{
 "id": "ambrose-bierce/to-a-debtor-abroad",
 "title": "To a Debtor Abroad",
 "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": 12,
  "n_stanzas": 1,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 43,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Grief for an absent lover, husband, friend,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is barely felt before it comes to end:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A score of early consolations serve",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To modify its mouth’s dejected curve.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But woes of creditors when debtors flee",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Forever swell the separating sea.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When standing on an alien shore you mark",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The steady course of some intrepid bark,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "How sweet to think a tear for you abides,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not all unuseful, in the wave she rides!⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That sighs for you commingle in the gale",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beneficently bellying her sail!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}