{
 "id": "frances-ellen-watkins-harper/youth-in-heaven",
 "title": "Youth in Heaven",
 "poet": "Frances Ellen Watkins Harper",
 "poet_slug": "frances-ellen-watkins-harper",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Poems",
 "book_slug": "poems",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": null,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1871,
  "venue": "Poems (1871)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poems01harp"
  ]
 },
 "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": 24,
  "n_stanzas": 6,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 36,
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 },
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 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Not for them the length’ning shadows",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Falling coldly round our lives,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Nearer, nearer through the ages",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Life’s new spring for them arrives.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Not for them the doubt and anguish",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of an old and loveless age,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Dropping sadly tears of sorrow",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On life’s faded, blotted page.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Not for them the mournful dimming",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of the weary, tear-stained eye,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "That has seen the sad procession",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of its dearest hopes go by.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Not for them the hopeless clinging",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To life’s worn and feeble strands,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Till the last has ceased to tremble",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In our agèd, withered hands.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Never lines of light and darkness",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thread the brows forever fair,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And the eldest of the angels",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Seems the youngest brother there.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "There the stream of life doth never",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Cross the mournful plains of death,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And the pearly gates are ever",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Closed against his icy breath.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}