{
 "id": "ambrose-bierce/laudace",
 "title": "L’audace",
 "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": 109,
 "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": 19,
  "n_stanzas": 1,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 52,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Daughter of God! Audacity divine⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of clowns the terror and of brains the sign⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not thou the inspirer of the rushing fool,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not thine of idiots the vocal drool:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy bastard sister of the brow of brass,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Presumption, actuates the charging ass.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sky-born Audacity! of thee who sings",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Should strike with freer hand than mine the strings;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The notes should mount on pinions true and strong,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For thou, the subject shouldst sustain the song,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till angels lean from Heaven, a breathless throng!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Alas! with reeling heads and wavering tails,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They (notes, not angels) drop and the hymn fails;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The minstrel’s tender fingers and his thumbs",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Are torn to rags upon the lyre he strums.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Have done! the lofty thesis makes demand",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For stronger voices and a harder hand⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Night-howling apes to make the notes aspire,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And Poet Riley’s fist to slug the rebel wire!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}