{
 "id": "james-weldon-johnson/lazy",
 "title": "“Lazy”",
 "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": 25,
 "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": 32,
  "n_stanzas": 4,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 39,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Some men enjoy the constant strife",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Of days with work and worry rife,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But that is not my dream of life:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I think such men are crazy.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "For me, a life with worries few,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A job of nothing much to do,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Just pelf enough to see me through:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I fear that I am lazy.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "On winter mornings cold and drear,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When six o’clock alarms I hear,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "’Tis then I love to shift my ear,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And hug my downy pillows.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "When in the shade it’s ninety-three,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "No job in town looks good to me,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I’d rather loaf down by the sea,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And watch the foaming billows.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Some people think the world’s a school,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where labor is the only rule;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But I’ll not make myself a mule,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And don’t you ever doubt it.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I know that work may have its use,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But still I feel that’s no excuse",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For turning it into abuse;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "What do you think about it?",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Let others fume and sweat and boil,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And scratch and dig for golden spoil,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And live the life of work and toil,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Their lives to labor giving.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But what is gold when life is sped,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And life is short, as has been said,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And we are such a long time dead,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I’ll spend my life in living.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}