{
 "id": "ambrose-bierce/convalescent",
 "title": "Convalescent",
 "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": null,
 "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": 40,
  "n_stanzas": 4,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 52,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "What! “Out of danger?” Can the slighted Dame",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or canting Pharisee no more defame?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Will Treachery caress my hand no more,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor Hatred lie alurk about my door?⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ingratitude, with benefits dismissed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not close the loaded palm to make a fist?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Will Envy henceforth not retaliate",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For virtues it were vain to emulate?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Will Ignorance my knowledge fail to scout,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not understanding what ’tis all about,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet feeling in its light so mean and small",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That all his little soul is turned to gall?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "What! “Out of danger?” Jealousy disarmed?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Greed from exaction magically charmed?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ambition stayed from trampling whom it meets,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like horses fugitive in crowded streets?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The Bigot, with his candle, book and bell,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tongue-tied, unlunged and paralyzed as well?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The Critic righteously to justice haled,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His own ear to the post securely nailed⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What most he dreads unable to inflict,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And powerless to hawk the faults he’s picked?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The liar choked upon his choicest lie,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And impotent alike to vilify",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or flatter for the gold of thrifty men",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who hate his person but employ his pen⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who love and loathe, respectively, the dirt",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Belonging to his character and shirt?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "What! “Out of danger?”⁠—Nature’s minions all,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like hounds returning to the huntsman’s call,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Obedient to the unwelcome note",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That stays them from the quarry’s bursting throat?⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Famine and Pestilence and Earthquake dire,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Torrent and Tempest, Lightning, Frost and Fire,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The soulless Tiger and the mindless Snake,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The noxious Insect from the stagnant lake",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "These from their immemorial prey restrained,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their fury baffled and their power chained?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I’m safe? Is that what the physician said?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What! “Out of danger?” Then, by Heaven, I’m dead!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}