{
 "id": "george-macdonald/o-do-not-leave-me",
 "title": "O Do Not Leave Me",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "George MacDonald",
 "poet_slug": "george-macdonald",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "The Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Volume I",
 "book_slug": "poetical-works-vol-1",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 20,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1893,
  "venue": "The Poetical Works of George MacDonald, Volume I (1893)",
  "note": "Taken from the 1893 collected Poetical Works, which is the printing this text is and not the poem's first appearance. MacDonald gathered and revised for it work published from 1855 onward, and it arranges the poems by its own editorial grouping rather than by the volumes they came from, so which earlier book or magazine printed this poem first has not been established here.",
  "uncertain": true,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poeticalworks01macduoft",
   "https://archive.org/metadata/poeticalworks01macduoft",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9543"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/george-macdonald_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1953",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/8949",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9543",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9984",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10578",
   "https://archive.org/details/bookofstrifeinfo00macd",
   "https://archive.org/details/discipleandothe02macdgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/hiddenlifeandoth00macduoft",
   "https://archive.org/details/discipleandothe02macdgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/rampolli00macd",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/102955776",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/011821572"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 12,
  "n_stanzas": 3,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 47,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "O do not leave me, mother, lest I weep;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till I forget, be near me in that chair.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The mother’s presence leads her down to sleep⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Leaves her contented there.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "O do not leave me, lover, brother, friends,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till I am dead, and resting in my place.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Love-compassed thus, the girl in peace ascends,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And leaves a raptured face.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Leave me not, God, until⁠—nay, until when?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not till I have with thee one heart, one mind;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not till the Life is Light in me, and then",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Leaving is left behind.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}