{
 "id": "james-weldon-johnson/de-little-pickaninnys-gone-to-sleep",
 "title": "De Little Pickaninny’s Gone to Sleep",
 "poet": "James Weldon Johnson",
 "poet_slug": "james-weldon-johnson",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Fifty Years & Other Poems",
 "book_slug": "fifty-years-and-other-poems",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 49,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1917,
  "venue": "Fifty Years & Other Poems (1917)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/fiftyyearsother00johnrich",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/17884"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/james-weldon-johnson_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.google.com/books/edition/How_the_National_Association_for_the_Adv/AAs-AQAAMAAJ",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/17884",
   "https://archive.org/details/fiftyyearsother00johnrich",
   "https://docsouth.unc.edu/southlit/johnson/johnson.html",
   "https://archive.org/details/godstrombonessev00johnso"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-12"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 24,
  "n_stanzas": 3,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 43,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Cuddle down, ma honey, in yo’ bed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Go to sleep an’ res’ yo’ little head,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Been a-kind o’ ailin’ all de day?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Didn’t have no sperit fu’ to play?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Never min’; to-morrer, w’en you wek,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Daddy’s gwine to ride you on his bek,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "’Roun’ an’ roun’ de cabin flo’ so fas’⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Der! He’s closed his little eyes at las’.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "De little pickaninny’s gone to sleep,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Cuddled in his trundle bed so tiny,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "De little pickaninny’s gone to sleep,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Closed his little eyes so bright an’ shiny.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Hush! an’ w’en you walk across de flo’",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Step across it very sof’ an’ slow.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "De shadders all aroun’ begin to creep,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "De little pickaninny’s gone to sleep.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Mandy, w’at’s de matter wid dat chile?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Keeps a-sighin’ ev’y little w’ile;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Seems to me I heayhd him sorter groan,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Lord! his little han’s am col’ as stone!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "W’at’s dat far-off light dat’s in his eyes?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Dat’s a light dey’s borrow’d f’om de skies;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Fol’ his little han’s across his breas’,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Let de little pickaninny res’.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}