{
 "id": "james-mcintyre/the-useful-weed",
 "title": "The Useful Weed",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "James McIntyre",
 "poet_slug": "james-mcintyre",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Poems of James McIntyre",
 "book_slug": "poems-of-james-mcintyre",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 44,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1889,
  "venue": "Poems of James McIntyre (1889)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_11791"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/james-mcintyre_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_09542",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/36068",
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_11791"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 24,
  "n_stanzas": 6,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 38,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Do not despise the humble weed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For the Lord He first sowed the seed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Perhaps it bears most precious fruit,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And useful leaves and potent root.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Though it seems now a useless weed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Countless millions it yet may feed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or future ages it may prize,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Finding in it beauteous dyes.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Or a valued healing balm,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Will make the heated pulse beat calm,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the future men of science,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "May place on it strong reliance.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And it may play important part,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In advancing skill and art,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And no person now doth know",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "How useful are the weeds that grow.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Weeds we now look on with loathing,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "They may yet be used for clothing,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Producing silken glossy coat,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or paper fine for the bank note.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "But you at present must take heed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And do not grow the cumbrous weed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Either in garden or in field,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where plants with profit now do yield.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}