DanFosing/public-domain-poetry huggingface dataset:
Cecil
by Walter De La Mare

Ye little elves, who haunt sweet dells,
Where flowers with the dew commune,
I pray you hush the child, Cecil,
With windlike song.
O little elves, so white she lieth,
Each eyelid gentler than the flow'r
Of the bramble, and her fleecy hair
Like smoke of gold.
O little elves, her hands and feet
The angels muse upon, and God
Hath shut a glimpse of Paradise
In each blue eye.
O little elves, her tiny body
Like a white flake of snow it is,
Drooping upon the pale green hood
Of the chill snowdrop.
O little elves, with elderflower,
And pimpernel, and the white hawthorn,
Sprinkle the journey of her dreams:
And, little elves,
Call to her magically sweet,
Lest of her very tenderness
She do forsake this rough brown earth
And return to us no more.
Ye Mariners Who Spread Your Sails.
by Victor-Marie Hugo

("Matel'ts, vous d'ploirez les voiles.")
[XVI., May 5, 1839.]
Ye mariners! ye mariners! each sail to the breeze unfurled,
In joy or sorrow still pursue your course around the world;
And when the stars next sunset shine, ye anxiously will gaze
Upon the shore, a friend or foe, as the windy quarter lays.
Ye envious souls, with spiteful tooth, the statue's base will bite;
Ye birds will sing, ye bending boughs with verdure glad the sight;
The ivy root in the stone entwined, will cause old gates to fall;
The church-bell sound to work or rest the villagers will call.
Ye glorious oaks will still increase in solitude profound,
Where the far west in distance lies as evening veils around;
Ye willows, to the earth your arms in mournful trail will bend,
And back again your mirror'd forms the water's surface send.
Ye nests will oscillate beneath the youthful progeny;
Embraced in furrows of the earth the germing grain will lie;
Ye lightning-torches still your streams will cast into the air,
Which like a troubled spirit's course float wildly here and there.
Ye thunder-peals will God proclaim, as doth the ocean wave;
Ye violets will nourish still the flower that April gave;
Upon your ambient tides will be man's sternest shadow cast;
Your waters ever will roll on when man himself is past.
All things that are, or being have, or those that mutely lie,
Have each its course to follow out, or object to descry;
Contributing its little share to that stupendous whole,
Where with man's teeming race combined creation's wonders roll.
The poet, too, will contemplate th' Almighty Father's love,
Who to our restless minds, with light and darkness from above,
Hath given the heavens that glorious urn of tranquil majesty,
Whence in unceasing stores we draw calm and serenity.
Author of "Critical Essays."
The Bonny Earl Of Murray
by Frank Sidgwick

The Text is given from Allan Ramsay's Tea-Table Miscellany, where it first appeared in the tenth edition (1740) in vol. iv. pp. 356-7. Child had not seen this, and gave his text from the eleventh edition of 1750. There is, however, scarcely any difference.
The Story of the murder of the Earl of Murray by the Earl of Huntly in February 1592 is found in several histories and other accounts:-- The History of the Church of Scotland (1655) by John Spottiswoode, Archbishop of Glasgow and of St. Andrews: History of the Western Highlands and Isles of Scotland (1836) by Donald Gregory: The History and Life of King James (the Sixth), ed. T. Thomson, Bannatyne Club, (1825): Extracts from the Diarey of R[obert] B[irrel], Burges of Edinburgh (? 1820): and Sir Walter Scott's Tales of a Grandfather. The following condensed account may suffice:--James Stewart, son of Sir James Stewart of Doune ('Down,' 6.2), Earl of Murray by his marriage with the heiress of the Regent Murray, 'was a comely personage, of a great stature, and strong of body like a kemp,' whence he was generally known as the Bonny Earl of Murray. In the last months of 1591, a rumour reached the King's ears that the Earl of Murray had assisted in, or at least countenanced, the attack recently made on Holyrood House by Stewart, Earl of Bothwell; and Huntly was commissioned to arrest Murray and bring him to trial. Murray, apprehended at Donibristle (or Dunnibirsel), his mother the Lady Doune's house, refused to surrender to his feudal enemy the Earl of Huntly, and the house was fired. Murray, after remaining behind the rest of his party, rushed out and broke through the enemy, but was subsequently discovered (by the plumes on his headpiece, which had caught fire) and mortally wounded. Tradition says that Huntly was compelled by his followers to incriminate himself in the deed, and struck the dying Murray in the face, whereat the bonny Earl said, 'You have spoiled a better face than your own.'
THE BONNY EARL OF MURRAY
1.
Ye Highlands and ye Lawlands,
Oh! where have you been?
They have slain the Earl of Murray,
And they lay'd him on the green!
They have, &c.
2.
Now wae be to thee, Huntly,
And wherefore did you sae?
I bade you bring him wi' you,
But forbade you him to slay.
I bade, &c.
3.
He was a braw gallant,
And he rid at the ring;
And the bonny Earl of Murray,
Oh! he might have been a King.
And the, &c.
4.
He was a braw gallant,
And he play'd at the ba';
And the bonny Earl of Murray
Was the flower amang them a'.
And the, &c.
5.
He was a braw gallant,
And he play'd at the glove;
And the bonny Earl of Murray,
Oh! he was the Queen's love.
And the, &c.
6.
Oh! lang will his lady
Look o'er the castle Down,
E'er she see the Earl of Murray
Come sounding thro' the town.
E'er she, &c.
Sonnet CXCI.
by Francesco Petrarca (Petrarch)

Aura, che quelle chiome bionde e crespe.
HE ENVIES THE BREEZE WHICH SPORTS WITH HER, THE STREAM THAT FLOWS TOWARDS HER.
Ye laughing gales, that sporting with my fair,
The silky tangles of her locks unbraid;
And down her breast their golden treasures spread;
Then in fresh mazes weave her curling hair,
You kiss those bright destructive eyes, that bear
The flaming darts by which my heart has bled;
My trembling heart! that oft has fondly stray'd
To seek the nymph, whose eyes such terrors wear.
Methinks she's found--but oh! 'tis fancy's cheat!
Methinks she's seen--but oh! 'tis love's deceit!
Methinks she's near--but truth cries "'tis not so!"
Go happy gale, and with my Laura dwell!
Go happy stream, and to my Laura tell
What envied joys in thy clear crystal flow!
ANON. 1777.
Thou gale, that movest, and disportest round
Those bright crisp'd locks, by them moved sweetly too,
That all their fine gold scatter'st to the view,
Then coil'st them up in beauteous braids fresh wound;
About those eyes thou playest, where abound
The am'rous swarms, whose stings my tears renew!
And I my treasure tremblingly pursue,
Like some scared thing that stumbles o'er the ground.
Methinks I find her now, and now perceive
She's distant; now I soar, and now descend;
Now what I wish, now what is true believe.
Stay and enjoy, blest air, the living beam;
And thou, O rapid, and translucent stream,
Why can't I change my course, and thine attend?
NOTT.
It Is Time To Begin To Conclude.
by A. H. Laidlaw

Ye Parsons, desirous all sinners to save,
And to make each a prig or a prude,
If two thousand long years have not made us behave,
It is time you began to conclude.
Ye Husbands, who wish your sweet mates to grow mum,
And whose tongues you have never subdued,
If ten years of your reign have not made them grow dumb,
It is time to begin to conclude.
Ye Matrons of men whose brown meerschaum still mars
The sweet kiss with tobacco bedewed,
After pleading nine years, if they still puff cigars,
It is time you began to conclude.
Ye Lawyers, who aim to reform all the land,
And your statutes forever intrude,
If five thousand lost years have not worked as you planned,
It is time to begin to conclude.
Ye Lovers, who sigh for the heart of a maid,
And for forty-four years have pursued,
If two scores of young years have not taught you your trade,
It is time you began to conclude.
Ye Doctors, who claim to cure every ill,
And so much of mock learning exude,
If the Comma Bacillus still laughs at your pill,
It is time to begin to conclude.
Ye Maidens of Fifty who lonely abide,
Yet who heartily scout solitude,
If Jack with his whiskers is not at your side,
It is time to begin to conclude.
Ye Spaniards, akin to the Mexican mule,
And who have not fair Cuba subdued,
After three bloody years of your miscreant rule,
It is time you began to conclude.
We commend to your mind Bill McKinley's big toe
In a boot that is rugged and rude,
When that boot and that toe give you notice to go,
It is time to begin to conclude.
Walk Spanish from Cuba, with Miles at your heel,
And by Fitz Hugh the Southron pursued,
Or you'll learn from a thrust of American steel
That it's time you began to conclude.
And Sigsbee will soon shoot it all very plain
Into Blanco's most murderous brood,
That the cry from the blood of the Men of the Maine
Makes it meet for mere talk to conclude.
Ye Powers Unseen
by Mark Akenside

Ye powers unseen, to whom, the bards of Greece
Erected altars; ye who to the mind
More lofty views unfold, and prompt the heart
With more divine emotions; if erewhile
Not quite unpleasing have my votive rites
Of you been deem'd when oft this lonely seat
To you I consecrated; then vouchsafe
Here with your instant energy to crown
My happy solitude. It is the hour
When most I love to invoke you, and have felt
Most frequent your glad ministry divine.
The air is calm: the sun's unveiled orb
Shines in the middle heaven. the harvest round
Stands quiet, and among the golden sheaves
The reapers lie reclin'd. the neighbouring groves
Are mute; nor even a linnet's random strain
Echoeth amid the silence. Let me feel
Your influence, ye kind powers. Aloft in heaven,
Abide ye? or on those transparent clouds
Pass, ye from hill to hill? or on the shades
Which yonder elms cast o'er the lake below
Do you converse retir'd? From what lov'd haunt
Shall I expect you? Let me once more feel
Your influence, o ye kind inspiring powers:
And I will guard it well, nor shall a thought
Rise in my mind, nor shall a passion move
Across my bosom unobserv'd, unstor'd
By faithful memory. and then at some
More active moment, will I call them forth
Anew; and join them in majestic forms,
And give them utterance in harmonious strains;
That all mankind shall wonder at your sway.
The Song Of The Derelict
by John McCrae

Ye have sung me your songs, ye have chanted your rimes
(I scorn your beguiling, O sea!)
Ye fondle me now, but to strike me betimes.
(A treacherous lover, the sea!)
Once I saw as I lay, half-awash in the night
A hull in the gloom, a quick hail, and a light
And I lurched o'er to leeward and saved her for spite
From the doom that ye meted to me.
I was sister to `Terrible', seventy-four,
(Yo ho! for the swing of the sea!)
And ye sank her in fathoms a thousand or more
(Alas! for the might of the sea!)
Ye taunt me and sing me her fate for a sign!
What harm can ye wreak more on me or on mine?
Ho braggart! I care not for boasting of thine,
A fig for the wrath of the sea!
Some night to the lee of the land I shall steal,
(Heigh-ho to be home from the sea!)
No pilot but Death at the rudderless wheel,
(None knoweth the harbor as he!)
To lie where the slow tide creeps hither and fro
And the shifting sand laps me around, for I know
That my gallant old crew are in Port long ago,
For ever at peace with the sea!
To Cherry-Blossoms.
by Robert Herrick

Ye may simper, blush and smile,
And perfume the air awhile;
But, sweet things, ye must be gone,
Fruit, ye know, is coming on;
Then, ah! then, where is your grace,
Whenas cherries come in place?
Epitaph On Howard
by Thomas Oldham

Ye! who this hallow'd ground with reverence tread,
Where sleep in honour'd urns the illustrious dead,
To trace the achievements of the Sons of Fame,
And pay just worship to each godlike name;
(If, blest with hearts that melt at human wo,
And feel philanthropy's celestial glow,)
Midst all the monuments that court your view,
And claim the debt to buried merit due,
Mark chiefly this; on this with tearful eyes
More fondly gaze; beneath it Howard lies!
O'er other urns mere mortals only mourn;
Celestial Beings honour Howard's urn;
Benevolence sits weeping on his stone;
Heaven's Angel still, though on her earthly throne.
Compensation.
by Madison Julius Cawein

Yea, whom He loves the Lord God chasteneth
With disappointments, so that this side death,
Through suffering and failure, they know Hell
To make them worthy in that Heaven to dwell
Of Love's attainment, where they come to be
Parts of its beauty and divinity.
Young Love VII - The Lamp And The Star
by Richard Le Gallienne

Yea, let me be 'thy bachelere,'
'Tis sweeter than thy lord;
How should I envy him, my dear,
The lamp upon his board.
Still make his little circle bright
With boon of dear domestic light,
While I afar,
Watching his windows in the night,
Worship a star
For which he hath no bolt or bar.
Yea, dear,
Thy 'bachelere.'
Young Love X - Love's Poor
by Richard Le Gallienne

Yea, love, I know, and I would have it thus,
I know that not for us
Is springtide Passion with his fire and flowers,
I know this love of ours
Lives not, nor yet may live,
By the dear food that lips and hands can give.
Not, Love, that we in some high dream despise
The common lover's common Paradise;
Ah, God, if Thou and I
But one short hour their blessedness might try,
How could we poor ones teach
Those happy ones who half forget them rich:
For if we thus endure,
'Tis only, love, because we are so poor.
Acceptance.
by Emma Lazarus

Yea, she hath looked Truth grimly face to face,
And drained unto the lees the proffered cup.
This silence is not patience, nor the grace
Of recognition, meekly offered up,
But mere acceptance fraught with keenest pain,
Seeing that all her struggles must be vain.
Her future clear and terrible outlies, - 
This burden to be borne through all her days,
This crown of thorns pressed down above her eyes,
This weight of trouble she may never raise.
No reconcilement doth she ask nor wait;
Knowing such things are, she endures her fate.
No brave endeavor of the broken will
To cling to such poor stays as will abide
(Although the waves be wild and angry still)
After the lapsing of the swollen tide.
No fear of further loss, no hope of gain,
Naught but the apathy of weary pain.
On the Platonic 'Ideal' as it was Understood by Aristotle.
by John Milton

Ye sister Pow'rs who o'er the sacred groves
Preside, and, Thou, fair mother of them all
Mnemosyne,1 and thou, who in thy grot
Immense reclined at leisure, hast in charge
The Archives and the ord'nances of Jove,
And dost record the festivals of heav'n,
Eternity! Inform us who is He,
That great Original by Nature chos'n
To be the Archetype of Human-kind,
Unchangeable, Immortal, with the poles
Themselves coaeval, One, yet ev'rywhere,
An image of the god, who gave him Being?
Twin-brother of the Goddess born from Jove,2
He dwells not in his Father's mind, but, though
Of common nature with ourselves, exists
Apart, and occupies a local home.
Whether, companion of the stars, he spend
Eternal ages, roaming at his will
From sphere to sphere the tenfold heav'ns, or dwell
On the moon's side that nearest neighbours Earth,
Or torpid on the banks of Lethe3 sit
Among the multitude of souls ordair'd
To flesh and blood, or whether (as may chance)
That vast and giant model of our kind
In some far-distant region of this globe
Sequester'd stalk, with lifted head on high
O'ertow'ring Atlas, on whose shoulders rest
The stars, terrific even to the Gods.
Never the Theban Seer,4 whose blindness proved
His best illumination, Him beheld
In secret vision; never him the son
Of Pleione,5 amid the noiseless night
Descending, to the prophet-choir reveal'd;
Him never knew th'Assyrian priest,6 who yet
The ancestry of Ninus7 chronicles,
And Belus, and Osiris far-renown'd;
Nor even Thrice-great Hermes,7 although skill'd
So deep in myst'ry, to the worshippers
Of Isis show'd a prodigy like Him.
And thou,8 who hast immortalized the shades
Of Academus, if the school received
This monster of the Fancy first from Thee,
Either recall at once the banish'd bards
To thy Republic, or, thyself evinc'd
A wilder Fabulist, go also forth.
Homer's Hymn To Castor And Pollux.
by Percy Bysshe Shelley

Ye wild-eyed Muses, sing the Twins of Jove,
Whom the fair-ankled Leda, mixed in love
With mighty Saturn's Heaven-obscuring Child,
On Taygetus, that lofty mountain wild,
Brought forth in joy: mild Pollux, void of blame,
And steed-subduing Castor, heirs of fame.
These are the Powers who earth-born mortals save
And ships, whose flight is swift along the wave.
When wintry tempests o'er the savage sea
Are raging, and the sailors tremblingly
Call on the Twins of Jove with prayer and vow,
Gathered in fear upon the lofty prow,
And sacrifice with snow-white lambs, - the wind
And the huge billow bursting close behind,
Even then beneath the weltering waters bear
The staggering ship - they suddenly appear,
On yellow wings rushing athwart the sky,
And lull the blasts in mute tranquillity,
And strew the waves on the white Ocean's bed,
Fair omen of the voyage; from toil and dread
The sailors rest, rejoicing in the sight,
And plough the quiet sea in safe delight.
On The Same Occasion
by William Wordsworth

(The Final Submission Of The Tyrolese)
Ye Storms, resound the praises of your King!
And ye mild Seasons, in a sunny clime,
Midway on some high hill, while father Time
Looks on delighted, meet in festal ring,
And loud and long of Winter's triumph sing!
Sing ye, with blossoms crowned, and fruits, and flowers,
Of Winter's breath surcharged with sleety showers,
And the dire flapping of his hoary wing!
Knit the blithe dance upon the soft green grass;
With feet, hands, eyes, looks, lips, report your gain;
Whisper it to the billows of the main,
And to the aerial zephyrs as they pass,
That old decrepit Winter, 'He' hath slain
That Host, which rendered all your bounties vain!
Alleluia Height
by Michael Earls

Yea, constant through the changeful year,
This queenly Height commands our praise.
To stand in meek unflinching hardihood
When fortune blows its storm of fright,
And work to full effect that good
Resolved in open days of clearer sight-
O, this is worth!
That daily sees the soul
To braver liberties give birth,
That heeds not time's annoy,
And hears surrounding voices roll
Perennial circumstance of joy.
Then come not only when the springtime blows
The old familiar strangeness of its breath
Across the long-lain snows,
And chants her resurrected songs
About the tombs of death;
Nor yet when summer glows
In roseate throngs
And works her plenitude of deeds
By tangled dells and waving meads,
Come here in beauty's pilgrimage:
Nor when the autumn reads
Illuminate her page
With tints of magicry besprent
Of iridescent wonderment-
(As scrolls in old monastic towers,
Done in an earnest far-off age).
But choose to come in winter hours
To see how character can live,
How noble character will give
Through desolate distress
And cold neglect's duress,
The fulness of its powers
And win the soul its victor sign.
Yea, come when in a peasant gown,
Amid the ample banners of the pine,
Inscription For A Monument In Crosthwaite Church, In The Vale Of Keswick
by William Wordsworth

Ye vales and hills whose beauty hither drew
The poet's steps, and fixed him here, on you
His eyes have closed! And ye, loved books, no more
Shall Southey feed upon your precious lore,
To works that ne'er shall forfeit their renown,
Adding immortal labours of his own,
Whether he traced historic truth, with zeal
For the State's guidance, or the Church's weal,
Or Fancy, disciplined by studious art,
Informed his pen, or wisdom of the heart,
Or judgments sanctioned in the Patriot's mind
By reverence for the rights of all mankind.
Wide were his aims, yet in no human breast
Could private feelings meet for holier rest.
His joys, his griefs, have vanished like a cloud
From Skiddaw's top; but he to heaven was vowed
Through his industrious life, and Christian faith
Calmed in his soul the fear of change and death.
Calvin Campbell
by Edgar Lee Masters

Ye who are kicking against Fate,
Tell me how it is that on this hill-side
Running down to the river,
Which fronts the sun and the south-wind,
This plant draws from the air and soil
Poison and becomes poison ivy?
And this plant draws from the same air and soil
Sweet elixirs and colors and becomes arbutus?
And both flourish?
You may blame Spoon River for what it is,
But whom do you blame for the will in you
That feeds itself and makes you dock-weed,
Jimpson, dandelion or mullen
And which can never use any soil or air
So as to make you jessamine or wistaria?
Reasons
by Madison Julius Cawein

I
Yea, why I love thee let my heart repeat:
I look upon thy face and then divine
How men could die for beauty, such as thine,--
Deeming it sweet
To lay my life and manhood at thy feet,
And for a word, a glance,
Do deeds of old romance.
II
Yea, why I love thee let my heart unfold:
I look into thy heart and then I know
The wondrous poetry of the long-ago,
The Age of Gold,
That speaks strange music, that is old, so old,
Yet young, as when 't was born,
With all the youth of morn.
III
Yea, why I love thee let my heart conclude:
I look into thy soul and realize
The undiscovered meaning of the skies,--
That long have wooed
The world with far ideals that elude,--
Out of whose dreams, maybe,
God shapes reality.
Cave Of Staffa
by William Wordsworth

Ye shadowy Beings, that have rights and claims
In every cell of Fingal's mystic Grot,
Where are ye? Driven or venturing to the spot,
Our fathers glimpses caught of your thin Frames,
And, by your mien and bearing knew your names;
And they could hear 'his' ghostly song who trod
Earth, till the flesh lay on him like a load,
While he struck his desolate harp without hopes or aims.
Vanished ye are, but subject to recall;
Why keep 'we' else the instincts whose dread law
Ruled here of yore, till what men felt they saw,
Not by black arts but magic natural!
If eyes be still sworn vassals of belief,
Yon light shapes forth a Bard, that shade a Chief.
Sacramentum Supremum
by Henry John Newbolt, Sir

MUKDEN, MARCH 6TH, 1905
Ye that with me have fought and failed and fought
To the last desperate trench of battle's crest,
Not yet to sleep, not yet; our work is nought;
On that last trench the fate of all may rest,
Draw near, my friends; and let your thoughts be high;
Great hearts are glad when it is time to give;
Life is no life to him that dares not die,
And death no death to him that dares to live.
Draw near together; none be last or first;
We are no longer names, but one desire;
With the same burning of the soul we thirst,
And the same wine to-night shall quench our fire.
Drink! to our fathers who begot us men,
To the dead voices that are never dumb;
Then to the land of all our loves, and then
To the long parting, and the age to come.
On Censure
by Jonathan Swift

Ye wise, instruct me to endure
An evil, which admits no cure;
Or, how this evil can be borne,
Which breeds at once both hate and scorn.
Bare innocence is no support,
When you are tried in Scandal's court.
Stand high in honour, wealth, or wit;
All others, who inferior sit,
Conceive themselves in conscience bound
To join, and drag you to the ground.
Your altitude offends the eyes
Of those who want the power to rise.
The world, a willing stander-by,
Inclines to aid a specious lie:
Alas! they would not do you wrong;
But all appearances are strong.
Yet whence proceeds this weight we lay
On what detracting people say!
For let mankind discharge their tongues
In venom, till they burst their lungs,
Their utmost malice cannot make
Your head, or tooth, or finger ache;
Nor spoil your shape, distort your face,
Or put one feature out of place;
Nor will you find your fortune sink
By what they speak or what they think;
Nor can ten hundred thousand lies
Make you less virtuous, learn'd, or wise.
The most effectual way to balk
Their malice, is - to let them talk.
L' Envoi
by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Ye voices, that arose
After the Evening's close,
And whispered to my restless heart repose!
Go, breathe it in the ear
Of all who doubt and fear,
And say to them, "Be of good cheer!"
Ye sounds, so low and calm,
That in the groves of balm
Seemed to me like an angel's psalm!
Go, mingle yet once more
With the perpetual roar
Of the pine forest dark and hoar!
Tongues of the dead, not lost
But speaking from deaths frost,
Like fiery tongues at Pentecost!
Glimmer, as funeral lamps,
Amid the chills and damps
Of the vast plain where Death encamps!