{
 "id": "mary-weston-fordham/in-memoriam-2",
 "title": "In Memoriam",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": "Susan Eugenia Bennett",
 "poet": "Mary Weston Fordham",
 "poet_slug": "mary-weston-fordham",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Magnolia Leaves",
 "book_slug": "magnolia-leaves",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 63,
 "container": "In Memoriam",
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1897,
  "venue": "Magnolia Leaves (1897)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/magnolialeavespo00ford"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/mary-weston-fordham_magnolia-leaves",
  "file": "in-memoriam.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://scalar.lehigh.edu/african-american-poetry-a-digital-anthology/mary-weston-fordham-magnolia-leaves-full-text-1897-preface-by-booker-t-washington",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/006775637"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 16,
  "n_stanzas": 4,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 67,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "When the Sabbath was declining, just at twilight’s mystic hour,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Left the “Upper Courts” an angel, sent to cull our sweetest flower,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not in judgment, not in anger, did this white-winged seraph come,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But to lead a little Pilgrim through Death’s Portal to her home.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And our angel child was ready, aye, and anxious to depart⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not the slightest doubt o’ershadowed her trusting little heart;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But with a brow as radiant as rainbow in the sky,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "She whispered softly “Mother, I’m not afraid to die.”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "When shall these little, weary limbs lie down to sweet repose,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "’Mid the green, the verdant pastures where the limpid water flows;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When shall I the Golden City sparkling in its beauty see,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "“When shall it be, my Saviour, O! when shall I be free?”",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Ere the week-day with its labors, its duties and its care⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Was ushered in, our darling was found on earth nowhere;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But with the saints in glory, and the Saviour she adored,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "She’s happy and at rest, for aye and ever with the Lord.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}