{
 "id": "ambrose-bierce/subterranean-phantasies",
 "title": "Subterranean Phantasies",
 "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": 57,
 "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": 56,
  "n_stanzas": 8,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 53,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "I died. As meekly in the earth I lay,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With shriveled fingers reverently folded,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The worm⁠—uncivil engineer!⁠—my clay",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tunneled industriously, and the mole did.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "My body could not dodge them, but my soul did;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "For that had flown from this terrestrial ball",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And I was rid of it for good and all.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So there I lay, debating what to do⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What measures might most usefully be taken",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "To circumvent the subterranean crew",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of anthropophagi and save my bacon.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "My fortitude was all this while unshaken,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But any gentleman, of course, protests",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Against receiving uninvited guests.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "However proud he might be of his meats,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not even Apicius, nor, I think, Lucullus,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Wasted on tramps his culinary sweets;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“Aut Caesar,” say judicious hosts, “aut nullus.”",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And though when Marcius came unbidden Tullus",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Aufidius feasted him because he starved,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Marcius by Tullus afterward was carved.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "We feed the hungry, as the book commands",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "(For men might question else our orthodoxy)",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But do not care to see the outstretched hands,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And so we minister to them by proxy.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "When Want, in his improper person, knocks he",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Finds we’re engaged. The graveworm’s very fresh",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To think we like his presence in the flesh.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So, as I said, I lay in doubt; in all",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That underworld no judges could determine",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "My rights. When Death approaches them they fall,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And falling, naturally soil their ermine.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And still below ground, as above, the vermin",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "That work by dark and silent methods win",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The case⁠—the burial case that one is in.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Cases at law so slowly get ahead,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Even when the right is visibly unclouded,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "That if all men are classed as quick and dead,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The judges all are dead, though some unshrouded.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Pray Jove that when they’re actually crowded",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "On Styx’s brink, and Charon rows in sight,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His bark prove worse than Cerberus’s bite.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Ah! Cerberus, if you had but begot",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A race of three-mouthed dogs for man to nourish",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And woman to caress, the muse had not",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Lamented the decay of virtues currish,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And triple-hydrophobia now would flourish,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "For barking, biting, kissing to employ",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Canine repeaters were indeed a joy.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Lord! how we cling to this vile world! Here I,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whose dust was laid ere I began this carping,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "By moles and worms and such familiar fry",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Run through and through, am singing still and harping",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Of mundane matters⁠—flatting, too, and sharping.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I hate the Angel of the Sleeping-Cup:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So I’m for getting⁠—and for shutting⁠—up.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}