{
 "id": "c-s-lewis/dungeon-grates",
 "title": "Dungeon Grates",
 "ordinal": "XV",
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "C. S. Lewis",
 "poet_slug": "c-s-lewis",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Spirits in Bondage",
 "book_slug": "spirits-in-bondage",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 13,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1919,
  "venue": "Spirits in Bondage (1919)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/spiritsinbondage00lewirich",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2003"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
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  "repo": "standardebooks/c-s-lewis_poetry",
  "file": "spirits-in-bondage-chapter-15.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2003",
   "https://archive.org/details/spiritsinbondage00lewirich",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/101865124"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 41,
  "n_stanzas": 1,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 52,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "So piteously the lonely soul of man",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shudders before this universal plan,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So grievous is the burden and the pain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So heavy weighs the long, material chain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From cause to cause, too merciless for hate,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The nightmare march of unrelenting fate,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I think that he must die thereof unless",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ever and again across the dreariness",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There came a sudden glimpse of spirit faces,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A fragrant breath to tell of flowery places",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And wider oceans, breaking on the shore",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From which the hearts of men are always sore.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It lies beyond endeavour; neither prayer",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor fasting, nor much wisdom winneth there,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Seeing how many prophets and wise men",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Have sought for it and still returned again",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With hope undone. But only the strange power",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of unsought Beauty in some casual hour",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Can build a bridge of light or sound or form",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To lead you out of all this strife and storm;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When of some beauty we are grown a part",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till from its very glory’s midmost heart",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Out leaps a sudden beam of larger light",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Into our souls. All things are seen aright",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Amid the blinding pillar of its gold,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Seven times more true than what for truth we hold",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In vulgar hours. The miracle is done",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And for one little moment we are one",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With the eternal stream of loveliness",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That flows so calm, aloft from all distress",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet leaps and lives around us as a fire",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Making us faint with overstrong desire",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To sport and swim for ever in its deep⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Only a moment.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "O! but we shall keep",
    "indent": 8
   },
   {
    "text": "Our vision still. One moment was enough,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We know we are not made of mortal stuff.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And we can bear all trials that come after,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The hate of men and the fool’s loud bestial laughter",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And Nature’s rule and cruelties unclean,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For we have seen the Glory⁠—we have seen.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}