{
 "id": "edward-thomas/the-barn-and-the-down",
 "title": "The Barn and the Down",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Edward Thomas",
 "poet_slug": "edward-thomas",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Last Poems",
 "book_slug": "last-poems",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 34,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1918,
  "venue": "Last Poems (1918)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22732"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/edward-thomas_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22423",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/22732",
   "https://www.google.com/books/edition/Collected_Poems/LMsEAQAAIAAJ",
   "https://www.google.com/books/edition/Two_Poems/3ycPAAAAQAAJ"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 24,
  "n_stanzas": 6,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 33,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "It stood in the sunset sky",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like the straight-backed down,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Many a time⁠—the barn",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "At the edge of the town,",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So huge and dark that it seemed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It was the hill",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till the gable’s precipice proved",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It impossible.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then the great down in the west",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Grew into sight,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A barn stored full to the ridge",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With black of night;",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And the barn fell to a barn",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or even less",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Before critical eyes and its own",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Late mightiness.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "But far down and near barn and I",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Since then have smiled,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Having seen my new cautiousness",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By itself beguiled",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "To disdain what seemed the barn",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till a few steps changed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It past all doubt to the down;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So the barn was avenged.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}