{
 "id": "david-park-barnitz/prelude",
 "title": "Prelude",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "David Park Barnitz",
 "poet_slug": "david-park-barnitz",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "The Book of Jade",
 "book_slug": "the-book-of-jade",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 1,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1901,
  "venue": "The Book of Jade (1901)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/bookofjade00gautiala"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/david-park-barnitz_the-book-of-jade",
  "file": "prelude.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/46827",
   "https://archive.org/details/bookofjade00gautiala",
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_overland-monthly-and-out-west-magazine_1901-01_37_1"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 108,
  "n_stanzas": 18,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 53,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "I am a little tired of all things mortal;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I see through half-shut eyelids languorous",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The old monotonous",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Gold sun set slowly through the western portal,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where I recline upon my deep dîwân,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In Ispahân.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I am a little weary of the Persian",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Girl that I lov’d; I am quite tir’d of love;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And I am weary of",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The smoking censers, and the sweet diversion",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of stroking Leila’s jasmine-scented hair,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I thought so fair.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "At last I think I am quite tired of beauty;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Why do the stars shine always in the sky?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I think if I might die,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Something more sweet, less tiring than the duty",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of kissing her, might be; I am tired of myrrh,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And kissing her.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Khaled, come, come, and slowly move the scented",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Gold narghilé away; let the lyres cease.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And now a little peace!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For see, moon-faced Leila hath repented",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of singing Hafiz’ songs melodiously,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And languidly.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Surely all things are vain, and great thanksgiving",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is due not; surely all things now are vain;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And all my heart is fain",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of something, something, far too great for living;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nothing is very sad, nor wonderful,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor beautiful.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Well now, since all things are not worth the winning,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Goodbye! With these I have a little play’d;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And once, alas, I pray’d",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That gorgeous, golden sins be mine for sinning;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But now I would not leave my palanquin",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For any sin.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And long ago I prov’d in great compassion",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For man, that Brahm is not nor ever was;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But now, alas, alas",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I would he were, that in the olden fashion",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I might laugh once again ere all is said;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But Brahm is dead.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then with philosophy I bor’d me duly;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And since I could not slumber all the time,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I, in sweet golden rhyme,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On white papyrus scented with patchouli",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wrote masterpieces starry-beautiful.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The earth was full.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So beauty wearied me; in order slowly",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Love, Joy, and Victory came unto me;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I kiss’d them languidly;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And Virtue came, and Duty, stiff and holy;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To these I said⁠—Pray come another day;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And turn’d away.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Now since of all I am a little weary,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And since on earth I must a while sojourn,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And since a while must burn",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The censer of my long existence dreary,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All things shall walk, that own my mastery,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In luxury.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "My Ennui shall in vestments falling lowly,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Stiff, purple, trailing, long, episcopal",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sweep through her palace hall,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like to a consecrated bishop holy;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My Sin from golden goblets of Byzant",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shall drink absinthe.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And my gold-crowned wanton goddess Pleasure,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "(My candles are all burning at her shrine)",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shall be made drunk with wine,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And walk unto the velvet-falling measure",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of golden-voiced, solemn-sounding shawms.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "No rhyme for shawms.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "All they that wait upon me in my glory,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My purple Pride, and my Luxuriousness,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And my Voluptuousness,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shall show within their faces transitory",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Something more subtile than all life can give,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "While I shall live⁠ ⁠…",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Ah, all is liv’d, all eaten, all is drunken!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Soul, is there anything now left for thee",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Excepting sanctity?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nay, ev’n we too have been in virtue sunken,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We have been holy priest, we have confess’d,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Said, Missa Est.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I have drunk out of heavy goblets golden,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As from some hellish tabernaculum",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Cannabis, conium;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I know quite all the poisons, all the olden",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sins, all the ténébreux dark secrets hid,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And things forbid.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I have had all things unto mortals given,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I all the women, all the passion I,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All the satiety;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I have had all the pleasures known in heaven,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Paradisiacal, purpureal,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Exstatical.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "With all the sciences I am acquainted,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Alas! I know quite all the languages,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "All the philosophies,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Alas! and all the pictures that are painted,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And all the palac’d capitals that be",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Have wearied me.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Alas, all art, all knowledge, and all passion",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I have had: I have heard all the symphonies;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I have sail’d all the seas;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I have drain’d all life’s cup in languid fashion;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And I am come to Persiä again,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Land of cocagne.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}