{
 "id": "james-weldon-johnson/fifty-years",
 "title": "Fifty Years",
 "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": 1,
 "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": 76,
  "n_stanzas": 19,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 46,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "O brothers mine, today we stand",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where half a century sweeps our ken,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Since God, through Lincoln’s ready hand,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Struck off our bonds and made us men.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Just fifty years⁠—a winter’s day⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As runs the history of a race;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet, as we look back o’er the way,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "How distant seems our starting place!",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Look farther back! Three centuries!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To where a naked, shivering score,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Snatched from their haunts across the seas,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Stood, wild-eyed, on Virginia’s shore.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "This land is ours by right of birth,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "This land is ours by right of toil;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "We helped to turn its virgin earth,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our sweat is in its fruitful soil.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Where once the tangled forest stood⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where flourished once rank weed and thorn⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Behold the path-traced, peaceful wood,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The cotton white, the yellow corn.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "To gain these fruits that have been earned,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To hold these fields that have been won,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Our arms have strained, our backs have burned,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bent bare beneath a ruthless sun.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "That Banner which is now the type",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of victory on field and flood⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Remember, its first crimson stripe",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was dyed by Attucks’ willing blood.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And never yet has come the cry⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When that fair flag has been assailed⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "For men to do, for men to die,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That we have faltered or have failed.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "We’ve helped to bear it, rent and torn,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through many a hot-breath’d battle breeze",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Held in our hands, it has been borne",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And planted far across the seas.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And never yet⁠—O haughty Land,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Let us, at least, for this be praised⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Has one black, treason-guided hand",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ever against that flag been raised.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then should we speak but servile words,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or shall we hang our heads in shame?",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Stand back of new-come foreign hordes,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And fear our heritage to claim?",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "No! stand erect and without fear,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And for our foes let this suffice⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "We’ve bought a rightful sonship here,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And we have more than paid the price.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And yet, my brothers, well I know",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The tethered feet, the pinioned wings,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The spirit bowed beneath the blow,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The heart grown faint from wounds and stings;",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The staggering force of brutish might,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That strikes and leaves us stunned and dazed;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The long, vain waiting through the night",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To hear some voice for justice raised.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Full well I know the hour when hope",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Sinks dead, and ’round us everywhere",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Hangs stifling darkness, and we grope",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With hands uplifted in despair.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Courage! Look out, beyond, and see",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The far horizon’s beckoning span!",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Faith in your God-known destiny!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We are a part of some great plan.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Because the tongues of Garrison",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And Phillips now are cold in death,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Think you their work can be undone?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or quenched the fires lit by their breath?",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Think you that John Brown’s spirit stops?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That Lovejoy was but idly slain?",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Or do you think those precious drops",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From Lincoln’s heart were shed in vain?",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "That for which millions prayed and sighed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That for which tens of thousands fought,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "For which so many freely died,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "God cannot let it come to naught.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}