{
 "id": "frances-ellen-watkins-harper/the-slave-mother-2",
 "title": "The Slave Mother",
 "poet": "Frances Ellen Watkins Harper",
 "poet_slug": "frances-ellen-watkins-harper",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Poems on Miscellaneous Subjects",
 "book_slug": "poems-on-miscellaneous-subjects",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": null,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1854,
  "venue": "Poems on Miscellaneous Subjects (1854)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsonmiscellan00harp",
   "https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q42194389"
  ]
 },
 "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": 64,
  "n_stanzas": 16,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 43,
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 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "I have but four, the treasures of my soul,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They lay like doves around my heart;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I tremble lest some cruel hand",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Should tear my household wreaths apart.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "My baby girl, with childish glance,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Looks curious in my anxious eye,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "She little knows that for her sake",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Deep shadows round my spirit lie.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "My playful boys could I forget,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My home might seem a joyous spot,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But with their sunshine mirth I blend",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The darkness of their future lot.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And thou my babe, my darling one,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My last, my loved, my precious child,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Oh! when I think upon thy doom",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "My heart grows faint and then throbs wild.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The Ohio’s bridged and spanned with ice,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The northern star is shining bright,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I’ll take the nestlings of my heart",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And search for freedom by its light.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Winter and night were on the earth,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And feebly moaned the shivering trees,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "A sigh of winter seemed to run",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through every murmur of the breeze.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "She fled, and with her children all,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "She reached the stream and crossed it o’er,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Bright visions of deliverance came",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like dreams of plenty to the poor.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Dreams! vain dreams, heroic mother,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Give all thy hopes and struggles o’er,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The pursuer is on thy track,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the hunter at thy door.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Judea’s refuge cities had power",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To shelter, shield and save,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "E’en Rome had altars: ’neath whose shade",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Might crouch the wan and weary slave.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "But Ohio had no sacred fane,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To human rights so consecrate,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Where thou may’st shield thy hapless ones",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From their darkly gathering fate.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then, said the mournful mother,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "If Ohio cannot save,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I will do a deed for freedom.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "She shall find each child a grave.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I will save my precious children",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From their darkly threatened doom,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I will hew their path to freedom",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through the portals of the tomb.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "A moment in the sunlight,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "She held a glimmering knife,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The next moment she had bathed it",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In the crimson fount of life.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "They snatched away the fatal knife,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Her boys shrieked wild with dread;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The baby girl was pale and cold.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They raised it up, the child was dead.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Sends this deed of fearful daring",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through my country’s heart no thrill,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Do the icy hands of slavery",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Every pure emotion chill?",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Oh! if there is any honor.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Truth or justice in the land,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Will ye not, as men and Christians,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On the side of freedom stand?",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}