{
 "id": "frances-ellen-watkins-harper/mothers-treasures",
 "title": "Mother’s Treasures",
 "poet": "Frances Ellen Watkins Harper",
 "poet_slug": "frances-ellen-watkins-harper",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Atlanta Offering: Poems",
 "book_slug": "atlanta-offering",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 23,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1895,
  "venue": "Atlanta Offering: Poems (1895)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/69248"
  ]
 },
 "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",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/69249",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/007491600",
   "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",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/100319488",
   "https://archive.org/details/historyofafrican00payn",
   "https://archive.org/details/WeeklyAngloAfricanI",
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_liberator_1858-05-14_28_20",
   "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",
   "https://archive.org/details/frances-ellen-watkins-harper_light-beyond-the-darkness",
   "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": 32,
  "n_stanzas": 8,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 39,
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 "site_ready": true,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Two little children sit by my side,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I call them Lily and Daffodil;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I gaze on them with a mother’s pride,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "One is Edna, the other is Will.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Both have eyes of starry light,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And laughing lips o’er teeth of pearl.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I would not change for a diadem",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My noble boy and darling girl.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "To-night my heart o’erflows with joy;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I hold them as a sacred trust;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I fain would hide them in my heart,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Safe from tarnish of moth and rust.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "What should I ask for my dear boy?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The richest gifts of wealth or fame?",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "What for my girl? A loving heart",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And a fair and a spotless name?",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "What for my boy? That he should stand",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A pillar of strength to the state?",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "What for my girl? That she should be",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The friend of the poor and desolate?",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I do not ask they shall never tread",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With weary feet the paths of pain.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I ask that in the darkest hour",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They may faithful and true remain.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I only ask their lives may be",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Pure as gems in the gates of pearl,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Lives to brighten and bless the world⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "This I ask for my boy and girl.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I ask to clasp their hands again",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "’Mid the holy hosts of heaven,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Enraptured say: “I am here, oh! God,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the children Thou hast given.”",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}