{
 "id": "frances-ellen-watkins-harper/behold-the-lilies",
 "title": "Behold the Lilies!",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Frances Ellen Watkins Harper",
 "poet_slug": "frances-ellen-watkins-harper",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Poetry",
 "book_slug": null,
 "book_kind": "compilation",
 "sequence": null,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1900,
  "venue": "A.M.E. Church Review 16.4 (April 1900), page 468",
  "note": "Located in the issue scan on disk, printed under the heading BEHOLD THE LILIES! in the “Miscellaneous” department and signed “—Frances E. W. Harper.”; the masthead reads “Vol. 16, No. 4.  APRIL, 1900.  Whole No. 64.”. All twenty-eight lines agree with the corpus text. First located printing.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/ame-church-review-1900-04"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/frances-ellen-watkins-harper_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
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   "https://archive.org/details/poemsonmiscellan00harp",
   "https://scalar.lehigh.edu/african-american-poetry-a-digital-anthology/frances-ew-harper-poems-1871",
   "https://archive.org/details/poems01harp",
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   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/69248",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/100774124",
   "https://scalar.lehigh.edu/african-american-poetry-a-digital-anthology/frances-ew-harper-poems-full-text-1895",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/100488369",
   "https://scalar.lehigh.edu/african-american-poetry-a-digital-anthology/frances-ew-harper-idylls-of-the-bible-1901",
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   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/000500702",
   "https://archive.org/details/undergroundrailr00stil",
   "https://archive.org/details/frances-ellen-watkins-harper_sketches-of-southern-life-1872",
   "https://archive.org/details/25th-annual-report-of-the-board-of-managers-of-the-home-etc",
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   "https://archive.org/details/ame-church-review-1900-04"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-12"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 28,
  "n_stanzas": 7,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 40,
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 "site_ready": true,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Behold the lilies of the field",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "How beautiful and fair;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Their fragrance as a breath of heaven",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Refreshes all the air.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "No sordid labors bow them down,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor dull depressing care;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "They only tell of God’s great love,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And that is everywhere.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The wings of morning are too slow",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To bear us from His sight;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The midnight has no shadows deep",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To hide from us His light.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "If not a sparrow falls to earth",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Unnoticed by His eye,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Will He, our Father and our Friend",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Unheeded pass us by?",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Shall we not learn from fading flowers⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Frail children of the dust⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "To lay our cares before His throne,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And in His mercy trust?",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "There’s not a care that weighs us down,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor blinding tears that fall,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor sorrow piercing to the heart",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But He beholds them all;",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And offers us with tender love,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Mid dangers and alarms,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "A refuge for our souls within",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His everlasting arms.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}