seated
I picked up a lady's back hair!
From the Belle Vue in Thun I was hunted
By "'Arry" who wished to play pool;
On the Col du Bonhomme I confronted
The whole of a young ladies' school.
At Giacomo's Inn in Chiesa
I was asked to take shares in a mine;
With an agent for "Mappin's new Razor"
I sat down at Baveno to dine.
On the waves of Lake Leman were floating
Old lemons (imagine my feelings!),
The fish in Lucerne were all gloating
On cast-away salads and peelings;
And egg-shells and old bones of chicken
On the shore of St. Moritz did lie:
My spirit within me did sicken - 
Sweet Solitude, where shall I fly?
Disconsolate, gloomy, and undone
I take in the "Dilly" my place;
By Zurich and Basel to London
I rush, as if running a race.
My quest and my troubles are over;
As I drive through the desolate street
To my Club in Pall Mall, I discover
Sweet Solitude's summer retreat.
Lines on Receiving a Bunch of Wild Hyacinths by Post.
by John Hartley

Sweet, drooping, azure tinted bells,
How dear you are;
Bringing the scent of shady dells,
To me from far;
Telling of spring and gladsome sunny hours, - 
Nature's bright jewels!=-heart-refreshing flowers!
Oh, for a stroll when opening day
Silvers the dew,
Kissing the buds, whilst zephyrs play
As though they knew
Their gentle breath was needed, just to shake
Your slumbering beauties, and to bid you wake.
Far from the moilding town and trade,
How sweet to spend
An hour amid the misty glade,
And find a friend
In every tiny blossom, and to lie,
And dream of Him whose love can never die.
Ye are Gael's messengers, sent here
To make us glad;
Mute, and yet eloquent, to cheer
The heart that's sad;
To turn our thoughts from sordid earthly gains,
To that bright home where peace for ever reigns.
How dare we murmur, when around
On every side,
Such proofs of His great love abound,
O'er the world wide?
Faith cannot die within these hearts of ours,
If we but learn the lessons of the flowers.
Thanks to the one whose kindly heart
Was moved to send
This gift, when we were far apart,
To cheer a friend.
Sweet meditation now my mind employs;
A pleasure pure, and one which never cloys.
On The Death Of A Lady,
by Thomas Moore

Sweet spirit! if thy airy sleep
Nor sees my tears not hears my sighs,
Then will I weep, in anguish weep,
Till the last heart's drop fills mine eyes.
But if thy sainted soul can feel,
And mingles in our misery;
Then, then my breaking heart I'll seal--
Thou shalt not hear one sigh from me.
The beam of morn was on the stream,
But sullen clouds the day deform;
Like thee was that young, orient beam,
Like death, alas, that sullen storm!
Thou wert not formed for living here,
So linked thy soul was with the sky;
Yet, ah, we held thee all so dear,
We thought thou wert not formed to die.
Sweet Stay-At-Home
by William Henry Davies

Sweet Stay-at-Home, sweet Well-content,
Thou knowest of no strange continent:
Thou hast not felt thy bosom keep
A gentle motion with the deep;
Thou hast not sailed in Indian seas,
Where scent comes forth in every breeze.
Thou hast not seen the rich grape grow
For miles, as far as eyes can go;
Thou hast not seen a summer's night
When maids could sew by a worm's light;
Nor the North Sea in spring send out
Bright hues that like birds flit about
In solid cages of white ice, 
Sweet Stay-at-Home, sweet Love-one-place.
Thou hast not seen black fingers pick
White cotton when the bloom is thick,
Nor heard black throats in harmony;
Nor hast thou sat on stones that lie
Flat on the earth, that once did rise
To hide proud kings from common eyes,
Thou hast not seen plains full of bloom
Where green things had such little room
They pleased the eye like fairer flowers, 
Sweet Stay-at-Home, all these long hours.
Sweet Well-content, sweet Love-one-place,
Sweet, simple maid, bless thy dear face;
For thou hast made more homely stuff
Nurture thy gentle self enough;
I love thee for a heart that's kind, 
Not for the knowledge in thy mind.
Sweet! Sweet!
by Louisa May Alcott

"Sweet! Sweet!
Come, come and eat,
Dear little girls
With yellow curls;
For here you'll find
Sweets to your mind.
On every tree
Sugar-plums you'll see;
In every dell
Grows the caramel.
Over every wall
Gum-drops fall;
Molasses flows
Where our river goes
Under your feet
Lies sugar sweet;
Over your head
Grow almonds red.
Our lily and rose
Are not for the nose;
Our flowers we pluck
To eat or suck
And, oh! what bliss
When two friends kiss,
For they honey sip
From lip to lip!
And all you meet,
In house or street,
At work or play,
Sweethearts are they.
So, little dear,
Pray feel no fear;
Go where you will;
Eat, eat your fill.
Here is a feast
From west to east;
And you can say,
Ere you go away,
'At last I stand
In dear Candy-land,
And no more can stuff;
For once I've enough.'
Sweet! Sweet!
Tweet! Tweet!
Tweedle-dee!
Tweedle-dee!"
The First Walpurgis-Night.
by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

A DRUID.
Sweet smiles the May!
The forest gay
From frost and ice is freed;
No snow is found,
Glad songs resound
Across the verdant mead.
Upon the height
The snow lies light,
Yet thither now we go,
There to extol our Father's name,
Whom we for ages know.
Amid the smoke shall gleam the flame;
Thus pure the heart will grow.
THE DRUIDS.
Amid the smoke shall gleam the flame;
Extol we now our Father's name,
Whom we for ages know!
Up, up, then, let us go!
ONE OF THE PEOPLE.
Would ye, then, so rashly act?
Would ye instant death attract?
Know ye not the cruel threats
Of the victors we obey?
Round about are placed their nets
In the sinful heathen's way.
Ah! upon the lofty wall
Wife and children slaughter they;
And we all
Hasten to a certain fall.
CHORUS OF WOMEN.
Ay, upon the camp's high wall
All our children loved they slay.
Ah, what cruel victors they!
And we all
Hasten to a certain fall.
A DRUID.
Who fears to-day
His rites to pay,
Deserves his chains to wear.
The forest's free!
This wood take we,
And straight a pile prepare!
Yet in the wood
To stay 'tis good
By day, till all is still,
With watchers all around us plac'd
Protecting you from ill.
With courage fresh, then let us haste
Our duties to fulfil.
CHORUS OF WATCHERS.
Ye valiant watchers, now divide
Your numbers through the forest wide,
And see that all is still,
While they their rites fulfil.
A WATCHER.
Let us in a cunning wise,
Yon dull Christian priests surprise
With the devil of their talk
We'll those very priests confound.
Come with prong, and come with fork.
Raise a wild and rattling sound
Through the livelong night, and prowl
All the rocky passes round.
Screechowl, owl,
Join in chorus with our howl!
CHORUS OF WATCHERS.
Come with prong, and come with fork,
Like the devil of their talk,
And with wildly rattling sound,
Prowl the desert rocks around!
Screechowl, owl,
Join in chorus with our howl!
A DRUID.
Thus far 'tis right.
That we by night
Our Father's praises sing;
Yet when 'tis day,
To Thee we may
A heart unsullied bring.
'Tis true that now,
And often, Thou
Fav'rest the foe in fight.
As from the smoke is freed the blaze,
So let our faith burn bright!
And if they crush our golden ways,
Who e'er can crush Thy light?
A CHRISTIAN WATCHER.
Comrades, quick! your aid afford!
All the brood of hell's abroad;
See how their enchanted forms
Through and through with flames are glowing!
Dragon-women, men-wolf swarms,
On in quick succession going!
Let us, let us haste to fly!
Wilder yet the sounds are growing,
And the archfiend roars on high;
From the ground
Hellish vapours rise around.
CHORUS OF CHRISTIAN WATCHERS.
Terrible enchanted forms,
Dragon-women, men-wolf swarms!
Wilder yet the sounds are growing!
See, the archfiend comes, all-glowing!
From the ground
Hellish vapours rise around!
CHORUS OF DRUIDS.
As from the smoke is freed the blaze,
So let our faith burn bright!
And if they crush our golden ways,
Who e'er can crush Thy light?
Music Unheard
by Walter De La Mare

Sweet sounds, begone - 
Whose music on my ear
Stirs foolish discontent
Of lingering here;
When, if I crossed
The crystal verge of death,
Him I should see
Who these sounds murmureth.
Sweet sounds, begone - 
Ask not my heart to break
Its bond of bravery for
Sweet quiet's sake;
Lure not my feet
To leave the path they must
Tread on, unfaltering,
Till I sleep in dust.
Sweet sounds, begone:
Though silence brings apace
Deadly disquiet
Of this homeless place;
And all I love
In beauty cries to me,
'We but vain shadows
And reflections be.'
Rose Lorraine
by Henry Kendall

Sweet water-moons, blown into lights
Of flying gold on pool and creek,
And many sounds and many sights
Of younger days are back this week.
I cannot say I sought to face
Or greatly cared to cross again
The subtle spirit of the place
Whose life is mixed with Rose Lorraine.
What though her voice rings clearly through
A nightly dream I gladly keep,
No wish have I to start anew
Heart fountains that have ceased to leap.
Here, face to face with different days,
And later things that plead for love,
It would be worse than wrong to raise
A phantom far too fain to move.
But, Rose Lorraine ah! Rose Lorraine,
I'll whisper now, where no one hears
If you should chance to meet again
The man you kissed in soft, dead years,
Just say for once 'He suffered much,'
And add to this 'His fate was worst
Because of me, my voice, my touch.'
There is no passion like the first!
If I that breathe your slow sweet name,
As one breathes low notes on a flute,
Have vext your peace with word of blame,
The phrase is dead the lips are mute.
Yet when I turn towards the wall,
In stormy nights, in times of rain,
I often wish you could recall
Your tender speeches, Rose Lorraine.
Because, you see, I thought them true,
And did not count you self-deceived,
And gave myself in all to you,
And looked on Love as Life achieved.
Then came the bitter, sudden change,
The fastened lips, the dumb despair.
The first few weeks were very strange,
And long, and sad, and hard to bear.
No woman lives with power to burst
My passion's bonds, and set me free;
For Rose is last where Rose was first,
And only Rose is fair to me.
The faintest memory of her face,
The wilful face that hurt me so,
Is followed by a fiery trace
That Rose Lorraine must never know.
I keep a faded ribbon string
You used to wear about your throat;
And of this pale, this perished thing,
I think I know the threads by rote.
God help such love! To touch your hand,
To loiter where your feet might fall,
You marvellous girl, my soul would stand
The worst of hell its fires and all!
Sonnet. On Seeing A Young Lady, I Had Previously Known, Confined In A Madhouse.
by Thomas Gent

Sweet wreck of loveliness! alas, how soon
The sad brief summer of thy joys hath fled:
How sorrows Friendship for thy hapless doom,
Thy beauty faded, and thy hopes all dead.
Oh! 'twas that beauty's power which first destroy'd
Thy mind's serenity; its charms but led
The faithless friend, that thy pure love enjoy'd,
To tear the beauteous blossom from its bed.
How reason shudders at thy frenzied air!
To see thee smile, with fancy's dreams possess'd;
Or shrink, the frozen image of despair.
Or, love-enraptured, chant thy griefs to rest:
Oh! cease that mournful voice, affliction's child,
My heart but bleeds to hear thy musings wild.
To M.
by Arthur Macy

Sweet visions came to me in sleep,
Ah! wondrous fair to see;
And in my mind I strove to keep
The dream to tell to thee.
But morning broke with golden gleam,
And shone upon thy face,
And life was lovelier than a dream,
And dreams had lost their grace.
Sonnet LXXXIII.
by Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch)

L' aspettata virt' che 'n voi fioriva.
TO PAUDOLFO MALATESTA, LORD OF RIMINI.
Sweet virtue's blossom had its promise shed
Within thy breast (when Love became thy foe);
Fair as the flower, now its fruit doth glow,
And not by visions hath my hope been fed.
To hail thee thus, I by my heart am led,
That by my pen thy name renown should know;
No marble can the lasting fame bestow
Like that by poets' characters is spread.
Dost think Marcellus' or proud C'sar's name,
Or Africanus, Paulus--still resound,
That sculptors proud have effigied their deed?
No, Pandolph, frail the statuary's fame,
For immortality alone is found
Within the records of a poet's meed.
WOLLASTON.
The flower, in youth which virtue's promise bore,
When Love in your pure heart first sought to dwell,
Now beareth fruit that flower which matches well,
And my long hopes are richly come ashore,
Prompting my spirit some glad verse to pour
Where to due honour your high name may swell,
For what can finest marble truly tell
Of living mortal than the form he wore?
Think you great C'sar's or Marcellus' name,
That Paulus, Africanus to our days,
By anvil or by hammer ever came?
No! frail the sculptor's power for lasting praise:
Our study, my Pandolfo, only can
Give immortality of fame to man.
MACGREGOR.
Poem: [Greek Title]
by Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde

Sweet, I blame you not, for mine the fault
was, had I not been made of common clay
I had climbed the higher heights unclimbed
yet, seen the fuller air, the larger day.
From the wildness of my wasted passion I had
struck a better, clearer song,
Lit some lighter light of freer freedom, battled
with some Hydra-headed wrong.
Had my lips been smitten into music by the
kisses that but made them bleed,
You had walked with Bice and the angels on
that verdant and enamelled mead.
I had trod the road which Dante treading saw
the suns of seven circles shine,
Ay! perchance had seen the heavens opening,
as they opened to the Florentine.
And the mighty nations would have crowned
me, who am crownless now and without name,
And some orient dawn had found me kneeling
on the threshold of the House of Fame.
I had sat within that marble circle where the
oldest bard is as the young,
And the pipe is ever dropping honey, and the
lyre's strings are ever strung.
Keats had lifted up his hymeneal curls from out
the poppy-seeded wine,
With ambrosial mouth had kissed my forehead,
clasped the hand of noble love in mine.
And at springtide, when the apple-blossoms brush
the burnished bosom of the dove,
Two young lovers lying in an orchard would
have read the story of our love.
Would have read the legend of my passion,
known the bitter secret of my heart,
Kissed as we have kissed, but never parted as
we two are fated now to part.
For the crimson flower of our life is eaten by
the cankerworm of truth,
And no hand can gather up the fallen withered
petals of the rose of youth.
Yet I am not sorry that I loved you ah! what
else had I a boy to do,
For the hungry teeth of time devour, and the
silent-footed years pursue.
Rudderless, we drift athwart a tempest, and
when once the storm of youth is past,
Without lyre, without lute or chorus, Death
the silent pilot comes at last.
And within the grave there is no pleasure, for
the blindworm battens on the root,
And Desire shudders into ashes, and the tree of
Passion bears no fruit.
Ah! what else had I to do but love you, God's
own mother was less dear to me,
And less dear the Cytheraean rising like an
argent lily from the sea.
I have made my choice, have lived my poems,
and, though youth is gone in wasted days,
I have found the lover's crown of myrtle better
than the poet's crown of bays.
My Beads
by Abram Joseph Ryan

Sweet, blessed beads! I would not part
With one of you for richest gem
That gleams in kingly diadem;
Ye know the history of my heart.
For I have told you every grief
In all the days of twenty years,
And I have moistened you with tears,
And in your decades found relief.
Ah! time has fled, and friends have failed
And joys have died; but in my needs
Ye were my friends, my blessed beads!
And ye consoled me when I wailed.
For many and many a time, in grief,
My weary fingers wandered round
Thy circled chain, and always found
In some Hail Mary sweet relief.
How many a story you might tell
Of inner life, to all unknown;
I trusted you and you alone,
But ah! ye keep my secrets well.
Ye are the only chain I wear --
A sign that I am but the slave,
In life, in death, beyond the grave,
Of Jesus and His Mother fair.
Ballade Of Summer's Sleep.
by Archibald Lampman

Sweet summer is gone; they have laid her away - 
The last sad hours that were touched with her grace - 
In the hush where the ghosts of the dead flowers play;
The sleep that is sweet of her slumbering space
Let not a sight or a sound erase
Of the woe that hath fallen on all the lands:
Gather ye, dreams, to her sunny face,
Shadow her head with your golden hands.
The woods that are golden and red for a day
Girdle the hills in a jewelled case,
Like a girl's strange mirth, ere the quick death slay
The beautiful life that he hath in chase.
Darker and darker the shadows pace
Out of the north to the southern sands,
Ushers bearing the winter's mace:
Keep them away with your woven hands.
The yellow light lies on the wide wastes gray,
More bitter and cold than the winds that race,
From the skirts of the autumn, tearing away,
This way and that way, the woodland lace.
In the autumn's cheek is a hectic trace;
Behind her the ghost of the winter stands;
Sweet summer will moan in her soft gray place:
Mantle her head with your glowing hands.
Envoi.
Till the slayer be slain and the spring displace
The might of his arms with her rose-crowned bands,
Let her heart not gather a dream that is base:
Shadow her head with your golden hands.
Sweet! Sweet!
by Louisa May Alcott

"Sweet! Sweet!
Come, come and eat,
Dear little girls
With yellow curls;
For here you'll find
Sweets to your mind.
On every tree
Sugar-plums you'll see;
In every dell
Grows the caramel.
Over every wall
Gum-drops fall;
Molasses flows
Where our river goes.
Under your feet
Lies sugar sweet;
Over your head
Grow almonds red.
Our lily and rose
Are not for the nose;
Our flowers we pluck
To eat or suck.
And, oh! what bliss
When two friends kiss,
For they honey sip
From lip to lip!
And all you meet,
In house or street,
At work or play,
Sweethearts are they.
So, little dear,
Pray feel no fear;
Go where you will;
Eat, eat your fill.
Here is a feast
From west to east;
And you can say,
Ere you go away,
'At last I stand
In dear Candy-land,
And no more can stuff;
For once I've enough.'
Sweet! Sweet!
Tweet! Tweet!
Tweedle-dee!
Tweedle-dee!"
Another Comparison. Addressed To A Young Lady.
by William Cowper

Sweet stream that winds through yonder glade,
Apt emblem of a virtuous maid'
Silent and chaste she steals along,
Far from the world's gay busy throng;
With gentle yet prevailing force,
Intent upon her destined course;
Graceful and useful all she does,
Blessing and blest where'er she goes.
Pure-bosom'd as that watery glass,
And heaven reflected in her face.
To The Violet.
by John Clare

Sweet tiny flower of darkly hue,
Lone dweller in the pathless shade;
How much I love thy pensive blue
Of innocence so well display'd!
What time the watery skies are full
Of streaming dappled clouds so pale,
And sideling rocks, more white than wool,
Portending snowy sleet, or hail;
I 'gin to seek thy charming flower
Along each hedge-row's mossy seat,
Where, dithering many a cold bleak hour,
I've hugg'd myself in thy retreat.
What makes me cherish such fond taste,
What makes such raptures spring for thee,
Is, that thou lov'st the dreary waste
Which is so well belov'd by me.
For solitude should be my choice
Could I this labouring life resign,
To see the little birds rejoice,
And thy sweet flowers in clusters shine.
I'd choose a cave beside some rock,
Clos'd in all round with ash and thorn,
That near my door thy tribe might flock
To shed their sweets in early morn.
But, ah! that way would never prove
Means to sustain impending life;
I must forego those scenes I love,
And still beat on with needy strife.
Sweet flower ! we must reverse the plan,
Nor cherish such romantic views;
I'll strive to seek thee when I can,
Through noontide heat or evening dews.
To spring return, with all thy train
Of flowrets cloth'd in varied hue,
I long to see that morn again
Which brings to light the violet blue.
The Snowdrop.
by John Clare

Sweet type of innocence, snow-clothed blossom,
Seemly, though vainly, bowing down to shun
The storm hard-beating on thy wan white bosom,
Left in the swail, and little cheer'd by sun;
Resembling that frail jewel, just begun
To ope on vice's eye its witcheries blooming,
Midst all its storms, with little room to shun--
Ah, thou art winter's snowdrop, lovely Woman!
In this world dropt, where every evil's glooming
With killing tempests o'er its tender prey,
Watching the opening of thy beauties coming,
Its every infant charm to snatch away:
Then come the sorrows thou'rt too weak to brave,
And then thy beauty-cheek digs ruin's early grave.
Sweet, Sweet Days Are Passing
by Louisa May Alcott

Sweet, sweet days are passing
O'er my happy home.
Passing on swift wings through the valley of life.
Cold are the days when winter comes again.
When my sweet days were passing at my happy home,
Sweet were the days on the rivulet's green brink ;
Sweet were the days when I read my father's books;
Sweet were the winter days when bright fires are blazing."
A River Pool
by Arthur Hugh Clough

Sweet streamlet bason! at thy side
Weary and faint within me cried
My longing heart, In such pure deep
How sweet it were to sit and sleep;
To feel each passage from without
Close up, above me and about,
Those circling waters crystal clear,
That calm impervious atmosphere!
There on thy pearly pavement pure,
To lean, and feel myself secure,
Or through the dim-lit inter-space,
Afar at whiles upgazing trace
The dimpling bubbles dance around
Upon thy smooth exterior face;
Or idly list the dreamy sound
Of ripples lightly flung, above
That home, of peace, if not of love.
Amour 36
by Michael Drayton

Sweete, sleepe so arm'd with Beauties arrowes darting,
Sleepe in thy Beauty, Beauty in sleepe appeareth;
Sleepe lightning Beauty, Beauty sleepes, darknes cleereth,
Sleepes wonder Beauty, wonders to worlds imparting.
Sleep watching Beauty, Beauty waking, sleepe guarding
Beauty in sleepe, sleepe in Beauty charmed,
Sleepes aged coldnes with Beauties fire warmed,
Sleepe with delight, Beauty with loue rewarding.
Sleepe and Beauty, with equall forces stryuing,
Beauty her strength vnto sleepes weaknes lending,
Sleepe with Beauty, Beauty with sleepe contending,
Yet others force the others force reuiuing,
And others foe the others foe imbrace.
Myne eyes beheld thys conflict in thy face.