Free Song Lyrics

Public Domain + CC0 Original searchable database

Public Domain 1,347 songs - No restrictions CC0 Original 2,726 songs - Free to use
All lyrics in this database are verified public domain. Sources include Wikisource and Project Gutenberg.
1,347
Songs
11
Categories
100%
Free
Browse all 1,347 songs
The Song of Right and Wrong
Drinking songs
Feast on wine or fast on water
And your honour shall stand sure,
God Almighty's son and daughter
He the valiant, she the pure;
If an angel out of heaven
Brings you other things to drink,
Thank him for his kind attentions,
Go and pour them down the sink.
Tea is like the East he grows in,
A great yellow Mandarin
With urbanity of manner
And unconsciousness of sin;
All the women, like a harem,
At his pig-tail troop along;
And, like all the East he grows in,
He is Poison when he's strong.
Tea, althou...
Show full lyrics →
Gillespies Beach Beginnings
Sea songs
When miners walked the beaches
Of this rugged coast of ours,
And faced the scourge of sandflies,
The solitude, and showers,
There was history in the making
When they found within the sand,
An ounce or two of finest gold
That anyone had panned.
So they pitched their tents and settled
On this isolated reach;
Built pubs and school and chapel
And a town - Gillespie’s Beach.
But the mining dwindled right away,
The township lost its pub,
And down the years the settlement
Was swallowed by the scrub.
Love Is like a Violin
Sea songs
Love is like a Violin,
Withit'stones grave or gay,
Caprices the artist may play,
The light love that last for a day,
There are songs that lie within,
Like the voice of the sea,
Of the one love eternal,
Enduring for aye!
And that voice calls to me!
There's the love that is folly's gay dance,
There's the charm of a moonlight romance,
There's the lure of the danger that lies,
In the passion that lies in a fool's Paradise,
All the songs for an hour we may prize,
But there's none like the one.
And th...
Show full lyrics →
May (Mácha)
Sea songs
The lake, hid where the thicket reared.
Expressed its grief in a muffled sound,
Where banks entwined it all around;
The suns of other worlds appeared
And strayed across the azure spheres,
Gleaming above like love's bright tears.
Whole worlds of them appeared at length
Upon the skies—love's timeless seat.
Then, changed to fading stars—whose strength
Was spent by love's o'er sweet extent@—They met, as roaming lovers meet.
The full moon's softly glowing cheeks
So brightly faint, so faintly br...
Show full lyrics →
It Came upon a Midnight Clear (unsourced)
Love songs
It came upon a midnight clear,
That glorious song of old,
From angels bending near the earth
To touch their harps of gold:"Peace on the earth, good will to men,
From heav'n's all gracious King!"The world in solemn stillness lay
To hear the angels sing.
Still thru the cloven skies they come
With peaceful wings unfurled,
And still their heav'nly music floats
O'er all the weary world:
Above its sad and lowly plains
They bend on hov'ring wing,
And ever o'er its Babel sounds
The blessed angels sing.
...
Show full lyrics →
The Ballad of that P.N.
Sea songs
The shades of night had fallen at last,
When through the house a shadow passed,
That once had been the
Genial Dan,
But now become a desperate man,
At question time he waited near,
And on the Premier's startled ear
A voice fell like half a brick --"Did ye, or did ye not, pay
Crick
Did ye?"By land and sea the Premier sped,
But found his foe where'er he fled,
The sailors swore -- with whitened lip --That Neptune swam behind the ship:
When to the stern the Premier ran,
Behold, 'twas no one else but ...
Show full lyrics →
Morning Song (Field)
Work songs
The eastern sky is streaked with red,
The weary night is done,
And from his distant ocean bed
Rolls up the morning sun.
The dew, like tiny silver beads
Bespread o'er velvet green,
Is scattered on the wakeful meads
By angel hands unseen."Good-morrow, robin in the trees!"The star-eyed daisy cries;"Good-morrow," sings the morning breeze
Unto the ruddy skies;"Good-morrow, every living thing!"Kind Nature seems to say,
And all her works devoutly sing
A hymn to birth of day,
So, haste, without delay,
H...
Show full lyrics →
Lyrics (Phillips)
Folk songs
O to recall!
What to recall?
All the roses under snow?
Not these.
Stars that toward the water go?
Not these.
O to recall!
What to recall?
All the greenness after rain?
Not this.
Joy that gleameth after pain?
Not this.
O to recall!
What to recall?
Not the greenness nor delight,
Not these;
Not the roses out of sight,
Not these.
O to recall!
What to recall?
Not the star in waters red,
Not this:
Laughter of a girl that's dead,
O this!
A Pretty Girl Is like a Melody
Work songs
I have an ear for music,
And I have an eye for a maid.
I link a pretty girlie,
With each pretty tune that's played.
They go together,
Like sunny weather goes with the month of May.
I've studied girls and music,
So I'm qualified to say...
A pretty girl is like a melody
That haunts you night and day,
Just like the strain of a haunting refrain,
She'll start up-on a marathon
And run around your brain.
You can't escape she's in your memory.
By morning night and noon.
She will leave you and then come ...
Show full lyrics →
Song Bird and Flower
Work songs
I.

In the forest deep a flower was growing,
In the forest deep, without a peer;
To its secret home in beauty glowing,
Came one day a lovely song bird near:
With wild strain of love enamor'd flying,
To the flowret's lips at last he press'd,
And, another moment, he was lying,
Lying close, and nestling in her breast.

II.

Day by day he flew to seek the flower,
Blooming in that forest wild and deep,
And when came at last the parting hour,—And he left her,—she was left to weep.
But, when later ...
Show full lyrics →
Uncle Jim’s Baptist Revival Hymn
Hymns
Solo.—Sin’s rooster’s crowed, Ole Mahster’s riz,
De sleepin’-time is pas’;
Wake up dem lazy Baptissis,
Chorus.—Dey’s mightily in de grass, grass,
Dey’s mightily in de grass.
Ole Mahster’s blowed de mornin’ horn,
He’s blowed a powerful blas’;
O Baptis’ come, come hoe de corn,
You’s mightily in de grass, grass,
You’s mightily in de grass.
De Meth’dis team’s done hitched; O fool,
De day’s a-breakin’ fas’;
Gear up dat lean ole Baptis’ mule,
Dey’s mightil...
Show full lyrics →
On and Onward
Children's songs
GES Kluang, We're Comrades All
As Members Let Us Serve
The School That Taught Our Childhood Days
Ne'er From The Right To Swerve
Remember We Are Members All
As Our Dear School We Praise
Who Led Us, Cheered Us, Then And Now
In Calm And Stormy Days
Chorus (x2):
GES Kluang, Forever
None More Loved Can Be
What Can We Do To Serve Thee
Who Belong To Thee
Harder Ever Harder
We For Thee Will Strive
On And Onward, School And Town For Aye
On And Onward, School And Town For Aye
Lyrics: C. D. Westwood
Air:
L...
Show full lyrics →
The Song of Quoodle
Folk songs
They haven't got no noses,
The fallen sons of Eve;
Even the smell of roses
Is not what they supposes;
But more than mind discloses
And more than men believe.
They haven't got no noses,
They cannot even tell
When door and darkness closes
The park a Jew encloses,
Where even the law of Moses
Will let you steal a smell.
The brilliant smell of water,
The brave smell of a stone,
The smell of dew and thunder,
The old bones buried under,
Are things in which they blunder
And err, if left alone.
The wind ...
Show full lyrics →
The Song of the Sufferer
Drinking songs
Hisdrink it is Saline Pyretic,
He longs, but he shall not eat,
His soul is convulsed with emetic,
His stomach is empty of meat.
His bowels are stirred by blind motions,
His form in the flannel is bound,
He has gargles, and powders, and potions,
And walks as not feeling the ground.
For the doctor has harrowed his being,
And of medicine wondrous the might is;
He suffers in agony, seeing
He is prey to acute tonsilitis.
The Boy Land Boomer
Sea songs
Chapter 1 Dick Arbuckle's Discovery
Chapter 2 Dick on a Runaway
Chapter 3 A Cave and a Cave-in
Chapter 4: Out of the Cavern
Chapter 5: The Cavalrymen
Chapter 6: Dick’s Hunt
Chapter 7: Out on the River
Chapter 8: Exposing a Swindler
Chapter 9: Mike and the Mules
Chapter 10: Mr. Arbuckle’s Story
Chapter 11: A Strange Letter
Chapter 12: Yellow Elk
Chapter 13: Nellie’s Flight
Chapter 14: Dick to the Rescue
Chapter 15: An Important Conversation
Chapter 16: Attacked by a Wildcat
Chapter 17: The ...
Show full lyrics →
The Drummer Boy of Shiloh
Work songs
On Shiloh’s dark and bloody ground,
The dead and wounded lay,
Amongst them was a drummer boy,
Who beat the drum that day,
A wounded soldier raised him up,
His drum was by his side,
He clasped his hands and raised his eyes
And prayed before he died.
Look down upon the battle-field,
Oh thou, our Heavenly Friend,
Have mercy on our sinful souls,
The soldiers cried, “Amen.”For gather’d round, a little group,
Each brave man knelt and cried,
They listened to the drummer boy
Who prayed before he...
Show full lyrics →
Camp Song of the Maryland Line
Spirituals
We’re the boys, so gay and happy,
Wheresoe’er we chance to be—If at home or on camp duty,’Tis the same—we’re always free.
So let the war guns roar as they will,
We’ll be gay and happy still;
Gay and happy—gay and happy,
We’ll be gay and happy still.
We’ve left our homes and those we cherish,
In our good old Maryland;
Rather than wear chains we’ll perish,
Side by side and hand in hand.
So let the war guns, &c.
Old Virginia needs assistance,
Northern hosts invade her soil;
We...
Show full lyrics →
Mingle my dust with the burning brand...
Sea songs
Mingle my dust with the burning brand,
Scatter it free to the sky
Fling it wide on the ocean's sand,
From peaks where the vultures fly.
Let it drift with the drifting tide,
And flit o'er the artic floe,
Let it spin and ride where the snow-storms hide
And the wild ice-field winds blow.
Let it mingle with desert sand,
And the waves of a tropic sea,
When the roaring surge sweeps o'er the strand
And the ocean winds shout free.
When I Lost You
Love songs
[1st verse:]The roses each one
Met with the sun
Sweetheart when I met you
The sunshine had fled
The roses were dead
Sweetheart when I lost you.[chorus:]I lost the sunshine and roses
I lost the heavens of blue
I lost the beautiful rainbow
I lost the morning dew
I lost the angel who gave me
Summer, the whole winter through
I lost the gladness that turned into sadness
When I lost you.[2nd verse:]The birds ceased their song
Right turned to wrong
Sweetheart when I lost you
A day turned to years
The w...
Show full lyrics →
Nine Miles From Gundagai
Work songs
I've done my share of shearing sheep,
Of droving and all that,
And bogged a bullock team as well
On a Murrumbidgee flat.
I've seen the bullock stretch and strain,
And blink his bleary eve,
And the dog sat on the tucker box,
Nine miles from Gundagai.
I've been jilted, jarred and crossed in love,
And sand-bagged in the dark,
And if a mountain fell on me
I'd treat it as a lark.
It's when you've got your bullocks bogged.
That's the time you flog and cry,
And the dog sits on the tucker box,
Nine mile...
Show full lyrics →

Data Sources