PoetryMTEB/EnglishPoetryFormClassification huggingface dataset:
Inscription for a Fountain on a Heath
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

This Sycamore, oft musical with bees,—
Such tents the Patriarchs loved! O long unharmed
May all its agèd boughs o'er-canopy
The small round basin, which this jutting stone
Keeps pure from falling leaves! Long may the Spring,
Quietly as a sleeping infant's breath,
Send up cold waters to the traveller
With soft and even pulse! Nor ever cease
Yon tiny cone of sand its soundless dance,
Which at the bottom, like a Fairy's Page,
As merry and no taller, dances still,
Nor wrinkles the smooth surface of the Fount.
Here Twilight is and Coolness: here is moss,
A soft seat, and a deep and ample shade.
Thou may'st toil far and find no second tree.
Drink, Pilgrim, here; Here rest! and if thy heart
Be innocent, here too shalt thou refresh
Thy spirit, listening to some gentle sound,
Or passing gale or hum of murmuring bees!

Form: pastoral
To Fashion
by Elizabeth Moody

Gay Fashion thou Goddess so pleasing,
   However imperious thy sway;
Like a mistress capricious and teasing,
   Thy slaves tho’ they murmur obey.

The simple, the wise, and the witty,
   The learned, the dunce, and the fool,
The crooked, straight, ugly, and pretty,
   Wear the badge of thy whimsical school.

Tho’ thy shape be so fickle and changing,
   That a Proteus thou art to the view;
And our taste so for ever deranging,
   We know not which form to pursue.

Yet wave but thy frolicksome banners,
   And hosts of adherents we see;
Arts, morals, religion, and manners,
   Yield implicit obedience to thee.

More despotic than beauty thy power,
   More than virtue thy rule o’er the mind:
Tho’ transient thy reign as a flower,
   That scatters its leaves to the wind.

Ah! while folly thou dealest such measure,
   No matter how fleeting thy day!
Be Wisdom, dear goddess, thy pleasure!
   Then lasting as time be thy stay.

Form: ode
Hearing the Battle.—July 21, 1861
by Sarah Morgan Bryan Piatt

One day in the dreamy summer,
     On the Sabbath hills, from afar
 We heard the solemn echoes
     Of the first fierce words of war.
  
 Ah, tell me, thou veilèd Watcher
     Of the storm and the calm to come,
 How long by the sun or shadow
     Till these noises again are dumb.
  
 And soon in a hush and glimmer
     We thought of the dark, strange fight,
 Whose close in a ghastly quiet
     Lay dim in the beautiful night.
  
 Then we talk’d of coldness and pallor,
     And of things with blinded eyes
 That stared at the golden stillness
     Of the moon in those lighted skies;
  
 And of souls, at morning wrestling
     In the dust with passion and moan,
 So far away at evening
     In the silence of worlds unknown.
  
 But a delicate wind beside us
     Was rustling the dusky hours,
 As it gather’d the dewy odors
     Of the snowy jessamine-flowers.
  
 And I gave you a spray of the blossoms,
     And said: “I shall never know
 How the hearts in the land are breaking,
     My dearest, unless you go.”

Form: quatrain
[A cloud of flowers!]
by Matsuo Bashō

A cloud of flowers!
Is the bell Uyeno
Or Asakusa?

Form: haiku
Say over again... (Sonnet 21)
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Say over again, and yet once over again,
That thou dost love me. Though the word repeated
Should seem "a cuckoo-song," as thou dost treat it,
Remember, never to the hill or plain,
Valley and wood, without her cuckoo-strain
Comes the fresh Spring in all her green completed.
Belovèd, I, amid the darkness greeted
By a doubtful spirit-voice, in that doubt’s pain
Cry, "Speak once more—thou lovest!" Who can fear
Too many stars, though each in heaven shall roll,
Too many flowers, though each shall crown the year?
Say thou dost love me, love me, love me—toll
The silver iterance!—only minding, Dear,
To love me also in silence with thy soul.

Form: sonnet
Signs of the Times
by Paul Laurence Dunbar

Air a-gittin' cool an' coolah,
   Frost a-comin' in de night,
Hicka' nuts an' wa'nuts fallin',
   Possum keepin' out o' sight.
Tu'key struttin' in de ba'nya'd,
   Nary step so proud ez his;
Keep on struttin', Mistah Tu'key,
   Yo' do' know whut time it is.

Cidah press commence a-squeakin'
   Eatin' apples sto'ed away,
Chillun swa'min' 'roun' lak ho'nets,
   Huntin' aigs ermung de hay.
Mistah Tu'key keep on gobblin'
   At de geese a-flyin' souf,
Oomph! dat bird do' know whut's comin';
   Ef he did he'd shet his mouf.

Pumpkin gittin' good an' yallah
   Mek me open up my eyes;
Seems lak it's a-lookin' at me
   Jes' a-la'in' dah sayin' "Pies."
Tu'key gobbler gwine 'roun' blowin',
   Gwine 'roun' gibbin' sass an' slack;
Keep on talkin', Mistah Tu'key,
   You ain't seed no almanac.

Fa'mer walkin' th'oo de ba'nya'd
   Seein' how things is comin' on,
Sees ef all de fowls is fatt'nin'—
   Good times comin' sho's you bo'n.
Hyeahs dat tu'key gobbler braggin',
   Den his face break in a smile—
Nebbah min', you sassy rascal,
   He's gwine nab you atter while.

Choppin' suet in de kitchen,
   Stonin' raisins in de hall,
Beef a-cookin' fu' de mince meat,
   Spices groun'—I smell 'em all.
Look hyeah, Tu'key, stop dat gobblin',
   You ain' luned de sense ob feah,
You ol' fool, yo' naik's in dangah,
   Do' you know Thanksgibbin's hyeah?

Form: common measure
Youth and Art
by Robert Browning

It once might have been, once only:
   We lodged in a street together,
You, a sparrow on the housetop lonely,
   I, a lone she-bird of his feather.

 Your trade was with sticks and clay,
   You thumbed, thrust, patted and polished,
Then laughed "They will see some day
   Smith made, and Gibson demolished."

 My business was song, song, song;
   I chirped, cheeped, trilled and twittered,
"Kate Brown's on the boards ere long,
   And Grisi's existence embittered!"

 I earned no more by a warble
   Than you by a sketch in plaster;
You wanted a piece of marble,
   I needed a music-master.

 We studied hard in our styles,
   Chipped each at a crust like Hindoos,
For air looked out on the tiles,
   For fun watched each other's windows.

 You lounged, like a boy of the South,
   Cap and blouse—nay, a bit of beard too;
Or you got it, rubbing your mouth
   With fingers the clay adhered to.

 And I—soon managed to find
   Weak points in the flower-fence facing,
Was forced to put up a blind
   And be safe in my corset-lacing.

 No harm! It was not my fault
   If you never turned your eye's tail up
As I shook upon E in alt,
   Or ran the chromatic scale up:

 For spring bade the sparrows pair,
   And the boys and girls gave guesses,
And stalls in our street looked rare
   With bulrush and watercresses.

 Why did not you pinch a flower
   In a pellet of clay and fling it?
Why did not I put a power
   Of thanks in a look, or sing it?

 I did look, sharp as a lynx,
   (And yet the memory rankles,)
When models arrived, some minx
   Tripped up-stairs, she and her ankles.

 But I think I gave you as good!
   "That foreign fellow,—who can know
How she pays, in a playful mood,
   For his tuning her that piano?"

 Could you say so, and never say
   "Suppose we join hands and fortunes,
And I fetch her from over the way,
   Her, piano, and long tunes and short tunes?"

 No, no: you would not be rash,
   Nor I rasher and something over:
You've to settle yet Gibson's hash,
   And Grisi yet lives in clover.

 But you meet the Prince at the Board,
   I'm queen myself at bals-paré,
I've married a rich old lord,
   And you're dubbed knight and an R.A.

 Each life unfulfilled, you see;
   It hangs still, patchy and scrappy:
We have not sighed deep, laughed free,
   Starved, feasted, despaired,—been happy.

 And nobody calls you a dunce,
   And people suppose me clever:
This could but have happened once,
   And we missed it, lost it for ever.

Form: ballad
The Knight's Tomb
by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Where is the grave of Sir Arthur O'Kellyn?
Where may the grave of that good man be?—
By the side of a spring, on the breast of Helvellyn,
Under the twigs of a young birch tree!
The oak that in summer was sweet to hear,
And rustled its leaves in the fall of the year,
And whistled and roared in the winter alone,
Is gone,—and the birch in its stead is grown.—
The Knight's bones are dust,
And his good sword rust;—
His soul is with the saints, I trust.

Form: couplet
Upon the Disobedient Child
by John Bunyan

LXVI. Upon the Disobedient Child.
Children become, while little, our delights,
When they grow bigger, they begin to fright's.
Their sinful Nature prompts them to rebel,
And to delight in Paths that lead to Hell.
Their Parents Love, and Care, they overlook,
As if Relation had them quite forsook.
They take the Counsels of the Wanton's rather,
Then the most grave Instructions of a Father.
They reckon Parents ought to do for them,
Tho they the Fifth Commandement contemn.
They snap, and snarl, if Parents them controul,
Tho but in things, most hurtful to the Soul.
They reckon they are Masters, and that we,
Who Parents are, should to them Subject be!
If Parents fain would have a hand in chusing,
The Children have a heart will in refusing.
They'l by wrong doings, under Parents, gather
And say, it is no Sin to rob a Father,
They'l jostle Parents out of place and Pow'r,
They'l make themselves the Head, and them devour.
How many Children, by becoming Head,
Have brought their Parents to a peice of Bread!
Thus they who at the first were Parents Joy,
Turn that to Bitterness, themselves destroy.
    But Wretched Child, how canst thou thus requite
Thy Aged Parents, for that great delight
They took in thee, when thou, as helpless lay
In their Indulgent Bosoms day by day?
Thy Mother, long before she brought thee forth,
Took care thou should'st want, neither Food, nor Cloth.
Thy Father glad was at his very heart,
Had he, to thee, a Portion to impart.
Comfort they promised themselves in thee,
But thou, it seems, to them a Grief wil't be.
How oft! How willingly brake they their Sleep,
If thou, their Bantling, didst but whinch or weep.
Their Love to thee was such, they could have giv'n,
That thou might'st live, almost, their part of Heav'n.
    But now, behold, how they rewarded are!
For their Indulgent Love, and tender Care,
All is forgot, this Love he doth despise,
They brought this Bird up to pick out their Eyes.

Form: couplet
The Song of the Wreck
by Charles Dickens

The wind blew high, the waters raved,
   A ship drove on the land,
A hundred human creatures saved
   Kneel’d down upon the sand.
Three-score were drown’d, three-score were thrown
   Upon the black rocks wild,
And thus among them, left alone,
   They found one helpless child.

A seaman rough, to shipwreck bred,
   Stood out from all the rest,
And gently laid the lonely head
   Upon his honest breast.
And travelling o’er the desert wide
   It was a solemn joy,
To see them, ever side by side,
   The sailor and the boy.

In famine, sickness, hunger, thirst,
   The two were still but one,
Until the strong man droop’d the first
   And felt his labours done.
Then to a trusty friend he spake,
   “Across the desert wide,
O take this poor boy for my sake!”
   And kiss’d the child and died.

Toiling along in weary plight
   Through heavy jungle, mire,
These two came later every night
   To warm them at the fire.
Until the captain said one day,
   “O seaman good and kind,
To save thyself now come away,
   And leave the boy behind!”

The child was slumbering near the blaze:
   “O captain, let him rest
Until it sinks, when God’s own ways
   Shall teach us what is best!”
They watch’d the whiten’d ashy heap,
   They touch’d the child in vain;
They did not leave him there asleep,
   He never woke again.

Form: ballad
Substitution
by Anne Spencer

Is Life itself but many ways of thought,
Does thinking furl the poets’ pleiades,
Is in His slightest convolution wrought
These mantled worlds and their men-freighted seas?
He thinks—and being comes to ardent things:
The splendor of the day-spent sun, love’s birth,—
Or dreams a little, while creation swings
The circle of His mind and Time’s full girth . . .
As here within this noisy peopled room
My thought leans forward . . . quick! you’re lifted clear
Of brick and frame to moonlit garden bloom,—
Absurdly easy, now, our walking, dear,
Talking, my leaning close to touch your face . . .
His All-Mind bids us keep this sacred place!

Form: sonnet
Farewell to Bath
by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

To all you ladies now at Bath,
   And eke, ye beaux, to you,
With aching heart, and wat'ry eyes,
   I bid my last adieu.

 Farewell ye nymphs, who waters sip
   Hot reeking from the pumps,
While music lends her friendly aid,
   To cheer you from the dumps.

 Farewell ye wits, who prating stand,
   And criticise the fair;
Yourselves the joke of men of sense,
   Who hate a coxcomb's air.

 Farewell to Deard's, and all her toys,
   Which glitter in her shop,
Deluding traps to girls and boys,
   The warehouse of the fop.

 Lindsay's and Hayes's both farewell,
   Where in the spacious hall,
With bounding steps, and sprightly air,
   I've led up many a ball.

 Where Somerville of courteous mien,
   Was partner in the dance,
With swimming Haws, and Brownlow blithe,
   And Britton pink of France.

 Poor Nash, farewell! may fortune smile,
   Thy drooping soul revive,
My heart is full I can no more—
   John, bid the coachman drive.

Form: common measure
O, from what power hast thou this powerful might (Sonnet 150)
by William Shakespeare

O, from what power hast thou this powerful might
With insufficiency my heart to sway?
To make me give the lie to my true sight?
And swear that brightness doth not grace the day?
Whence hast thou this becoming of things ill,
That in the very refuse of thy deeds
There is such strength and warranties of skill
That, in my mind, thy worst all best exceeds?
Who taught thee how to make me love thee more
The more I hear and see just cause of hate?
O, though I love what others do abhor,
With others thou shouldst not abhor my state:
    If thy unworthiness raised love in me,
    More worthy I to be beloved of thee.

Form: sonnet
Ianthe! You are Call’d to Cross the Sea
by Walter Savage Landor

Ianthe! you are call’d to cross the sea!
         A path forbidden me!
Remember, while the Sun his blessing sheds
         Upon the mountain-heads,
How often we have watcht him laying down
         His brow, and dropt our own
Against each other’s, and how faint and short
         And sliding the support!
What will succeed it now? Mine is unblest,
         Ianthe! nor will rest
But on the very thought that swells with pain.
         O bid me hope again!
O give me back what Earth, what (without you)
         Not Heaven itself can do—
One of the golden days that we have past,
         And let it be my last!
Or else the gift would be, however sweet,
         Fragile and incomplete.

Form: couplet
Ode to Stephen Dowling Bots, Dec'd.
by Mark Twain

And did young Stephen sicken,
   And did young Stephen die?
And did the sad hearts thicken,
   And did the mourners cry?

No; such was not the fate of
   Young Stephen Dowling Bots;
Though sad hearts round him thickened,
   'Twas not from sickness' shots.

No whooping-cough did rack his frame,
   Nor measles drear, with spots;
Not these impaired the sacred name
   Of Stephen Dowling Bots.

Despised love struck not with woe
   That head of curly knots,
Nor stomach troubles laid him low,
   Young Stephen Dowling Bots.

O no. Then list with tearful eye,
   Whilst I his fate do tell.
His soul did from this cold world fly,
   By falling down a well.

They got him out and emptied him;
   Alas it was too late;
His spirit was gone for to sport aloft
   In the realms of the good and great.

Form: elegy
Modern Love: XXIII
by George Meredith

’Tis Christmas weather, and a country house
Receives us: rooms are full: we can but get
An attic-crib. Such lovers will not fret
At that, it is half-said. The great carouse
Knocks hard upon the midnight’s hollow door,
But when I knock at hers, see the pit.
Why did I come here in that dullard fit?
I enter, and lie couched upon the floor.
Passing, I caught the coverlet’s quick beat:—
Come, Shame, burn to my soul! and Pride, and Pain—
Foul demons that have tortured me, enchain!
Out in the freezing darkness the lambs bleat.
The small bird stiffens in the low starlight.
I know not how, but shuddering as I slept,
I dreamed a banished angel to me crept:
My feet were nourished on her breasts all night.

Form: sonnet
[mosquito at my ear]
by Kobayashi Issa

Mosquito at my ear—
does he think
      I’m deaf?

Form: haiku
Epitaph on the Tombstone of a Child, the Last of Seven that Died Before
by Aphra Behn

This Little, Silent, Gloomy Monument,
Contains all that was sweet and innocent ;
The softest pratler that e'er found a Tongue,
His Voice was Musick and his Words a Song ;
Which now each List'ning Angel smiling hears,
Such pretty Harmonies compose the Spheres;
Wanton as unfledg'd Cupids, ere their Charms
Has learn'd the little arts of doing harms ;
Fair as young Cherubins, as soft and kind,
And tho translated could not be refin'd ;
The Seventh dear pledge the Nuptial Joys had given,
Toil'd here on Earth, retir'd to rest in Heaven ;
Where they the shining Host of Angels fill,
Spread their gay wings before the Throne, and smile.

Form: sonnet
from The Princess: Now Sleeps the Crimson Petal
by Lord Tennyson Alfred

Now sleeps the crimson petal, now the white;
Nor waves the cypress in the palace walk;
Nor winks the gold fin in the porphyry font.
The firefly wakens; waken thou with me.

   Now droops the milk-white peacock like a ghost,
And like a ghost she glimmers on to me.

   Now lies the Earth all Danaë to the stars,
And all thy heart lies open unto me.

   Now slides the silent meteor on, and leaves
A shining furrow, as thy thoughts in me.

   Now folds the lily all her sweetness up,
And slips into the bosom of the lake.
So fold thyself, my dearest, thou, and slip
Into my bosom and be lost in me.

Form: blank verse
I shall forget you presently, my dear (Sonnet IV)
by Edna St. Vincent Millay

I shall forget you presently, my dear,
So make the most of this, your little day,
Your little month, your little half a year
Ere I forget, or die, or move away,
And we are done forever; by and by
I shall forget you, as I said, but now,
If you entreat me with your loveliest lie
I will protest you with my favorite vow.
I would indeed that love were longer-lived,
And vows were not so brittle as they are,
But so it is, and nature has contrived
To struggle on without a break thus far,—
Whether or not we find what we are seeking
Is idle, biologically speaking.

Form: sonnet
A Dialogue, between the Resolved Soul and Created Pleasure
by Andrew Marvell

Courage, my Soul, now learn to wield
The weight of thine immortal shield.
Close on thy head thy helmet bright.
Balance thy sword against the fight.
See where an army, strong as fair,
With silken banners spreads the air.
Now, if thou be’st that thing divine,
In this day’s combat let it shine:
And show that Nature wants an art
To conquer one resolvèd heart.

PLEASURE
Welcome the creation’s guest,
Lord of earth, and heaven’s heir.
Lay aside that warlike crest,
And of Nature’s banquet share:
Where the souls of fruits and flowers
Stand prepared to heighten yours.

SOUL
I sup above, and cannot stay
To bait so long upon the way.

PLEASURE
On these downy pillows lie,
Whose soft plumes will thither fly:
On these roses strewed so plain
Lest one leaf thy side should strain.

SOUL
My gentler rest is on a thought,
Conscious of doing what I ought.

PLEASURE
If thou be’st with perfumes pleased,
Such as oft the gods appeased,
Thou in fragrant clouds shalt show
Like another god below.

SOUL
A soul that knows not to presume
Is heaven’s and its own perfume.

PLEASURE
Everything does seem to vie
Which should first attract thine eye:
But since none deserves that grace,
In this crystal view thy face.

SOUL
When the Creator’s skill is prized,
The rest is all but earth disguised.

PLEASURE
Hark how music then prepares
For thy stay these charming airs;
Which the posting winds recall,
And suspend the river’s fall.

SOUL
Had I but any time to lose,
On this I would it all dispose.
Cease, tempter. None can chain a mind
Whom this sweet chordage cannot bind.

CHORUS
Earth cannot show so brave a sight
As when a single soul does fence
The batteries of alluring sense,
And heaven views it with delight.
   Then persevere: for still new charges sound:
   And if thou overcom’st, thou shalt be crowned.

PLEASURE
All this fair, and soft, and sweet,
   Which scatteringly doth shine,
Shall within one beauty meet,
   And she be only thine.

SOUL
If things of sight such heavens be,
What heavens are those we cannot see?

PLEASURE
Wheresoe’er thy foot shall go
   The minted gold shall lie,
Till thou purchase all below,
   And want new worlds to buy.

SOUL
Were’t not a price, who’d value gold?
And that’s worth naught that can be sold.

PLEASURE
Wilt thou all the glory have
   That war or peace commend?
Half the world shall be thy slave
   The other half thy friend.

SOUL
What friends, if to my self untrue!
What slaves, unless I captive you!

PLEASURE
Thou shalt know each hidden cause;
   And see the future time:
Try what depth the centre draws;
   And then to heaven climb.

SOUL
None thither mounts by the degree
Of knowledge, but humility.

CHORUS
Triumph, triumph, victorious Soul;
The world has not one pleasure more:
The rest does lie beyond the Pole,
And is thine everlasting store.

Form: couplet
Avising the Bright Beams
by Sir Thomas Wyatt

Avising the bright beams of these fair eyes
Where he is that mine oft moisteth and washeth,
The wearied mind straight from the heart departeth
For to rest in his worldly paradise
And find the sweet bitter under this guise.
What webs he hath wrought well he perceiveth
Whereby with himself on love he plaineth
That spurreth with fire and bridleth with ice.
Thus is it in such extremity brought,
In frozen thought, now and now it standeth in flame.
Twixt misery and wealth, twixt earnest and game,
But few glad, and many diverse thought
With sore repentance of his hardiness.
Of such a root cometh fruit fruitless.

Form: sonnet
The Mower against Gardens
by Andrew Marvell

Luxurious man, to bring his vice in use,
 Did after him the world seduce,
And from the fields the flowers and plants allure,
 Where nature was most plain and pure.
He first enclosed within the gardens square
 A dead and standing pool of air,
And a more luscious earth for them did knead,
 Which stupified them while it fed.
The pink grew then as double as his mind;
 The nutriment did change the kind.
With strange perfumes he did the roses taint,
 And flowers themselves were taught to paint.
The tulip, white, did for complexion seek,
 And learned to interline its cheek:
Its onion root they then so high did hold,
 That one was for a meadow sold.
Another world was searched, through oceans new,
 To find the Marvel of Peru.
And yet these rarities might be allowed
 To man, that sovereign thing and proud,
Had he not dealt between the bark and tree,
 Forbidden mixtures there to see.
No plant now knew the stock from which it came;
 He grafts upon the wild the tame:
That th’ uncertain and adulterate fruit
 Might put the palate in dispute.
His green seraglio has its eunuchs too,
 Lest any tyrant him outdo.
And in the cherry he does nature vex,
 To procreate without a sex.
’Tis all enforced, the fountain and the grot,
 While the sweet fields do lie forgot:
Where willing nature does to all dispense
 A wild and fragrant innocence:
And fauns and fairies do the meadows till,
 More by their presence than their skill.
Their statues, polished by some ancient hand,
 May to adorn the gardens stand:
But howsoe’er the figures do excel,
 The gods themselves with us do dwell.

Form: pastoral