DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
The Cities Of The Plain
by John Greenleaf Whittier

"Get ye up from the wrath of God's terrible day!
Ungirded, unsandalled, arise and away!
'T is the vintage of blood, 't is the fulness of time,
And vengeance shall gather the harvest of crime!"
The warning was spoken, the righteous had gone,
And the proud ones of Sodom were feasting alone;
All gay was the banquet, the revel was long,
With the pouring of wine and the breathing of song.
'T was an evening of beauty; the air was perfume,
The earth was all greenness, the trees were all bloom;
And softly the delicate viol was heard,
Like the murmur of love or the notes of a bird.
And beautiful maidens moved down in the dance,
With the magic of motion and sunshine of glance
And white arms wreathed lightly, and tresses fell free
As the plumage of birds in some tropical tree.
Where the shrines of foul idols were lighted on high,
And wantonness tempted the lust of the eye;
Midst rites of obsceneness, strange, loathsome, abhorred,
The blasphemer scoffed at the name of the Lord.
Hark! the growl of the thunder, the quaking of earth!
Woe, woe to the worship, and woe to the mirth!
The black sky has opened; there's flame in the air;
The red arm of vengeance is lifted and bare!
Then the shriek of the dying rose wild where the song
And the low tone of love had been whispered along;
For the fierce flames went lightly o'er palace and bower,
Like the red tongues of demons, to blast and devour!
Down, down on the fallen the red ruin rained,
And the reveller sank with his wine-cup undrained;
The foot of the dancer, the music's loved thrill,
And the shout and the laughter grew suddenly still.
The last throb of anguish was fearfully given;
The last eye glared forth in its madness on Heaven!
The last groan of horror rose wildly and vain,
And death brooded over the pride of the Plain
Trifles.
by Friedrich Schiller

THE EPIC HEXAMETER.
Giddily onward it bears thee with resistless impetuous billows;
Naught but the ocean and air seest thou before or behind.
THE DISTICH.
In the hexameter rises the fountain's watery column,
In the pentameter sweet falling in melody down.
THE EIGHT-LINE STANZA.
Stanza, by love thou'rt created, by love, all-tender and yearning;
Thrice dost thou bashfully fly; thrice dost with longing return.
THE OBELISK.
On a pedestal lofty the sculptor in triumph has raised me.
"Stand thou," spake he, and I stand proudly and joyfully here.
THE TRIUMPHAL ARCH.
"Fear not," the builder exclaimed, "the rainbow that stands in the heavens;
I will extend thee, like it, into infinity far!"
THE BEAUTIFUL BRIDGE.
Under me, over me, hasten the waters, the chariots; my builder
Kindly has suffered e'en me, over myself, too, to go!
THE GATE.
Let the gate open stand, to allure the savage to precepts;
Let it the citizen lead into free nature with joy.
ST. PETER'S.
If thou seekest to find immensity here, thou'rt mistaken;
For my greatness is meant greater to make thee thyself!
To Phoebe
by William Schwenck Gilbert

"Gentle, modest little flower,
Sweet epitome of May,
Love me but for half an hour,
Love me, love me, little fay."
Sentences so fiercely flaming
In your tiny shell-like ear,
I should always be exclaiming
If I loved you, PHOEBE dear.
"Smiles that thrill from any distance
Shed upon me while I sing!
Please ecstaticize existence,
Love me, oh, thou fairy thing!"
Words like these, outpouring sadly
You'd perpetually hear,
If I loved you fondly, madly;
But I do not, PHOEBE dear.
Unpardoned
by John Frederick Freeman

Gentle as the air that kisses
The splendid and ignoble with one breath,
Gentle as obliterating Death--
Though you be gentler yet,
In days when the old, old things begin to fret
The backward-looking consciousness,
Will you forget?
Or if remembering, will you forgive?
But there is one severer.
Stung by your forgivingness so great
Shall I forgive you then?--
Basest of men
Would rise in bitterness and sting again.
Not if you should forget
Could I forget:
Or if remembering, myself could I forgive?
Never! And yet such things have been,
And ills as dark forgiven or forgot.
But in those black hours when the heart burns hot
And there's no nerve that's not
Quick with the sense of things unheard, unseen--
A terrible voice that's mine yet not mine cries,
"Can that Eternal Righteousness
Remembering forgive?"
To My Mother
by Alfred Joyce Kilmer (Joyce)

Gentlest of critics, does your memory hold
(I know it does) a record of the days
When I, a schoolboy, earned your generous praise
For halting verse and stories crudely told?
Over these childish scrawls the years have rolled,
They might not know the world's unfriendly gaze;
But still your smile shines down familiar ways,
Touches my words and turns their dross to gold.
More dear to-day than in that vanished time
Comes your nigh praise to make me proud and strong.
In my poor notes you hear Love's splendid chime,
So unto you does this, my work belong.
Take, then, a little gift of fragile rhyme:
Your heart will change it to authentic song.
Shoe Black.
by James McIntyre

Gent on sidewalk held out his foot
While boy in gutter brushed his boot,
But at this time, how sad, alas,
An unruly horse did o'er him pass.
The child for friends he sad did lack,
They said he was but a shoeblack,
Kind hearted man the poor child bore,
To a soft cot in back of store.
And brought from hospital ward
A skilful nurse the lad to guard,
She often listened for his breath,
As he was passing the vale of death.
But, poor child, once he ope'd his eyes,
And he looked round in great surprise,
Feebly he asked, heaving a sigh,
Where in the world now am I.
The tender nurse bent o'er his face,
And said, dear boy, you're in good place,
She asked his name, he said it was Tom,
And that for long he had no home.
And since his mother was stricken dead,
He had not once reposed in bed,
And while suffering child did rack,
He eagerly asked will mother come back.
The nurse she gently answered, no,
But, to your dear mother you can go,
In his last sleep he had a dream,
Shining up boots it was his theme.
He soon awoke and called out, mother,
I see you and little brother,
Christ, I know, has me forgiven,
For they are beckoning me to Heaven.
To My Absent Daughter.
by George Pope Morris

Georgie, come home!--Life's tendrils cling about thee,
Where'er thou art, by wayward fancy led.
We miss thee, love!--Home is not home without thee--
The light and glory of the house have fled:
The autumn shiver of the linden-tree
Is like the pang that thrills my frame for thee!
Georgie, come home!--To parents, brother, sister
Thy place is vacant in this lonely hall,
Where shines the river through the "Jeannie Vista,"
While twilight shadows lengthen on the wall:
Our spirits falter at the close of day,
And weary night moves tardily away.
Georgie, come home!--The winds and waves are singing
The mournful music of their parting song,
To soul and sense the sad forboding bringing,
Some ill detains thee in the town so long:
Oh, that the morn may dissipate the fear,
And bring good tidings of my daughter dear!
Georgie, come home!--The forest leaves are falling,
And dreary visions in thy absence come;
The fountain on the hill in vain is calling
Thee, my beloved one, to thy woodland home.
And I imagine every passing breeze
Whispers thy name among the moaning trees!
Georgie, come home!--Thy gentle look can banish
The gathering gloom round this once cheerful hearth;
In thy sweet presence all our care will vanish,
And sorrow soften into mellow mirth.
Return, my darling, never more to roam:
Heart of the Highlands!--Georgie, dear, come home!
Geraldine, Geraldine
by Madison Julius Cawein

Geraldine, Geraldine,
Do you remember where
The willows used to screen
The water flowing fair?
The mill-stream's banks of green
Where first our love begun,
When you were seventeen,
And I was twenty-one?
Geraldine, Geraldine,
Do you remember how
From th' old bridge we would lean
The bridge that's broken now
To watch the minnows sheen,
And the ripples of the Run,
When you were seventeen,
And I was twenty-one?
Geraldine, Geraldine
Do you remember too
The old beech-tree, between
Whose roots the wild flowers grew?
Where oft we met at e'en,
When stars were few or none,
When you were seventeen,
And I was twenty-one?
Geraldine, Geraldine,
The bark has grown around
The names I cut therein,
And the truelove-knot that bound;
The love-knot, clear and clean,
I carved when our love begun,
When you were seventeen,
And I was twenty-one?
Geraldine, Geraldine,
The roof of the farmhouse gray
Is fallen and mossy green;
Its rafters rot away:
The old path scarce is seen
Where oft our feet would run,
When you were seventeen,
And I was twenty-one.
Geraldine, Geraldine,
Through each old tree and bough
The lone winds cry and keen
The place is haunted now,
With ghosts of what-has-been,
With dreams of love-long-done,
When you were seventeen,
And I was twenty-one.
Geraldine, Geraldine,
There, in your world of wealth,
There, where you move a queen,
Broken in heart and health,
Does there ever rise a scene
Of days, your soul would shun,
When you were seventeen,
And I was twenty-one?
Geraldine, Geraldine,
Here, 'mid the rose and rue,
Would God that your grave were green,
And I were lying too!
Here on the hill, I mean,
Where oft we laughed I' the sun,
When you were seventeen,
And I was twenty-one.
The Epic Hexameter.
by Friedrich Schiller

Giddily onward it bears thee with resistless impetuous billows;
Naught but the ocean and air seest thou before or behind.
Gentle Lady, Do Not Sing
by James Joyce

Gentle lady, do not sing
Sad songs about the end of love;
Lay aside sadness and sing
How love that passes is enough.
Sing about the long deep sleep
Of lovers that are dead, and how
In the grave all love shall sleep:
Love is aweary now.
Gloria The True.
by Marietta Holley

Gayly a knight set forth against the foe,
For a fair face had shone on him in dreams;
A voice had stirred the silence of his sleep,
"Go win the battle, and I will be thine."
So, for the love of those appealing eyes,
Led by low accents of fair Gloria's voice,
He wound the bugle down his castle's steep,
And gayly rode to battle in the morn.
And none were braver in the tented field,
Like lightning heralding the doomful bolt;
The enemy beheld his snowy plume,
And death-lights flashed along his glancing spear.
But in the lonesome watches of the night,
An angel came and warned him with clear voice,
Against high God his rash right arm was raised,
Was rashly raised against the true, the right.
He strove to drown the angel voice with song
And merry laughter with his princely peers;
But still the angel bade him with clear voice,
"Go join the ranks you rashly have opposed."
"Oh, Angel!" cried he, "they are few and weak,
They may not stand before the press of knights;"
But still the angel bade him with clear voice,
"Go help the weak against the mighty wrong."
At last the words sunk deep within his heart,
With god-like courage cried he out at last,
"Oh, Gloria, beautiful, I can lose thee,
Lose life and thee, to battle for the right."
And when he joined the brave and stalwart ranks,
Like Saul amid his brethren he stood,
Braver and seemlier than all his peers,
And nobly did he battle for the right.
Gentlest unto the weak, and in the fray,
So dauntless, none - no fear of man had he;
He wrought dismay in Error's blackened ranks
So nobly did he battle for the right.
But at the last he lay on a lost field;
Couched on a broken spear, he pallid lay;
With dying lips he murmured Gloria's name,
"The field is lost, and thou art lost to me."
When lo! she stood beside him, pure and fair,
With tender eyes that blessed him as he lay;
And lo! she knelt and clasped his dying hands,
And murmured, "I am thine, am thine at last."
With wondering eyes, he moaned, "All - all is lost,
And I am dying."    "Ah, not so," she cried,
"Nothing is lost to him who dare be true;
Who gives his life shall find it evermore."
"Methought I saw the spears beat down like grain,
And the ranks reel before the press of knights;
The level ground ran gory with our wounds;
Methought the field was lost, and then I fell."
"Be calm," she cried, "the right is never lost,
Though spear, and shield, and cross may shattered be,
Out of their dust shall spring avenging blades
That yet shall rid us of some giant wrong.
"And all the blood that falls in righteous cause,
Each crimson drop shall nourish snowy flowers
And quicken golden grain, bright sheaves of good,
That under happier skies shall yet be reaped.
"When right opposes wrong, shall evil win?
Nay, never - but the year of God is long,
And you are weary, rest ye now in peace,
For so He giveth His beloved sleep."
He smiled, and murmured low, "I am content,"
With blissful tears that hid the battle's loss;
So, held to her true heart he closed his eyes,
In quietest rest that ever he had known.
Forbearance
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

(Beareth all things. - 1 Cor. xiii. 7.)
Gently I took that which ungently came,
And without scorn forgave: Do thou the same.
A wrong done to thee think a cat's-eye spark
Thou wouldst not see, were not thine own heart dark.
Thine own keen sense of wrong that thirsts for sin,
Fear that, the spark self-kindled from within,
Which blown upon will blind thee with its glare,
Or smother'd stifle thee with noisome air.
Clap on the extinguisher, pull up the blinds,
And soon the ventilated spirit finds
Its natural daylight. If a foe have kenn'd,
Or worse than foe, an alienated friend,
A rib of dry rot in thy ship's stout side,
Think it God's message, and in humble pride
With heart of oak replace it; thine the gains
Give him the rotten timber for his pains!
The Oak & The Reeds
by Walter Crane

Giant Oak, in his strength & his scorn
Of the winds, by the roots was uptorn:
But slim Reeds at his side,
The fierce gale did outride,
Since, by bending the burden was borne.
Bend, Not Break
Song - Good Counsel To A Young Maid
by Thomas Carew

Gaze not on thy beauty's pride,
Tender maid, in the false tide
That from lovers' eyes doth slide.
Let thy faithful crystal show
How thy colours come and go:
Beauty takes a foil from woe.
Love, that in those smooth streams lies
Under pity's fair disguise,
Will thy melting heart surprise.
Nets of passion's finest thread,
Snaring poems, will be spread,
All to catch thy maidenhead.
Then beware! for those that cure
Love's disease, themselves endure
For reward a calenture.
Rather let the lover pine,
Than his pale cheek should assign
A perpetual blush to thine.
Written In L. J.'s Album.
by Eliza Paul Kirkbride Gurney

Gay visions for thee 'neath hope's pencil have glowed,
Peace dwells in thy bosom, a guileless abode;
Thou hast seen the bright side of existence alone,
And believ'st every spirit as pure as thine own.
May'st thou never awake from these rapturous dreams,
To find that the world is not fair as it seems,
To feel that the few thou hast loved have deceived,
Have forsaken the heart that confided, believed,
And left it as leafless, as bloomless, and waste
As the rose-tree that's stript by the merciless blast.
When the warm sky of childhood was beaming for me,
My days were all joyous, my heart was all glee;
Affection's best ties round my bosom were spun;
No cloud dimmed the lustre of life's morning sun.
If I watched o'er my favorite rose-bud's decay,
And mourned that its bright tints were fading away,
I knew not an anguish more poignant than this,
And the morrow's young brow wore a halo of bliss.
May'st thou long be a novice to feelings like mine,
When the shades of joy's noonday proclaimed their decline,
When death has doomed hearts warm as thine to decay,
Or frigid estrangement has torn them away.
Oh, I sometimes have questioned, when lingering near
The home of the dead, of the friends who were dear,
If the brightest enchantments of earth could repair
The sad devastation that time has made there;
If the joys of the world had a balm to impart,
That would act as a charm to the woes of the heart.
Yes, there is such a balm, but it comes from above,
It is wafted to earth on the pinions of love;
'Tis the spirit of piety, spotless and pure,
That teaches us calmly life's ills to endure;
When it reigns in the heart, every error's forgiven,
It resigns us to earth, and prepares us for Heaven.
A Ghost
by Victor James Daley

Ghosts walk the Earth, that rise not from the grave.
The Dead Past hath its living dead. We see
All suddenly, at times, and shudder then,
Their faces pale, and sad accusing eyes.
Last night, within the crowded street, I saw
A Phantom from the Past, with pallid face
And hollow eyes, and pale, cold lips, and hair
Faded from that imperial hue of gold
Which was my pride in days that are no more.
That pallid face I knew in its young bloom,
A radiant lily with a rose-flushed heart,
Most beautiful, a vision of delight;
And seeing it again, so changed, so changed,
I felt as if the icy hand of Death
Had touched my forehead and his voice said 'Come!'
Ah, pale, cold lips that once were rosy-red!
Lips I have kissed on golden afternoons,
Past, past, and gone, and gone beyond recall,
Breathing low vows beside the summer sea
(Vows broken like the breaking of a wave);
Ah, faded hair, whose curls I have caressed,
And sworn the least of them was dearer far
Than all the wealth of all the world to me!
Ah, hollow, haunting eyes, within whose depths,
Flower-like, and star-like, once my Fate I saw,
Or thought I saw! is there not any way
To call back from its grave the Buried Past?
Dear! Though my vows to thee were all for-sworn,
Too well, too late, I know I loved thee more
Than mine own life, a life-in-death since then.
Yet shall I nevermore in all the days
And all the lives to come, if lives there be
Beyond this life, beyond the weary earth,
Kiss thee again upon the lips and hair,
And call thee by the old caressing names,
And feel thy true heart beating against mine,
That was so false and would, too late, be true;
For neither passionate prayer, nor burning tears,
Nor incantations that might rend the rocks,
Nor all the powers of hell, nor God Himself,
May raise the Buried Past to life again.
For thou that wert art not; dead evermore,
Dead evermore, too, that which once was I.
What exorcism will lay these haunting ghosts?
None but a draught of the Lethean stream.
Who drinks therefrom shall all things soon forget,
Himself forgetting, too, the greatest good.
Shoo's thi Sister.
by John Hartley

(Written on seeing a wealthy Townsman rudely push a poor little girl off the pavement.)
Gently, gently, shoo's thi sister,
Tho' her clooas are nowt but rags;
On her feet ther's monny a blister:
See ha painfully shoo drags
Her tired limbs to some quiet corner:
Shoo's thi sister - dunnot scorn her.
Daan her cheeks noa tears are runnin,
Shoo's been shov'd aside befoor;
Used to scoffs, an sneers, an shunnin - 
Shoo expects it, 'coss shoo's poor;
Schooil'd for years her grief to smother,
Still shoo's human - tha'rt her brother.
Tho' tha'rt donn'd i' fine black cloathin,
A kid glove o' awther hand,
Dunnot touch her roughly, loathin - 
Shoo's thi sister, understand:
Th' wind maks merry wi' her tatters,
Poor lost pilgrim! - but what matters?
Luk ha sharp her elbow's growin,
An ha pale her little face;
An her hair neglected, showin
Her's has been a sorry case;
O, mi heart felt sad at th' seet,
When tha shov'd her into th' street.
Ther wor once a "Man," mich greater
Nor thisen wi' all thi brass;
Him, awr blessed Mediator, - 
Wod He scorn that little lass?
Noa, He called 'em, an He blessed 'em,
An His hands divine caress'd 'em.
Goa thi ways! an if tha bears net
Some regret for what tha's done,
If tha con pass on, an cares net
For that sufferin little one;
Then ha'ivver poor shoo be,
Yet shoo's rich compared wi' thee.
Oh! 'at this breet gold should blind us,
To awr duties here below!
For we're forced to leeav behind us
All awr pomp, an all awr show;
Why then should we slight another?
Shoo's thi sister, unkind brother.
Choose For The Best.
by Robert Herrick

Give house-room to the best; 'tis never known
Virtue and pleasure both to dwell in one.
Longings.
by George W. Doneghy

I.
Gim me back my stone-bruised heel,
And them tow-linen pants,
An' that old pole an' line an' reel,
An' all them boyhood ha'nts,
An' that old hat I used to wear,
That didn't hav' no crown,
An' that same crop uv yeller hair--
Sun-burnt on top ter brown--
An' them playmates I used ter know,
An' loved like very brothers--
An' you kin let the old world go
An' giv' its wealth ter others!
II.
Gim me back one gallus, too,
That buttoned with a peg,
An' them blamed ticks that burrowed through
The skin uv either leg,
An' that old single-barrel gun,
As crooked as a rail,
An' that same dog that used ter run
The molly cotton-tail,
An' lem me hav' the tops I spun--
The kites that I hav' sailed--
An' then at last, when life is done,
Who'd keer if it had failed?
Recreation.
by W. M. MacKeracher

Give me a cottage embower'd in trees,
Far from the press and the din of the town;
There let me loiter and live at my ease,
Happier far than the King with his crown.
There let the music that's sweeter than words
Waken my soul's inarticulate song,
Murmur of zephyrs and warbling of birds,
Babble of waters that hurry along.
Under the shade of the maple and beech
Let me in tranquil contentment recline,
Learning what nature and solitude teach,
Charming philosophy, human, divine;
Finding how trivial the myriad things
Life is concern'd with, to seek or to shun;
Seeing the sources whence blessedness springs,
Gathering strength for the work to be done.
Upon Punchin. Epig.
by Robert Herrick

Give me a reason why men call
Punchin a dry plant-animal.
Because as plants by water grow,
Punchin by beer and ale spreads so.
Gifts
by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Gifts of one who loved me,--
'T was high time they came;
When he ceased to love me,
Time they stopped for shame.
Nursery Rhyme. DCXVII. Relics.
by Unknown

Girls and boys, come out to play,
The moon doth shine as bright as day;
Leave your supper, and leave your sleep,
And come with your playfellows into the street.
Come with a whoop, come with a call,
Come with a good will or not at all.
Up the ladder and down the wall,
A halfpenny roll will serve us all.
You find milk, and I'll find flour,
And we'll have a pudding in half an hour.
The Death Of Robin Hood
by Eugene Field

"Give me my bow," said Robin Hood,
"An arrow give to me;
And where 't is shot mark thou that spot,
For there my grave shall be."
Then Little John did make no sign,
And not a word he spake;
But he smiled, altho' with mickle woe
His heart was like to break.
He raised his master in his arms,
And set him on his knee;
And Robin's eyes beheld the skies,
The shaws, the greenwood tree.
The brook was babbling as of old,
The birds sang full and clear,
And the wild-flowers gay like a carpet lay
In the path of the timid deer.
"O Little John," said Robin Hood,
"Meseemeth now to be
Standing with you so stanch and true
Under the greenwood tree.
"And all around I hear the sound
Of Sherwood long ago,
And my merry men come back again,--
You know, sweet friend, you know!
"Now mark this arrow; where it falls,
When I am dead dig deep,
And bury me there in the greenwood where
I would forever sleep."
He twanged his bow. Upon its course
The clothyard arrow sped,
And when it fell in yonder dell,
Brave Robin Hood was dead.
The sheriff sleeps in a marble vault,
The king in a shroud of gold;
And upon the air with a chanted pray'r
Mingles the mock of mould.
But the deer draw to the shady pool,
The birds sing blithe and free,
And the wild-flow'rs bloom o'er a hidden tomb
Under the greenwood tree.
Mediocrity In Love Rejected
by Thomas Carew

Give me more love or more disdain;
The torrid, or the frozen zone,
Bring equal ease unto my pain;
The temperate affords me none;
Either extreme, of love, or hate,
Is sweeter than a calm estate.
Give me a storm; if it be love,
Like Danae in that golden show'r
I swim in pleasure; if it prove
Disdain, that torrent will devour
My vulture-hopes; and he's possess'd
Of heaven, that's but from hell releas'd.
Then crown my joys, or cure my pain;
Give me more love, or more disdain.
His Wish To Privacy
by Robert Herrick

Give me a cell
To dwell,
Where no foot hath
A path;
There will I spend,
And end,
My wearied years
In tears.
Honours Are Hindrances.
by Robert Herrick

Give me honours! what are these,
But the pleasing hindrances?
Stiles, and stops, and stays that come
In the way 'twixt me and home;
Clear the walk, and then shall I
To my heaven less run than fly.