DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Miss Edith Makes It Pleasant for Brother Jack
by Bret Harte (Francis)

'Crying!' Of course I am crying, and I guess you would be crying, too,
If people were telling such stories as they tell about me, about you.
Oh yes, you can laugh if you want to, and smoke as you didn't care how,
And get your brains softened like uncle's. Dr. Jones says you're gettin' it now.
Why don't you say 'Stop!' to Miss Ilsey? She cries twice as much as I do,
And she's older and cries just from meanness, for a ribbon or anything new.
Ma says it's her 'sensitive nature.' Oh my! No, I sha'n't stop my talk!
And I don't want no apples nor candy, and I don't want to go take a walk!
I know why you're mad! Yes, I do, now! You think that Miss Ilsey likes you,
And I've heard her repeatedly call you the bold-facest boy that she knew;
And she'd 'like to know where you learnt manners.' Oh yes! Kick the table, that's right!
Spill the ink on my dress, and go then round telling Ma that I look like a fright!
What stories? Pretend you don't know that they're saying I broke off the match
Twixt old Money-grubber and Mary, by saying she called him 'Crosspatch,'
When the only allusion I made him about sister Mary was, she
Cared more for his cash than his temper, and you know, Jack, you said that to me.
And it's true! But it's me, and I'm scolded, and Pa says if I keep on I might
By and by get my name in the papers! Who cares? Why, 'twas only last night
I was reading how Pa and the sheriff were selling some lots, and it's plain
If it's awful to be in the papers, why, Papa would go and complain.
You think it ain't true about Ilsey? Well, I guess I know girls, and I say
There's nothing I see about Ilsey to show she likes you, anyway!
I know what it means when a girl who has called her cat after one boy
Goes and changes its name to another's. And she's done it and I wish you joy!
A Winter Bluejay
by Sara Teasdale

Crisply the bright snow whispered,
Crunching beneath our feet;
Behind us as we walked along the parkway,
Our shadows danced,
Fantastic shapes in vivid blue.
Across the lake the skaters
Flew to and fro,
With sharp turns weaving
A frail invisible net.
In ecstacy the earth
Drank the silver sunlight;
In ecstacy the skaters
Drank the wine of speed;
In ecstacy we laughed
Drinking the wine of love.
Had not the music of our joy
Sounded its highest note?
But no,
For suddenly, with lifted eyes you said,
'Oh look!'
There, on the black bough of a snow flecked maple,
Fearless and gay as our love,
A bluejay cocked his crest!
Oh who can tell the range of joy
Or set the bounds of beauty?
Holy Russia.
by Francis William Lauderdale Adams

Crouched in the terrible land,
The circle of pitiless ice,
With frozen bloody feet
And her pestilential summer's
Fever-throb in her brow,
Look, in her deep slow eyes
The mists of her sleep of faith
Stir, and a gleam of light,
The ray of a blood-red sun,
Beams out into the dusk.
From far away, from the west,
From the east, from the south, there come
Faint sweet breaths of the breeze
Of plenteous warmth and light.
And she moves, and around her neck
She feels the iron-scaled Snake
Whose fangs suck at the heart
Hid by her tattered dress,
By her lean and hanging teat.
Russia, O land of faith,
O realm of the ageless Slav,
O oppressed one of eternity,
This darkest hour is the hour,
The hour of the coming dawn!
Europe the rank, the corrupt,
Lies stretched out at your feet.
Turkey, India, lo all,
East and south, it is yours!
Years, years ago a nation, {44}
Oppressed as you are oppressed,
Burst her bonds and leaped out,
A volcanic sea-wave of fire,
Quenched at last but in blood,
Though not before the red spray
Dashed the Pyramids, the Escurial,
Rome and your own grey Kremlin.
That was the great sea-wave
Of a nation that disbelieved,
Of a nation that had not faith!
What shall the sea-wave be
Of this race of eternal belief,
This nation of a passionate faith?
Whistler versus Ruskin Trial.
by Thomas Runciman

Critic John cam here to view
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
Lindsay's picture shop bran new,
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
John, he cast his head fu' high,
Looked asklent and unco' skeigh,
Vowed he'd gar James stand abeigh:
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
John he nayther ramps nor roars,
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
Soft gans hame and writes in "Fors" - 
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
Writes, and wi' ae critic-puff
Blaws James oot, like can'le snuff:
Sweers in Art he's just a muff!
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
Englan' heurs and rubs her ee,
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
"Just as I had guessed," quo' she:
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
No so James. He to the Judge
Cries, "John he ca's my noketurns 'fudge':
That's a lee - spoke in a grudge."
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
Ca' up Michael! Ca' up Moore!
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
Bring up Wills - he's kenned before!
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
Midmay Michael's ta'en his stan',
Moore and Wills say Whistler' gran',
Nae better work done in this lan':
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
Now bring Jones - let's hear his min':
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
Out spake he: "Jim's work's rale fine,"
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
"An' were't like Titian's here or mine,
A' this or that, I'd no decline
To say they're rather like muneshine."
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
Run in Frith. Says he: "Dear me!"
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
"For my pairt here's nowt like me:"
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
"Nothing is like nature here.
Where's the detail roun' an' clear,
Such as in my work appear?"
Ha, ha, the viewin' o't!
How it cam let lawyers tell:
Ha, ha, the provin' o't!
Jury bodies luik fu' swell:
Ha, ha, the provin' o't!
"John's no right, yet Jim's no wrang!
Art's made of nocht but peut an' slang!
Half a bawbee! Hame let's gang!"
Ha, ha, the provin' o't!
Lines, On Hearing A Young Gentleman, Who Is Both Lame And Blind, But In Other Respects Very Handsome, Sing And Play On His Violin For The First Time
by Thomas Oldham

Crippled his limbs, and sightless are his eyes;
I view the youth, and feel compassion rise.
He sings! how sweet the notes! in pleased amaze
I listen, listen, and admiring gaze.
Still, as he catches inspiration's fire,
Sweeping with bolder hands the obedient strings,
That mix, harmonious, with the strains he sings,
He pours into the music all his soul,
And governs mine with strong, but soft controul:
Raptured I glow, and more and more admire.
His mortal ailments I no longer see;
But, of divinities my fancy dreams;
Blind was the enchanting God of soft desire;
And lame the powerful Deity of fire;
His bow the magic rod of Hermes seems;
And in his voice I hear the God of harmony.
The Lover To His Lass
by Duncan Campbell Scott

Crown her with stars, this angel of our planet,
Cover her with morning, this thing of pure delight,
Mantle her with midnight till a mortal cannot
See her for the garments of the light and the night.
How far I wandered, worlds away and far away,
Heard a voice but knew it not in the clear cold,
Many a wide circle and many a wan star away,
Dwelling in the chambers where the worlds were growing old.
Saw them growing old and heard them falling
Like ripe fruit when a tree is in the wind;
Saw the seraphs gather them, their clarion voices calling
In rounds of cheering labour till the orchard floor was thinned.
Saw a whole universe turn to its setting,
Old and cold and weary, gray and cold as death,
But before mine eyes were veiled in forgetting,
Something always caught my soul and held its breath.
Caught it up and held it, now I know the reason;
Governed it and soothed it, now I know why;
Nurtured it and trained it and kept it for the season
When new worlds should blossom in the springtime sky.
How have they blossomed, see the sky is like a garden!
Ah! how fresh the worlds look hanging on the slope!
Pluck one and wear it, Love, and ask the Gardener's pardon,
Pluck out the Pleiads like a spray of heliotrope.
See Aldebaran like a red rose clamber,
See brave Betelgeux pranked with poppy light;
This young earth must float in floods of amber
Glowing with a crocus flame in the dells of night.
O you cannot cheat the soul of an inborn ambition,
'Tis a naked viewless thing living in its thought,
But it mounts through errors and by valleys of contrition
Till it conquers destiny and finds the thing it sought.
Crown her with stars, this angel of our planet,
Cover her with morning, this thing of pure delight,
Mantle her with midnight till a mortal cannot
See her for the garments of the light and the night.
A Divine Image
by William Blake

Cruelty has a human heart,
And Jealousy a human face;
Terror the human form divine,
And Secresy the human dress.
The human dress is forged iron,
The human form a fiery forge,
The human face a furnace sealed,
The human heart its hungry gorge.
Nursery Rhyme. DXXI. Natural History.
by Unknown

Cuckoo, Cuckoo,
What do you do?
In April
I open my bill;
In May
I sing night and day;
In June
I change my tune;
In July
Away I fly;
In August
Away I must.
Nursery Rhyme. DXI. Natural History.
by Unknown

Croak! said the Toad, I'm hungry, I think,
To-day I've had nothing to eat or to drink,
I'll crawl to a garden and jump through the pales,
And there I'll dine nicely on slugs and on snails;
Ho, ho! quoth the Frog, is that what you mean?
Then I'll hop away to the next meadow stream,
There I will drink, and eat worms and slugs too,
And then I shall have a good dinner like you.
Wagner
by Rupert Brooke

Creeps in half wanton, half asleep,
One with a fat wide hairless face.
He likes love-music that is cheap;
Likes women in a crowded place;
And wants to hear the noise they're making.
His heavy eyelids droop half-over,
Great pouches swing beneath his eyes.
He listens, thinks himself the lover,
Heaves from his stomach wheezy sighs;
He likes to feel his heart's a-breaking.
The music swells. His gross legs quiver.
His little lips are bright with slime.
The music swells. The women shiver.
And all the while, in perfect time,
His pendulous stomach hangs a-shaking.
The Cardinal And The Dog
by Robert Browning

Browning wrote this poem in 1842 for Macready's son, who was ill. He had also written the Pied Piper of Hamelin at the same time.
Crescenzio, the Pope's Legate at the High Council, Trent,
Year Fifteen hundred twenty-two, March Twenty-five, intent
On writing letters to the Pope till late into the night,
Rose, weary, to refresh himself, and saw a monstrous sight:
(I give mine Author's very words: he penned, I reindite.)
A black Dog of vast bigness, eyes flaming, ears that hung
Down to the very ground almost, into the chamber sprung
And made directly for him, and laid himself right under
The table where Crescenzio wrote, who called in fear and wonder
His servants in the ante-room, commanded every one
To look for and find out the beast: but, looking, they found none.
The Cardinal fell melancholy, then sick, soon after died:
And at Verona, as be lay on his death-bed, he cried
Aloud to drive away the Dog that leapt on his bedside.
Heaven keep us Protestants from harm: the rest . . . no ill betide!
The Sonnets CLIII - Cupid laid by his brand and fell asleep
by William Shakespeare

Cupid laid by his brand and fell asleep:
A maid of Dian's this advantage found,
And his love-kindling fire did quickly steep
In a cold valley-fountain of that ground;
Which borrow'd from this holy fire of Love,
A dateless lively heat, still to endure,
And grew a seeting bath, which yet men prove
Against strange maladies a sovereign cure.
But at my mistress' eye Love's brand new-fired,
The boy for trial needs would touch my breast;
I, sick withal, the help of bath desired,
And thither hied, a sad distemper'd guest,
But found no cure, the bath for my help lies
Where Cupid got new fire; my mistress' eyes.
Cupid Caught Napping
by Ellis Parker Butler

Cupid on a summer day,
Wearied by unceasing play,
In a rose heart sleeping lay,
While, to guard the tricksy fellow,
Close above the fragrant bed
Back and forth a gruff bee sped,
And, to lull the sleepy head,
Played 'Zoom! Zoom!' upon his 'cello.
Little did the god surmise
That sweet Anna's cerule eyes
Gazed on him with glad surprise,
Or that he was in such danger;
But the watchman bee, in haste,
Left his post that he might taste
of the honey nature placed
On the lips of that fair stranger.
Thus unwatched, from Cupid's side
Anna stole the boy god's pride,
All his love darts, and then hied
Far away from capture's chances
And today she wields the prize;
For Love's quiver still supplies
Darts that speed from Anna's eyes
In her love compelling glances!
Oak-Leaves
by Helen Leah Reed

Crinkled oak-leaves, twinkling in the sun,
Splashed by midday showers, dripping cold - 
Serrate oak-leaves, silvered by the sun
That has brushed yon dull brown grass with gold.
Green and crinkled oak leaves, tremble now - 
Strong you would be, strong would be and bold,
Ah! green oak-leaves, you are trembling now - 
By the saucy wind deceived - cajoled!
Trembling oak leaves - you are soon to fall,
Soon to hide the earth with yellowing mould
Twinkling, crinkling oak-leaves, soon you'll fall
For the autumn sun is shining cold.
Upon A Crooked Maid.
by Robert Herrick

Crooked you are, but that dislikes not me:
So you be straight where virgins straight should be.
The Wounded Cupid
by Robert Herrick

Cupid as he lay among
Roses, by a Bee was stung.
Whereupon in anger flying
To his Mother, said thus crying;
Help! O help! your Boy's a dying.
And why, my pretty Lad, said she?
Then blubbering, replyed he,
A winged Snake has bitten me,
Which Country people call a Bee.
At which she smil'd; then with her hairs
And kisses drying up his tears:
Alas! said she, my Wag! if this
Such a pernicious torment is:
Come, tel me then, how great's the smart
Of those, thou woundest with thy Dart!
The Last Word
by Matthew Arnold

Creep into thy narrow bed, 
Creep, and let no more be said! 
Vain thy onset! all stands fast. 
Thou thyself must break at last. 
Let the long contention cease! 
Geese are swans, and swans are geese. 
Let them have it how they will! 
Thou art tired: best be still. 
They out-talked thee, hissed thee, tore thee? 
Better men fared thus before thee; 
Fired their ringing shot and passed, 
Hotly charged, and sank at last. 
Charge once more, then, and be dumb! 
Let the victors, when they come, 
When the forts of folly fall, 
Find thy body by the wall!
The Voice Of Beauty Drowned.
by Robert von Ranke Graves

Cry from the thicket my heart's bird!
The other birds woke all around,
Rising with toot and howl they stirred
Their plumage, broke the trembling sound,
They craned their necks, they fluttered wings,
"While we are silent no one sings,
And while we sing you hush your throat,
Or tune your melody to our note."
Cry from the thicket my heart's bird!
The screams and hootings rose again:
They gaped with raucous beaks, they whirred
Their noisy plumage; small but plain
The lonely hidden singer made
A well of grief within the glade.
"Whist, silly fool, be off," they shout,
"Or we'll come pluck your feathers out."
Cry from the thicket my heart's bird!
Slight and small the lovely cry
Came trickling down, but no one heard.
Parrot and cuckoo, crow, magpie
Jarred horrid notes and the jangling jay
Ripped the fine threads of song away,
For why should peeping chick aspire
To challenge their loud woodland choir?
Cried it so sweet that unseen bird?
Lovelier could no music be,
Clearer than water, soft as curd,
Fresh as the blossomed cherry tree.
How sang the others all around?
Piercing and harsh, a maddening sound,
With Pretty Poll, tuwit-tu-woo,
Peewit, caw caw, cuckoo-cuckoo.
At Perry, September 16, 1893.
by Freeman Edwin Miller

Crowds! Crowds! Crowds!
Suddenly here as if come from the clouds
That faded away as they came;
Mad acres of people aflame
With thirst for a morsel of land;
Wild hunters of fortune, whose game
Is ever escaping the hand;
Vast, countless, uncountable throngs
With restless, unrestable feet,
That hurry the ways, full of agonized wrongs,
For the conquest of happiness sweet;
Wild seas of ambition whose waves of desire
On their obstacles mighty continually beat,
Where neither the shore nor the ocean is fixed;
Like thunderous songs of a choir,
Whose murmurs in music repeat;
And confusion and chaos are terribly mingled and mixed.
Dust! Dust! Dust!
Borne in the arms of the gathering gust,
And whirled on the wings of the wind,
The eyes feel the blight of the blind,
And horror comes into the heart;
For nature is far more unkind
Than the thousands that struggle apart.
Dark, wild, inescapable dust,
In fiercest, untamable clouds,
That men into misery helplessly thrust,
And bury in agony-shrouds;
A simoom of sorrow whose pestilent breath
To the strong and the weak, to the young and the old,
Brings despair that is reckless of possible gain,
And the awfullest anguish of death;
Till the soul in its rage uncontrolled,
Droops low in the horrible sickness and sorrow of pain.
But out from the clouds,
Out from the agonized dust that enshrouds;
True kings shall arise who shall reign
In homes on the populous plain!
Great cities shall gather and grow
In glories that never shall wane,
Far over the valleys below.
With merry yet measureless might
They conquer the waste with the gladness that brings
To the desert the newest delight.
The barren shall bloom as the rose, and the land
That is sleeping, a wilderness wasted and wild,
And dreaming to welcome its master's command,
Shall leap at the touch of his hand,
His voice shall obey as a child!
West London
by Matthew Arnold

Crouch'd on the pavement close by Belgrave Square
A tramp I saw, ill, moody, and tongue-tied;
A babe was in her arms, and at her side
A girl; their clothes were rags, their feet were bare.
Some labouring men, whose work lay somewhere there,
Pass'd opposite; she touch'd her girl, who hied
Across, and begg'd and came back satisfied.
The rich she had let pass with frozen stare.
Thought I: Above her state this spirit towers;
She will not ask of aliens, but of friends,
Of sharers in a common human fate.
She turns from that cold succour, which attends
The unknown little from the unknowing great,
And points us to a better time than ours.
On the Gunpowder Plot.
by John Milton

Cum simul in regem nuper satrapasque Britannos
Ausus es infandum perfide Fauxe nefas,
Fallor? an & mitis voluisti ex parte videri,
Et pensare mala cum pietate scelus;
Scilicet hos alti missurus ad atria caeli,
Sulphureo curru flammivolisque rotis.
Qualiter ille feris caput inviolabile Parcis
Liquit Jordanios turbine raptus agros.
On The Gunpowder Plot.[1]
by William Cowper

Cum simul in regem nuper satrapasque Britannos
Ausus es infandum perfide Fauxe nefas,
Fallor? an & mitis voluisti ex parte videri,
Et pensare mala cum pietate scelus;
Scilicet hos alti missurus ad atria caeli,
Sulphureo curru flammivolisque rotis.
Qualiter ille feris caput inviolabile Parcis
Liquit Jordanios turbine raptus agros.
Another on the Same.
Siccine tentasti caelo donasse Jacobum
Quae septemgemino Bellua monte lates?
Ni meliora tuum poterit dare munera numen,
Parce precor donis insidiosa tuis.
Ille quidem sine te consortia serus adivit
Astra, nec inferni pulveris usus ope.
Sic potius foedus in caelum pelle cucullos,
Et quot habet brutos Roma profana Deos,
Namque hac aut alia quemque adjuveris arte,
Crede mihi, caeli vix bene scandet iter.
Another on the Same.
Purgatorem animae derisit Jacobus ignem,
Et sine quo superum non adeunda domus.
Frenduit hoc trina monstrum Latiale corona
Movit & horrificum cornua dena minax.
Et nec inultus ait temnes mea sacra Britanne,
Supplicium spreta relligione dabis.
Et si stelligeras unquam penetraveris arces,
Non nisi per flammas triste patebit iter.
O quam funesto cecinisti proxima vero,
Verbaque ponderibus vix caritura suis! 
Nam prope Tartareo sublime rotatus ab igni
Ibat ad aethereas umbra perusta plagas.
Another on the Same.
Quem modo Roma suis devoverat impia diris,
Et Styge damnarat Taenarioque sinu,
Hunc vice mutata jam tollere gestit ad astra,
Et cupit ad superos evehere usque Deos.
On the Inventor of Gunpowder.
Praise in old time the sage Prometheus won,
Who stole ethereal radiance from the sun;
But greater he, whose bold invention strove
To emulate the fiery bolts of Jove.
Nursery Rhyme. DCIX. Local.
by Unknown

Cripple Dick upon a stick,
And Sandy on a sow,
Riding away to Galloway,
To buy a pound o' woo.
Cuckoo!
by John Hartley

Cuckoo! Cuckoo! Just a word i' thi ear, - 
Aw hooap we shall net disagree;
But aw'm foorced to admit as aw watch thi each year,
At tha seems a big humbug to me.
We know at tha brings us glad tidins ov Spring,
An for that art entitled to thanks;
But tha maks a poor fist when tha offers to sing,
An tha plays some detestable pranks.
Too lazy to build a snug hooam for thisel,
Tha lives but a poor vagrant life;
An thi mate is noa better aw'm sooary to tell,
Shoo's unfit to be onny burd's wife.
Shoo drops her egg into another burd's nest,
An shirks what's her duty to do;
Noa love for her offspring e'er trubbles the breast,
Ov this selfish, hard-hearted Cuckoo.
Some other poor burd mun attend to her young,
An work hard to find 'em wi' grubs,
An all her reward, is to find befooar long
At her foster child treeats her wi' snubs.
Tha lives throo all th' sunshine, but th' furst chilly wind
'At ruffles thi feathers a bit,
Yo gather together an all i' one mind
Turn yor tails, - fly away, an forget.
Ther's some men just like yo, soa selfish an base,
They dooant care what comes or what gooas;
If they can just manage to live at ther ease,
Ait an drink, an be donn'd i' line clooas,
Cuckoo, thar't a type ov a lot at aw've met, - 
Aw'm nooan sooary when th' time comes to Part; - 
An i' spite ov all th' poets 'at's lauded thi, yet,
Tha'rt a humbug! - That's just what tha art.
Fragments Of Ancient Poetry, Fragment XIII
by James Macpherson

[Footnote: This is the opening of the epic poem mentioned in the preface. The two following fragments are parts of some episodes of the same work.]
Cuchlaid sat by the wall; by the
tree of the rustling leaf.
[Footnote: The aspen or poplar tree]
His spear leaned against the mossy rock.
His shield lay by him on the grass.
Whilst he thought on the mighty Carbre
whom he slew in battle, the scout of
the ocean came, Moran the son of Fithil.
Rise, Cuchulaid, rise! I see the ships
of Garve. Many are the foe, Cuchulaid;
many the sons of Lochlyn.
Moran! thou ever tremblest; thy
fears increase the foe. They are the
ships of the Desert of hills arrived to assist
Cuchulaid.
I saw their chief, says Moran, tall as
a rock of ice. His spear is like that fir;
his shield like the rising moon. He sat
upon a rock on the shore, as a grey
cloud upon the hill. Many, mighty
man! I said, many are our heroes;
Garve, well art thou named,
many are the sons of our king.
[Footnote: Garve sigifies a man of great size.]
He answered like a wave on the
rock; who is like me here? The valiant
live not with me; they go to the
earth from my hand. The king of the
Desert of hills alone can fight with
Garve. Once we wrestled on the hill.
Our heels overturned the wood. Rocks
fell from their place, and rivulets changed
their course. Three days we strove
together; heroes stood at a distance,
and feared. On the fourth, the King
saith that I fell; but Garve saith, he
stood. Let Cuchulaid yield to him that
is strong as a storm.
No. I will never yield to man.
Cuchulaid will conquer or die. Go,
Moran, take my spear; strike the shield
of Caithbait which hangs before the
gate. It never rings in peace. My heroes
shall hear on the hill,--
Crosses And Troubles
by William Ernest Henley

Crosses and troubles a-many have proved me.
One or two women (God bless them!) have loved me.
I have worked and dreamed, and I've talked at will.
Of art and drink I have had my fill.
I've comforted here, and I've succoured there.
I've faced my foes, and I've backed my friends.
I've blundered, and sometimes made amends.
I have prayed for light, and I've known despair.
Now I look before, as I look behind,
Come storm, come shine, whatever befall,
With a grateful heart and a constant mind,
For the end I know is the best of all.
1888-1889