{
 "id": "ambrose-bierce/for-expulsion",
 "title": "For Expulsion",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Ambrose Bierce",
 "poet_slug": "ambrose-bierce",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume IV",
 "book_slug": "collected-works-iv",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 26,
 "container": "Shapes of Clay",
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1910,
  "venue": "The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume IV (1910)",
  "note": "Taken from Volume IV of the Neale collected edition (copyright 1910). That is the printing this text comes from, not the poem's first appearance: the volume's own preface speaks of the verses republished in this volume and the next, and which newspaper or earlier book printed this poem first has not been established here.",
  "uncertain": true,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof04bierrich"
  ]
 },
 "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": 33,
  "n_stanzas": 3,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 50,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "They say, Brig. Roberts, you have seven wives,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And every one a beauty! As to that",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I’m not informed; in the domestic hives",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of Utah, where I’ve sometimes hung my hat,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Not all the dames were comely. Like a cat",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "That has nine lives and must support them all,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You have to hustle round a bit, I fancy.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Now don’t you really agree with Paul",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That women are the devil?⁠—even Nancy",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And Mary Jane and Caroline and Ella",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And Ruth and Adeline and Isabella!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "If I had half as many wives as you",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "(That’s three wives and a half as I compute)",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I hardly know what I’d be driven to.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I might in desperation play the flute,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Or Congress find in me a raw recruit.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Then, I suppose, the country would uprise",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And say the things I least should care to hear:",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And virtuous editors would damn my eyes,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And cartilaginous virgins pain my ear.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And now and then some pious person clamor,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Blessed with one wife, ten wenches and no grammar.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "All that and more you’re suffering, my friend,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For, having married all the maids you saw,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "You contumaciously refuse to bend",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A corrigible back to altered law",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And leave them (all but one) lamenting. Pshaw!",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Don’t be so squeamish. Yes, the children may",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Lament a little too when made acquainted",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "With their mischance in being put away,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And your own countenance with shame be painted;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But that’s the smallest price for which we’ll sell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A seat in Congress and a bed in Hell.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}