{
 "id": "ambrose-bierce/a-morning-fancy",
 "title": "A Morning Fancy",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Ambrose Bierce",
 "poet_slug": "ambrose-bierce",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Shapes of Clay",
 "book_slug": "shapes-of-clay",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 11,
 "container": "Shapes of Clay",
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1903,
  "venue": "Shapes of Clay (1903)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/shapesofclay00bier"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/ambrose-bierce_poetry",
  "file": "shapes-of-clay.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/4793",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12658",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12977",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/15599",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof04bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof05bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof08bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/shapesofclay00bier",
   "https://archive.org/details/blackbeetlesinam00bier",
   "https://archive.org/details/literarycalifor05mighgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/cali07webb"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 44,
  "n_stanzas": 4,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 54,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "I drifted (or I seemed to) in a boat",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Upon the surface of a shoreless sea",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Whereon no ship nor anything did float,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Save only the frail bark supporting me;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And that⁠—it was so shadowy⁠—seemed to be",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Almost from out the subtle azure wrought",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of the great ocean underneath its keel;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And all that blue profound appeared as naught",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But thicker sky, translucent to reveal,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Miles down, whatever through its spaces glided,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or at the bottom traveled or abided.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Great cities there I saw; of rich and poor",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The palace and the hovel; mountains, vales,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Forest and field; the desert and the moor;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tombs of the good and wise who’d lived in jails;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Seas of denser fluid, white with sails",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Pushed at by currents moving here and there",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And sensible to sight above the flat",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Of that opaquer deep. Ah, strange and fair",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The nether world that I was gazing at",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "With beating heart from that exalted level,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And⁠—lest I founder⁠—trembling like the devil!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The cities all were populous: men swarmed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In public places⁠—chattered, laughed and wept;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And savages their shining bodies warmed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "At fires in primal woods. The wild beast leapt",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Upon its prey and slew it as it slept.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Armies went forth to battle on the plain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So far, far down in that unfathomed deep",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The living seemed as silent as the slain,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor even the widows could be heard to weep.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "One might have thought their shaking was but laughter;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And, truly, most were married shortly after.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Above the wreckage of that silent fray",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Strange fishes swam in circles, round and round⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Black, double-finned; and once a little way",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A bubble rose and burst without a sound",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And a man tumbled out upon the ground.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Lord! ’twas an eerie thing to drift apace",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On that pellucid sea, beneath black skies",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And o’er the heads of an undrowning race;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And when I woke I said⁠—to her surprise",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Who came with chocolate, for me to drink it:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“The atmosphere is deeper than you think it.”",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}