PoetryMTEB/EnglishPoetryFormClassification huggingface dataset:
That god forbid that made me first your slave (Sonnet 58)
by William Shakespeare

That god forbid that made me first your slave,
I should in thought control your times of pleasure,
Or at your hand the account of hours to crave,
Being your vassal, bound to stay your leisure!
O, let me suffer, being at your beck,
The imprison’d absence of your liberty;
And patience, tame to sufferance, bide each check,
Without accusing you of injury.
Be where you list, your charter is so strong
That you yourself may privilege your time
To what you will; to you it doth belong
Yourself to pardon of self-doing crime.
    I am to wait, though waiting so be hell’
    Not blame your pleasure, be it ill or well.

Form: sonnet
Sonnet 110: Alas, 'tis true I have gone here and there
by William Shakespeare

Alas, 'tis true I have gone here and there
And made myself a motley to the view,
Gor'd mine own thoughts, sold cheap what is most dear,
Made old offences of affections new.
Most true it is that I have look'd on truth
Askance and strangely: but, by all above,
These blenches gave my heart another youth,
And worse essays prov'd thee my best of love.
Now all is done, have what shall have no end!
Mine appetite, I never more will grind
On newer proof, to try an older friend,
A god in love, to whom I am confin'd.
Then give me welcome, next my heaven the best,
Even to thy pure and most most loving breast.

Form: sonnet
On Shakespeare. 1630
by John Milton

What needs my Shakespeare for his honoured bones,
The labor of an age in pilèd stones,
Or that his hallowed relics should be hid   
Under a star-ypointing pyramid?
Dear son of Memory, great heir of fame,
What need’st thou such weak witness of thy name?
Thou in our wonder and astonishment
Hast built thyself a live-long monument.
For whilst to th’ shame of slow-endeavouring art,   
Thy easy numbers flow, and that each heart   
Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued book
Those Delphic lines with deep impression took,   
Then thou, our fancy of itself bereaving,   
Dost make us marble with too much conceiving;
And so sepúlchred in such pomp dost lie,
That kings for such a tomb would wish to die.

Form: couplet
Love the Light-Giver
by Michelangelo Buonarroti

To Tommaso De’ Cavalieri

Veggio co’ bei vostri occhi.

With your fair eyes a charming light I see,
    For which my own blind eyes would peer in vain;
    Stayed by your feet, the burden I sustain
    Which my lame feet find all too strong for me;
Wingless upon your pinions forth I fly;
    Heavenward your spirit stirreth me to strain;
    E'en as you will, I blush and blanch again,
    Freeze in the sun, burn ’neath a frosty sky.
Your will includes and is the lord of mine;
    Life to my thoughts within your heart is given;
    My words begin to breathe upon your breath:
Like to the moon am I, that cannot shine
    Alone; for lo! our eyes see nought in heaven
    Save what the living sun illumineth.

Form: sonnet
Modern Love: XXXVI
by George Meredith

My Lady unto Madam makes her bow.
The charm of women is, that even while
You’re probed by them for tears you yet may smile,
Nay, laugh outright, as I have done just now.
The interview was gracious: they anoint
(To me aside) each other with fine praise:
Discriminating compliments they raise,
That hit with wondrous aim on the weak point:
My Lady’s nose of Nature might complain.
It is not fashioned aptly to express
Her character of large-browed steadfastness.
But Madam says: ‘Thereof she may be vain!’
Now Madam’s faulty feature is a glazed
And inaccessible eye, that has soft fires,
Wide gates, at love-time only. This admires
My Lady. At the two I stand amazed.

Form: sonnet
Modern Love: XXXV
by George Meredith

It is no vulgar nature I have wived.
Secretive, sensitive, she takes a wound
Deep to her soul, as if the sense had swooned,
And not a thought of vengeance had survived.
No confidences has she: but relief
Must come to one whose suffering is acute.
O have a care of natures that are mute!
They punish you in acts: their steps are brief.
What is she doing? What does she demand
From Providence or me? She is not one
Long to endure this torpidly, and shun
The drugs that crowd about a woman’s hands.
At Forfeits during snow we played, and I
Must kiss her. ‘Well performed!’ I said: then she:
‘’T is hardly worth the money, you agree?’
Save her? What for? To act this wedded lie!

Form: sonnet
The New Colossus
by Emma Lazarus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Form: sonnet
An Address to the Rev. George Gilfillan
by Knight of the White Elephant of Burmah William McGonagall

All hail to the Rev. George Gilfillan of Dundee,
He is the greatest preacher I did ever hear or see.
He is a man of genius bright,
And in him his congregation does delight,
Because they find him to be honest and plain,
Affable in temper, and seldom known to complain.
He preaches in a plain straightforward way,
The people flock to hear him night and day,
And hundreds from the doors are often turn’d away,
Because he is the greatest preacher of the present day.
He has written the life of Sir Walter Scott,
And while he lives he will never be forgot,
Nor when he is dead,
Because by his admirers it will be often read;
And fill their minds with wonder and delight,
And wile away the tedious hours on a cold winter’s night.
He has also written about the Bards of the Bible,
Which occupied nearly three years in which he was not idle,
Because when he sits down to write he does it with might and main,
And to get an interview with him it would be almost vain,
And in that he is always right,
For the Bible tells us whatever your hands findeth to do,
Do it with all your might.
Rev. George Gilfillan of Dundee, I must conclude my muse,
And to write in praise of thee my pen does not refuse,
Nor does it give me pain to tell the world fearlessly, that when
You are dead they shall not look upon your like again.

Form: ode
My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun (Sonnet 130)
by William Shakespeare

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damasked, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.
     And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
     As any she belied with false compare.

Form: sonnet
How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43)
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

Form: sonnet
Astrophil and Stella 31: With how sad steps, O Moon, thou climb'st the skies
by Sir Philip Sidney

With how sad steps, O Moon, thou climb'st the skies!
How silently, and with how wan a face!
What, may it be that even in heav'nly place
That busy archer his sharp arrows tries!
Sure, if that long-with love-acquainted eyes
Can judge of love, thou feel'st a lover's case,
I read it in thy looks; thy languish'd grace
To me, that feel the like, thy state descries.
Then, ev'n of fellowship, O Moon, tell me,
Is constant love deem'd there but want of wit?
Are beauties there as proud as here they be?
Do they above love to be lov'd, and yet
Those lovers scorn whom that love doth possess?
Do they call virtue there ungratefulness?

Form: sonnet
The Depths of the Grass
by Michael Field

Look, in the early light, 
   Down to the infinite 
   Depths at the deep grass-roots; 
      Where the sun shoots 
In golden veins, as looking through 
   A dear pool one sees it do; 
   Where campion drifts 
Its bladders, iris-brinded, through the rifts 
      Of rising, falling seed
   That the winds lightly scour—
Down to the matted earth where over 
   And over again crow’s-foot and clover
      And pink bindweed
      Dimly, steadily flower.

Form: sonnet
Sonnet 22: Cyriack, this three years' day these eyes, though clear
by John Milton

Cyriack, this three years' day these eyes, though clear
       To outward view of blemish or of spot,
       Bereft of light, their seeing have forgot;
       Nor to their idle orbs doth sight appear
Of sun or moon or star throughout the year,
       Or man or woman. Yet I argue not
       Against Heav'n's hand or will, not bate a jot
       Of heart or hope, but still bear up and steer
Right onward. What supports me, dost thou ask?
       The conscience, friend, to have lost them overplied
       In liberty's defence, my noble task,
Of which all Europe talks from side to side.
       This thought might lead me through the world's vain mask
       Content, though blind, had I no better guide.

Form: sonnet
Sonnet: To the Poppy [“While summer roses all their glory yield”]
by Anna Seward

While summer roses all their glory yield
   To crown the votary of love and joy,
   Misfortune’s victim hails, with many a sigh,
   Thee, scarlet Poppy of the pathless field,
Gaudy, yet wild and lone; no leaf to shield
   Thy flaccid vest that, as the gale blows high,
   Flaps, and alternate folds around thy head.
   So stands in the long grass a love-crazed maid,
Smiling aghast; while stream to every wind
   Her garish ribbons, smeared with dust and rain;
   But brain-sick visions cheat her tortured mind,
And bring false peace. Thus, lulling grief and pain,
   Kind dreams oblivious from thy juice proceed,
   Thou flimsy, showy, melancholy weed.

Form: sonnet
Town Eclogues: Monday; Roxana or the Drawing-Room
by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

ROXANA from the court retiring late,
Sigh'd her soft sorrows at St. JAMES's gate:
Such heavy thoughts lay brooding in her breast,
Not her own chairmen wth more weight opprest;
They groan the cruel load they're doom'd to bear ;
She in these gentler sounds express'd her care.

" Was it for this, that I these Roses wear,
" For this new-set my Jewels for my hair ?
" Ah ! Princess ! with what zeal have I pursu'd !
" Almost forgot the duty of a Prude.
" Thinking I never cou'd attend too soon,
" I've miss'd my prayers, to get me dress'd by noon.
" For Thee, ah ! what for Thee did I resign ?
" My Pleasures, Passions, all that e'er was mine.
" I sacrific'd both Modesty and Ease,
" Left Operas, and went to filthy Plays ;
" Double entendres shock'd my tender ear,
" Yet even this for Thee I chose to bear.
" In glowing youth, when nature bids be gay,
" And ev'ry joy of life before me lay,
" By honour prompted, and by pride restrain'd,
" The pleasures of the young my soul disdain'd :
" Sermons I sought, and with a mien severe
" Censur'd my neighbours, and said daily pray'r.
" Alas ! how chang'd! — with the same sermon mien
" That once I pray'd, the What-d'ye call't I've seen.
" Ah ! cruel Princess, for thy sake I've lost
" That reputation which so dear had cost :
" I, who avoided ev'ry publick place,
" When bloom, and beauty bid me show my face ;
" Now near Thee constant ev'ry night abide
" With never-failing duty by thy side,
" Myself and daughters standing on a row,
" To all the foreigners a goodly show !
" Oft had your drawing-room been sadly thin,
" And merchants wives close by the chair had been seen ;
" Had not I amply fill'd the empty space,
" And sav'd your Highness from the dire disgrace.

" Yet COQUETILLA's artifice prevails,
" When all my merit and my duty fails :
" That COQUETILLA, whose deluding airs
" Corrupts our virgins, and our youth ensnares ;
" So sunk her character, so lost her fame,
" Scarce visited before your Highness came ;
" Yet for the Bed-chamber 'tis Her you chuse,
" When Zeal and Fame and Virtue you refuse.
" Ah ! worthy choice ! not one of all your train
" Whom censure blasts not, and dishonours stain.
" Let the nice hind now suckle dirty pigs,
" And the proud pea-hen snatch the cuckoo's eggs !
" Let IRIS leave her paint, and own her age,
" And grave SUFFOLKIA wed a giddy page !
" A greater miracle is daily view'd,
" A virtuous Princess with a court so lewd.

" I know thee, Court ! with all thy treach'rous wiles,
" Thy false caresses and undoing smiles !
" Ah ! Princess, learn'd in all the courtly arts
" To cheat our hopes, and yet to gain our hearts.

" Large lovely bribes are the great statesman's aim ;
" And the neglected patriot follows fame.
" The Prince is ogled ; some the King pursue ;
" But your ROXANA only follows YOU.
" Despis'd ROXANA, cease, and try to find
" Some other, since the Princess proves unkind :
" Perhaps it is not hard to find at court
" If not a greater, a more firm support.

Form: couplet
The Dying Child
by John Clare

He could not die when trees were green,
         For he loved the time too well.
His little hands, when flowers were seen,
         Were held for the bluebell,
         As he was carried o'er the green.

His eye glanced at the white-nosed bee;
         He knew those children of the spring:
When he was well and on the lea
         He held one in his hands to sing,
         Which filled his heart with glee.

Infants, the children of the spring!
         How can an infant die
When butterflies are on the wing,
         Green grass, and such a sky?
         How can they die at spring?

He held his hands for daisies white,
         And then for violets blue,
And took them all to bed at night
         That in the green fields grew,
         As childhood's sweet delight.

And then he shut his little eyes,
         And flowers would notice not;
Birds' nests and eggs caused no surprise,
         He now no blossoms got;
         They met with plaintive sighs.

When winter came and blasts did sigh,
         And bare were plain and tree,
As he for ease in bed did lie
         His soul seemed with the free,
         He died so quietly.

Form: elegy
Sonnet 92: Behold that tree, in Autumn’s dim decay
by Anna Seward

Behold that tree, in Autumn’s dim decay,
   Stripped by the frequent, chill, and eddying wind;
   Where yet some yellow, lonely leaves we find
   Lingering and trembling on the naked spray,
Twenty, perchance, for millions whirled away!
   Emblem, also! too just, of humankind!
   Vain man expects longevity, designed
   For few indeed; and their protracted day
What is it worth that Wisdom does not scorn?
   The blasts of sickness, care, and grief appal,
   That laid the friends in dust, whose natal morn
Rose near their own; and solemn is the call;
   Yet, like those weak deserted leaves forlorn,
   Shivering they cling to life, and fear to fall!

Form: sonnet
Grain Field
by Adelaide Crapsey

Scarlet the poppies
Blue the corn-flowers,
Golden the wheat.
Gold for The Eternal:
Blue of Our Lady:
Red for the five
Wounds of her Son.

Form: free verse
If my dear love were but the child of state (Sonnet 124)
by William Shakespeare

If my dear love were but the child of state,
It might for Fortune’s bastard be unfather’d,
As subject to Time’s love or to Time’s hate
Weeds among weeds, or flowers with flowers gather’d.
No, it was builded far from accident;
It suffers not in smiling pomp, nor falls
Under the blow of thrilled discontent,
Whereto the inviting time our fashion calls:
It fears not policy, that heretic,
Which works on leases of short-number’d hours,
But all alone stands hugely politic,
That it nor grows with heat nor drowns with showers.
    To this I witness call the fools of time,
    Which die for goodness, who have lived for crime.

Form: sonnet
The Author to Her Book
by Anne Bradstreet

Thou ill-form’d offspring of my feeble brain,
Who after birth didst by my side remain,
Till snatched from thence by friends, less wise than true,
Who thee abroad, expos’d to publick view,
Made thee in raggs, halting to th’ press to trudge,
Where errors were not lessened (all may judg).
At thy return my blushing was not small,
My rambling brat (in print) should mother call,
I cast thee by as one unfit for light,
Thy Visage was so irksome in my sight;
Yet being mine own, at length affection would
Thy blemishes amend, if so I could:
I wash’d thy face, but more defects I saw,
And rubbing off a spot, still made a flaw.
I stretched thy joynts to make thee even feet,
Yet still thou run’st more hobling then is meet;
In better dress to trim thee was my mind,
But nought save home-spun Cloth, i’ th’ house I find.
In this array ’mongst Vulgars mayst thou roam.
In Criticks hands, beware thou dost not come;
And take thy way where yet thou art not known,
If for thy Father askt, say, thou hadst none:
And for thy Mother, she alas is poor,
Which caus’d her thus to send thee out of door.

Form: couplet
A London Thoroughfare. 2 A.M.
by Amy Lowell

They have watered the street,
 It shines in the glare of lamps,
 Cold, white lamps,
 And lies
 Like a slow-moving river,
 Barred with silver and black.
 Cabs go down it,
 One,
 And then another.
 Between them I hear the shuffling of feet.
 Tramps doze on the window-ledges,
 Night-walkers pass along the sidewalks.
 The city is squalid and sinister,
 With the silver-barred street in the midst,
 Slow-moving,
 A river leading nowhere.
Opposite my window,
 The moon cuts,
 Clear and round,
 Through the plum-coloured night.
 She cannot light the city;
 It is too bright.
 It has white lamps,
 And glitters coldly.
I stand in the window and watch the moon.
 She is thin and lustreless,
 But I love her.
 I know the moon,
 And this is an alien city.

Form: free verse
Experience
by Ralph Waldo Emerson

The lords of life, the lords of life,—
I saw them pass,
In their own guise,
Like and unlike,
Portly and grim,—
Use and Surprise,
Surface and Dream,
Succession swift and spectral Wrong,
Temperament without a tongue,
And the inventor of the game
Omnipresent without name;—
Some to see, some to be guessed,
They marched from east to west:
Little man, least of all,
Among the legs of his guardians tall,
Walked about with puzzled look.
Him by the hand dear Nature took,
Dearest Nature, strong and kind,
Whispered, ‘Darling, never mind!
To-morrow they will wear another face,
The founder thou; these are thy race!’

Form: couplet
Yarrow Visited. September, 1814
by William Wordsworth

And is this—Yarrow?—This the stream
Of which my fancy cherished,
So faithfully, a waking dream?
An image that hath perished!
O that some Minstrel's harp were near,
To utter notes of gladness,
And chase this silence from the air,
That fills my heart with sadness!

Yet why?—a silvery current flows
With uncontrolled meanderings;
Nor have these eyes by greener hills
Been soothed, in all my wanderings.
And, through her depths, Saint Mary's Lake
Is visibly delighted;
For not a feature of those hills
Is in the mirror slighted.

A blue sky bends o'er Yarrow vale,
Save where that pearly whiteness
Is round the rising sun diffused,
A tender hazy brightness;
Mild dawn of promise! that excludes
All profitless dejection;
Though not unwilling here to admit
A pensive recollection.

Where was it that the famous Flower
Of Yarrow Vale lay bleeding?
His bed perchance was yon smooth mound
On which the herd is feeding:
And haply from this crystal pool,
Now peaceful as the morning,
The Water-wraith ascended thrice—
And gave his doleful warning.

Delicious is the Lay that sings
The haunts of happy Lovers,
The path that leads them to the grove,
The leafy grove that covers:
And Pity sanctifies the Verse
That paints, by strength of sorrow,
The unconquerable strength of love;
Bear witness, rueful Yarrow!

But thou, that didst appear so fair
To fond imagination,
Dost rival in the light of day
Her delicate creation:
Meek loveliness is round thee spread,
A softness still and holy;
The grace of forest charms decayed,
And pastoral melancholy.

That region left, the vale unfolds
Rich groves of lofty stature,
With Yarrow winding through the pomp
Of cultivated nature;
And, rising from those lofty groves,
Behold a Ruin hoary!
The shattered front of Newark's Towers,
Renowned in Border story.

Fair scenes for childhood's opening bloom,
For sportive youth to stray in;
For manhood to enjoy his strength;
And age to wear away in!
Yon cottage seems a bower of bliss,
A covert for protection
Of tender thoughts, that nestle there—
The brood of chaste affection.

How sweet, on this autumnal day,
The wild-wood fruits to gather,
And on my True-love's forehead plant
A crest of blooming heather!
And what if I enwreathed my own!
'Twere no offence to reason;
The sober Hills thus deck their brows
To meet the wintry season.

I see—but not by sight alone,
Loved Yarrow, have I won thee;
A ray of fancy still survives—
Her sunshine plays upon thee!
Thy ever-youthful waters keep
A course of lively pleasure;
And gladsome notes my lips can breathe,
Accordant to the measure.

The vapours linger round the Heights,
They melt, and soon must vanish;
One hour is theirs, nor more is mine—
Sad thought, which I would banish,
But that I know, where'er I go,
Thy genuine image, Yarrow!
Will dwell with me—to heighten joy,
And cheer my mind in sorrow.

Form: common measure
Sonnet 71: No longer mourn for me when I am dead
by William Shakespeare

No longer mourn for me when I am dead
Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell
Give warning to the world that I am fled
From this vile world with vilest worms to dwell; 
Nay, if you read this line, remember not
The hand that writ it; for I love you so, 
That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot, 
If thinking on me then should make you woe.
O, if (I say) you look upon this verse, 
When I (perhaps) compounded am with clay,
Do not so much as my poor name rehearse,
But let your love even with my life decay,
Lest the wise world should look into your moan, 
And mock you with me after I am gone.

Form: sonnet
Thoughts
by Marjorie Pickthall

I gave my thoughts a golden peach,
A silver citron tree;
They clustered dumbly out of reach
And would not sing for me.

I built my thoughts a roof of rush,
A little byre beside;
They left my music to the thrush
And flew at eveningtide.

I went my way and would not care
If they should come and go;
A thousand birds seemed up in air,
My thoughts were singing so.

Form: common measure
Yet Do I Marvel
by Countee Cullen

I doubt not God is good, well-meaning, kind,
And did He stoop to quibble could tell why
The little buried mole continues blind,
Why flesh that mirrors Him must some day die,
Make plain the reason tortured Tantalus
Is baited by the fickle fruit, declare
If merely brute caprice dooms Sisyphus
To struggle up a never-ending stair.
Inscrutable His ways are, and immune
To catechism by a mind too strewn
With petty cares to slightly understand
What awful brain compels His awful hand.
Yet do I marvel at this curious thing:
To make a poet black, and bid him sing!

Form: sonnet