OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Alpine Flowers

THE ALPINE FLOWERS.
Meek dwellers mid yon terror-stricken cliffs!
With brows so pure, and incense-breathing lips,
Whence are ye?—Did some white wing'd messenger
On Mercy's missions trust your timid germ
To the cold cradle of eternal snows?
Or breathing on the callous icicles
Bid them with tear-drops nurse ye?—
 —Tree nor shrub
Dare that drear atmosphere,—no polar pine
Uprears a veteran front,—yet there ye stand.
Leaning your cheeks against the thick ribb'd ice,
And looking up with brilliant eyes to Him
Who bids you bloom unblanch'd amid the waste
Of desolation. Man, who panting toils
O'er slippery steeps, or trembling treads the verge
Of yawning gulfs, o'er which the headlong plunge
Is to Eternity, looks shuddering up,
And marks ye in your placid loveliness
Fearless, yet frail, and clasping his chill hands
Blesses your pencil'd beauty. Mid the pomp
Of mountain summits rushing on the sky,
And chaining the rapt soul in breathless awe,
He bows to bind you drooping to his breast,
Inhales your spirit from the frost-wing'd gale,
And freer dreams of Heaven.
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Cemetery of Pere La Chaise

THE CEMETERY OF PERE LA CHAISE.
Is this the abode of the dead?—Oh no!—
 The symbols of joy are here,—
Gay wreaths round columns of marble glow, From bright-wing'd birds sweet melodies flow,
 Nor cypress nor yew are near.
I thought that the city which death had rear'd
 Was with banners of grief o'erspread,—
That pleasure to weave her light garland fear'd, And the path to its desolate shrines appear'd
 Deep worn by the mourner's tread.
Yet still is there nought of secret wo
 'Neath the guise of this gaudy cheer?—
On yon little mound where roses grow,
Methinks that pale flower with its lip of snow
 Hath drank of a mother's tear.
Yes! Yes!—'t is the site of the dreamless bed,
 There 's a voice from those sepulchres cold,—
The mighty are there,—but their pomp is dead,
And the lover who pale from the bridal fled,
 In his bosom the worm to fold.
Can ye tell us nought of the souls who fly
 From their prison of earthly gloom?—
Hark! Hark! to the hollow and hoarse reply,
"Ora pro anima mea," they cry
 From the depth of each sculptured tomb.
But why do ye cry unto us, ye dead?—
 We are striving with sorrow's blast,
We are weak, and mid snares of sin we tread,
We are frail, and the change of death we dread,  That change with you is past.
Till the fearful audit of mortal crime,
 When the books of the judgment ope,
Till the flash of that flame whose wrath sublime
Shall feed on the spoils of buried time,
 Rest,—rest in your beds of hope.
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/Song of the Icelandic Fisher

SONG OF THE ICELANDIC FISHER.
Yield the bark to the breezes free,
Point her helm to the far deep sea,
Where Hecla's watch-fire streaming wild
Hath never the mariner's eye beguiled,
Where in boiling baths strange monsters play
Down to the deep sea,—launch away!
Gay o'er coral caves we steer
 Where moulder the bones of the brave, Where the beautiful sleep on their humid bier,
And the pale pearl gleams in its quenchless sphere,
 The lamp of their Ocean grave;
Swift o'er the crested surge we row,
Down to the fathomless sea we go.
 King of Day! to thee we turn,*
 May our course be blest by thee,
Eyes bright as thine in our homes shall burn,
 When again our hearths we see,
When the scaly throng, to our skill a prey,
At the feet of our fur clad maids we lay.
Thou art mighty in wrath, devouring tide!
The strong ship loves o'er thy foam to ride, Her banner by bending clouds carest,
The waves at her keel, and a world in her breast;
Thou biddest the blast of thy billows sweep,
Her tall masts bow to the cleaving deep, And seal'd in thy cells her proud ones sleep.
Our sails are as chaff, when the tempest raves,
And our boat a speck on the mountain waves:
Yet we pour not to thee, the imploring strain, We sooth not thine anger, relentless Main!
Libation we pour not, nor vow, nor prayer,
 Our hope is in thee,
 God of the Sea!
The deep is thy path, and the soul thy care.
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Chair of the Indian King

THE CHAIR OF THE INDIAN KING.
In the neighbourhood of Mohegan is a rude recess, environed by rocks, which still retains the name of "the chair of Uncas." When the fort of that King was besieged by the Narragansetts, and his people were perishing with famine, he took measures to inform the English of their danger, and was found seated in this rocky chair, ​ anxiously watching the river on the night when those supplies arrived, which rescued his tribe from destruction. These were conveyed in a large canoe from Saybrook, under cover of darkness, by an enterprising man, of the name of Leffingwell, to whom Uncas, as a proof of his gratitude, gave a large tract of land, comprising nearly the whole town of Norwich.
The monarch sat on his rocky throne,
 Before him the waters lay,—
His guards were the shapeless columns of stone,
Their lofty helmets with moss o'ergrown,
 And their spears of the bracken gray.
His lamps were the fickle stars that beam'd
 Through the veil of their midnight shroud,
And the redd'ning flashes that fitfully gleam'd
When the distant fires of the war-dance stream'd
Where his foes in frantic revel scream'd
 'Neath their canopy of cloud.
Say! why was his glance so restless and keen
 As it fell on the waveless tide?
And why, mid the gloom of that silent scene
Did the sigh heave his warlike bosom's screen
 And bow that front of pride?
Behind him his leaguer'd forces lay
 Withering in Famine's blight,
And he knew with the blush of the morning ray
That Philip would summon his fierce array,
On the core of the warrior's heart to prey,
 And quench a nation's light.
It comes! It comes!—that misty speck
 Which over the waters moves!
It boasts nor sail, nor mast, nor deck,
Yet dearer to him was that nameless wreck
 Than the maid to him who loves.
It bears to the warrior's nerveless arm
 The might of a victor's aim,
Its freight is a spell whose mystic charm
Shall protect the tottering sire from harm,
And the ire-doom'd babe, whose life-blood warm
 Was to hiss in the wigwam's flame.
The eye of the king with that lightning blazed
 Which the soul in its rapture sends;
His prayer to the Spirit of Good he raised
And the shades of his buried Fathers praised
 As toward his fort he wends.
That king hath gone to his lowly grave!
 He slumbers in dark decay;
And like the crest of the tossing wave,
Like the rush of the blast from the mountain cave,
Like the groan of the murder'd, with none to save,
 His people have passed away.
The monarch hath gone, but his rocky throne
 Still rests on its frowning base;
Its motionless guards rise in phalanx lone,
And nought save the winds through their helmets that moan,
And none but those bosoms and hearts of stone
 Sigh o'er a fallen race.
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Coral Insect

THE CORAL INSECT.
Toil on! toil on! ye ephemeral train,
Who build in the tossing and treacherous main;
Toil on,—for the wisdom of man ye mock.
With your sand-based structures and domes of rock:
Your columns the fathomless fountains lave, And your arches spring up to the crested wave;—
Ye're a puny race, thus to boldly rear
A fabric so vast, in a realm so drear.
Ye bind the deep with your secret zone,
The ocean is seal'd, and the surge a stone;
Fresh wreaths from the coral pavement spring,
Like the terraced pride of Assyria's king;
The turf looks green where the breakers roll'd,
O’er the whirlpool ripens the rind of gold;—
The sea-snatch'd isle is the home of men,
And mountains exult where the wave hath been.
But why do ye plant 'neath the billows dark
The wrecking reef for the gallant bark?—
There are snares enough on the tented field,
Mid the blossom'd sweets that the valleys yield;
There are serpents to coil, ere the flowers are up;
There 's a poison-drop in man's purest cup,
There are foes that watch for his cradle breath,
And why need ye sow the floods with death?
With mouldering bones the deeps are white,
From the ice-clad pole to the tropicks bright;—
The mermaid hath twisted her fingers cold
With the mesh of the sea-boy's curls of gold, And the gods of ocean have frown'd to see
The mariner's bed in their halls of glee;—
Hath earth no graves, that ye thus must spread
The boundless sea for the thronging dead?
Ye build,—ye build,—but ye enter not in,
Like the tribes whom the desert devour'd in their sin;
From the land of promise ye fade and die,
Ere its verdure gleams forth on your weary eye;—
As the kings of the cloud-crown'd pyramid,
Their noteless bones in oblivion hid;
Ye slumber unmark'd 'mid the desolate main, While the wonder and pride of your works remain.
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Dead Horseman

THE DEAD HORSEMAN.
Occasioned by reading the manner of carrying a young man to burial, on the back of a horse, in the mountainous region about Vettie's Giel in Norway, in a road on the precipitous declivity of a mountain, so narrow that two persons cannot pass abreast.
Who's riding o'er the Giel so fast,
 Mid the crags of Utledale?
He heeds nor cold, nor storm, nor blast,
 Though his cheek is deadly pale.
A fringe of pearl from his eye-lash long
 The wintry frost hath hung,
And his sinewy arm seems bold and strong,
 Yet his brow is smooth and young.
O'er his marble forehead in clusters bright
 Is wreath'd his golden hair,
His robe is of linen long and white.
Though a mantle of fur scarce could bide the blight
 Of this keen and frosty air.
God speed thee now, thou horseman bold!  For the tempest awakes in wrath,
And thy stony eye is fix'd and cold
 As the glass of thine icy path.
Down, down the precipice wild he breaks,
 Where the foaming waters roar,
And his way up the cliff of the mountain takes,
 Where man never trod before.
No checking hand to the rein he lends
 On frost-clad summits sheen,
But ever and aye his head he bends
 As they plunge in some dark ravine.
Dost thou bow in thy prayer to the God who guides
 Thy course o'er such pavement frail?
Or nod in thy dream o'er the steep where glides
The slippery brook with its curdling tides,
 Thou horseman, so young and pale?
Swift over the face of the frozen streams
 Toward Lyster Church he hies,
Whose holy spire mid the mountains, gleams
 Like a star in troubled skies.
Now stay! thou ghastly traveller, stay!
 Here pause in thy mad career,—
Be the guilt of thy bosom as dark as it may,  Thou surely canst purge it here.
But on, like the winged blast, he wends,
 Where the bones of the dead are laid,—
Where the sigh of a mourning group ascends
 From the depth of that cypress shade.
At a pit he stay'd, whose narrow brink
 Mid swollen snow was grooved,—
The trembling steed from that chasm did shrink,
 But the rider sat unmoved.
They bare him sad from his lonely seat,
 His father bound his head,—
And they laid him low in that dark retreat,
And breath'd, in accents simply sweet,
 The dirge for the youthful dead.
With pride, in a life of toil severe,
 His hardy breast had glow'd,
And it scorn'd, in the ease of the slothful bier,
 To pass to its last abode.
But his own loved steed, which his hands had drest
 In the mirth of his boyhood's day,
By the load of his lifeless limbs was prest,
 As he sped to his home of clay.
Yet oft to the depths of yon rock-barr'd dell,
 Where no ray from heaven hath glow'd,
Where the thundering rush of the Markefoss fell,
The trembling child shall point and tell
 How that fearful horseman rode.
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/Scottish Relics

SCOTTISH RELICS.
On being presented with a leaf of the Oak where the boat of the "Lady of the Lake" landed,—with a sprig of fern from Loch Katrine, and heath from the Trosach glen.
Poor wither'd leaf!—and didst thou spring
Luxuriant from that forest king,
The lofty oak, whose stately pride
O'erarch'd bold Caledonia's tide?—
—And when that bark approach'd the shore
Which Douglas' only treasure bore,
Then little relic didst thou grace
Thy parent bough, and bending, trace
Fair Ellen's form that charm'd the view
And strangely moved stern Roderick Dhu?—
Or didst thou mark that witching smile
Which could a father's wo beguile,
Make even a banish'd Earl forget
The splendour of his coronet,
His knightly train, his courtly bower,
And all the entrancing pomp of power?—
—Say, didst thou feel the zephyr meek
Which raised the tresses from her cheek?—
Or hear the ruder gale that woo'd
Her light boat o'er the silver flood?—
Or didst thou catch the sigh that broke
From him by nameless feeling woke,
Who in his suit of Lincoln green
Suprised, beheld that maid serene,
With dext'rous art her voyage make,
The Naiad of that silver lake?—
—'T is magic all!—and can it be
That thus I hold a leaf from thee
Majestic Oak!—and with it find
A sprig of heather close entwined;
And hardy fern that drank the dew
Near cold Loch Katrine's mirror blue?—
—Methinks with these should pour along
That wildering tide of minstrel song,
Which makes the soil that gave them birth
The holiest spot on Fancy's earth.—
Yes Scotia!—though thy rugged coast
Of Nature's wealth can scantly boast,
Yet haughty brows and spirits free
Have donn'd the pilgrims weeds for thee,
With staff in hand their beads to tell
By every haunted stream and dell, Upon thy lake's lone edge to dream,
To climb thy cliffs where eaglets scream, On Flodden-field, with pitying sigh
Start at Lord Marmion's dying cry,
Or through the outlaw's cavern steal,
Or in Diana's footprints kneel,
And find thy bound the deathless shrine
Of bards and minstrelsy divine.
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Dead Infant

THE DEAD INFANT.
I had a little tender flower,
I nursed it in my choicest bower,—
 No storm disturb'd the guest;
And even if the nightly dew
Hung heavy on its head,—I flew
 To warm it in my breast.—
And though to this my days were lent,—
For this,—my nights unslumbering spent.—
 Yet could I not repent,—
A nameless pleasure sooth'd my care,
I loved the plant,—I saw 't was fair,
 And knew by God 't was lent.
When watching o'er its balmy rest,
I pray'd,—"Oh be this blossom blest,
 Although in tears 't was sown;"
Then Death, whose form I did not see,
Still nearer sat, and watch'd with me,
 And claim'd it for his own.
But when he took it to his home,
That narrow house where all must come,  Its cheek was deadly pale,—
On me, its eye imploring roll'd
To save it from a grasp so cold.
 Ah!—what could this avail?
Yet though he tore it from my arms,
 And crush'd its bloom, and changed its charms,
 And o'er it heap'd the clods, And dimm'd its eye of gentle ray,
 And gave its form to worms a prey,
 It was not his,—but God's.
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Departed Benefactress

THE DEPARTED BENEFACTRESS.
There is a friend who loves me still;—unchanged
 By all the errors of my devious way,
When fickle fancies have my plans deranged
 Or hurtful follies lured my steps astray,
Her tenderness remain'd:—nor would she grieve
The lonely trusting one, that in her shade did live.
Amid the wayward freaks of childish haste,—
 Amid the wanderings of my youthful lot,
When toys deluded, or when phantoms chased,  Some sooth'd and promised,—then their care forgot;
But one hath loved me still: the friend who sleeps
Where the long herbage sighs and where remembrance weeps.
When Friendship's alter'd brow withheld its smile,  When cold and stern, her cordial welcome fled;
Though like a pilgrim, fainting mid his toil,
 Even in its pangs my struggling heart has said,
One friend there is, who loves me still,—above;—
The grave hath changed her form, but could not chill her love.
Reprove me not!—I trust she loves me still,  Though cold, and mute, and motionless her dust,
For when my heart hath felt affliction's thrill,
 Or swoln to bursting, mourn'd its broken trust;
Soft on the breeze of heaven, a voice would sigh
"Despond not thus, my child, my spirit hovers nigh."—
And in the silence of the midnight trance,
 In snowy robe she comes to cheer my sight;
So holy, so benignant is her glance,
 Her brow so placid,—and her eye so bright,
I know she loves me still:—and oh! that thought
Shall strongly nerve my soul to do the things it ought.
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Eighth Psalm

THE EIGHTH PSALM.
Oh Lord our Lord,—how great thy name!
Whose praise both heaven and earth proclaim!
Even babes with unaccustom'd tongue
And infant lips in knowledge young, Pour forth the sweet, accordant song, And put to shame the impious throng.—
—When on yon vaulted heavens I look,
That proudest page in nature's book,
Where the fair moon her course doth hold
And stars shoot forth in beamy gold,
Lord what is man!—that from above
Thou deign'st to visit him with love,
And kindly place him just below
Those angel-guards that round thee glow.—
—Thou giv'st him power to rule the train
That glide within the secret main,
And those that spread the sounding wing,
And mid the fields of ether sing,
And those who roam the varied earth
Of gentle kind, or savage birth.
—Yet what is he, frail child of clay?—
Who boasts o'er fleeting earth the sway,
Himself the being of a day,
Compared Oh God of Hosts, to thee,
Great Ruler of Immensity!
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Entreaty of Ruth

THE ENTREATY OF RUTH.
Why wouldst thou banish from thy side
 One, who can ne'er forget thy care? Who in thy home would fain abide,
 Or all thy weary wanderings share?—
Say'st thou, alas!—no home is thine?—
 Then where the wild blast wrecks the tree, Where forests frown, or brambles twine,
 My Mother! I will dwell with thee.
Yes.—Yes.—O'er mountain, stream and hill,
 Fast by thy steps my feet shall tread,
The same pure fount our cup shall fill,
 The same lone cavern be our bed:—
This hand shall strew thy thorny road
 With dear affection's filial flowers,
One God,—one people,—one abode,—
 One grave,—one burial shall be ours.
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Georgian Planet

This planet was the recently recognised Uranus
THE GEORGIAN PLANET.
Slow-moving Orb! majestic and remote,
Which Galileo's glass had fail'd to note,
Thou, who with swift-wing'd Mercury art given
To mark the grand antithesis of heaven,
Keep'st thou like armed sentinel the ground
Where rival systems press our solar round?
Read'st thou from them with ever sleepless eyes
What thy own zodiac's fainter page denies?
Or call'st thy six torch-bearers forth, to light
The guarded frontier through the watchful night,
Like border chieftain, whose strong castle towers,
The dreaded boundary of contiguous powers?
 Does the red Comet, in his hour of wrath,
Scorn thy dull movements and concentric path?
Or bear, replenish'd from some richer sphere,
Fuel and flame, thy shivering sons to cheer?
Touch with electric wand thy loosen'd reins,
And speed thy axle o'er the azure plains?
 While to the highest portal of the sky,*
Whose glowing threshold mocks the dazzled eye,
Thou journeyest onward through the fields of air,
Our earthborn infants grow to men of care;
And ere to Capricorn, its frigid goal,
Thy flambeaux-lighted car is seen to roll,
A few survive, with wasted locks, and gray,—
The rest have slumber'd long in kindred clay.
 Say,—do thy children thus, with scanty line,
Their seasons measure, and their graves define? Or, like that race whom the dire deluge slew,
Through waning centuries their youth renew?
Content to hold, beneath a niggard ray,
Cold, passive, passionless, their lingering way?
Alas! how weak is reason's wildering chain!
How low we fall, from heights we seek to gain!
The lamp of Science, through the mists afar, Fades like the sun upon the Georgian star;
We gaze and boast! yet scarce can turn about
Ere the brief hour-glass of our time is out!
We sink to rest, with those who went before,
Lost like the grains of sand on Ocean's boundless shore.
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Funeral of a Mother

THE FUNERAL OF A MOTHER.
I saw the soul's big tear in manhood's eye,—
 O'er youth's fair cheek, the shade of filial wo,
And heard sad echoing to the clouded sky,
 The mournful knell in dirge-like measures flow.
And there she lay, for whom such grief awoke,
 Rent from the world while all around was fair—
Ere from her brow the flush of health had broke,
 Or wasting years had worn their trace of care.—
Oh God!—if 'tis a bitter thing to die,
 To creeping age, neglected and forlorn,
What must it be where every tender tie
 Is fresh and clustering in its balmy morn?
Yes,—there she lay! and round her coffin'd bed
 Burst forth the piercing wail of infant woes,
While "Mother!—Mother!" fill'd the ear with dread,
 As from those nurslings' ruby lips it rose.—
And was there aught amid that hearsed gloom,
 In youth's fond tear, or manhood's deeper groan,
In smitten beauty, or the yawning tomb,  That smote the soul like their wild, wailing tone?
For who to them the heart's deep void shall fill,
 Watch o'er their cradle couch with sleepless care,
Lure the first lisp,—and sooth the fancied ill,  Check the young fault, and bless the trembling prayer?
A Mother's love!—Go ask the buds that live
 By heaven's pure dew on yonder parching hill,
Ask the pale flower that summer suns revive,
 For some faint emblem of that holy thrill;
The fickle dews may shun the plant that pines,
 The lofty Sun forget the flowery glen,—
A Mother's love with death alone declines,—
 And say ye white robed angels—dies it then?
# Poems (Sigourney, 1827)/The Funeral

THE FUNERAL.
I saw a dark-robed train, who sadly bare
A lifeless burden toward the house of God.
I enter'd there,—for I had heard 'twas good
To see the end of man. Then slowly woke
The organ's dirge-like strain,—soft—solemn—sweet;—
It's mournful modulation seem'd to breathe
A soul of sorrow o'er the slumbering air,
With its deep-drawn and linked melody
Enforcing tears. But at the words, sublime,
Of Inspiration,—"though we seem to sleep,
As for a moment,—we shall rise, be changed,
And in the twinkling of an eye put on
The victor robe of immortality,"—
Quick, at the warmth of so divine a faith
Vanish'd those tears,—as fleets the transient dew
From the morn's eye.
 There lay the form of one
Who many a year had, in that hallowed place,
Constant as came the day which God had bless'd,
Appeared to pay his vows.—Yes,—there he rose,
With reverend front,—and strong, majestic frame,
Where now as powerless as the smitten babe,
He waits for other hands to bear him forth.
Firm at each post of piety and peace
Where Christ hath bade his servants watch, he stood,
Even till the gather'd shades of evening blanch'd
His shuddering temples with unmelting frost.
He had the praise of men who knew to prize
The noiseless tenor of an upright course;—
And he had drank of sorrow.—Those who shed
The holy charities around his home,
Had long been tenants of the voiceless tomb;
And from that home, and those bright-shadowing trees.
The lingering solace of his hermit hours,
He by a freak of winged wealth was driven.
But now his head on that cold pillow rests,
Where sleepless anguish dare not plant a thorn.
No more his bruised heart pours strong incense forth
To Him who smote it,—nor his lonely tears
Freshen the turf where his loved treasures lay.
—And is there cause to weep, that yon pale clay
Should liberate its tortured prisoner?
Mourn we, because the radiant realms of bliss
Have gain'd a guest?—or that the countless ills
Which poise on vulture wing o'er helpless man,
Have lost a victim? Is it time to weep,
When at this very hour, perchance, the soul
Reads in the sun-bright register of Heaven
The need of all its discipline,—and pours
Its rapturous being forth to the great sire
In one eternal hymn?