{
 "id": "frances-ellen-watkins-harper/renewal-of-strength",
 "title": "Renewal of Strength",
 "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": 17,
 "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": {
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  "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": 16,
  "n_stanzas": 4,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "The prison-house in which I live",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is falling to decay,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But God renews my spirit’s strength,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Within these walls of clay.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "For me a dimness slowly creeps",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Around earth’s fairest light,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But heaven grows clearer to my view,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And fairer to my sight.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "It may be earth’s sweet harmonies",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Are duller to my ear,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But music from my Father’s house",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Begins to float more near.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then let the pillars of my home",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Crumble and fall away;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Lo, God’s dear love within my soul",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Renews it day by day.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}