{
 "id": "c-s-lewis/song-of-the-pilgrims",
 "title": "Song of the Pilgrims",
 "ordinal": "XXV",
 "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": 23,
 "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": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/c-s-lewis_poetry",
  "file": "spirits-in-bondage-chapter-25.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": 66,
  "n_stanzas": 22,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 56,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "O Dwellers at the back of the North Wind,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What have we done to you? How have we sinned",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wandering the Earth from Orkney unto Ind?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "With many deaths our fellowship is thinned,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our flesh is withered in the parching wind,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wandering the earth from Orkney unto Ind.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "We have no rest. We cannot turn again",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Back to the world and all her fruitless pain,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Having once sought the land where ye remain.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Some say ye are not. But, ah God! we know",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That somewhere, somewhere past the Northern snow",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Waiting for us the red-rose gardens blow:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "—The red-rose and the white-rose gardens blow",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In the green Northern land to which we go,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Surely the ways are long and the years are slow.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "We have forsaken all things sweet and fair,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We have found nothing worth a moment’s care",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Because the real flowers are blowing there.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Land of the Lotus fallen from the sun,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Land of the Lake from whence all rivers run,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Land where the hope of all our dreams is won!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Shall we not somewhere see at close of day",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The green walls of that country far away,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And hear the music of her fountains play?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So long we have been wandering all this while",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By many a perilous sea and drifting isle,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We scarce shall dare to look thereon and smile.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Yea, when we are drawing very near to thee,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And when at last the ivory port we see",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our hearts will faint with mere felicity:",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "But we shall wake again in gardens bright",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of green and gold for infinite delight,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sleeping beneath the solemn mountains white,",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "While from the flowery copses still unseen",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sing out the crooning birds that ne’er have been",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Touched by the hand of winter frore and lean;",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And ever living queens that grow not old",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And poets wise in robes of faerie gold",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whisper a wild, sweet song that first was told",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Ere God sat down to make the Milky Way.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And in those gardens we shall sleep and play",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For ever and for ever and a day.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "An, Dwellers at the back of the North Wind,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What have we done to you? How have we sinned,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That yes should hide beyond the Northern wind?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Land of the Lotus, fallen from the Sun,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When shall your hidden, flowery vales be won",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And all the travail of our way be done?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Very far we have searched; we have even seen",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The Scythian waste that bears no soft nor green,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And near the Hideous Pass our feet have been.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "We have heard Syrens singing all night long",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beneath the unknown stars their lonely song",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In friendless seas beyond the Pillars strong.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Nor by the dragon-daughter of Hypocras",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor the vale of the Devil’s head we have feared to pass,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet is our labour lost and vain, alas!",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Scouring the earth from Orkney unto Ind,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Tossed on the seas and withered in the wind,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We seek and seek your land. How have we sinned?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Or is it all a folly of the wise,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bidding us walk these ways with blinded eyes",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "While all around us real flowers arise?",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "But, by the very God, we know, we know",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That somewhere still, beyond the Northern snow",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Waiting for us the red-rose gardens blow.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}