{
 "id": "mary-weston-fordham/in-memoriam",
 "title": "In Memoriam",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": "Alphonse Campbell Fordham",
 "poet": "Mary Weston Fordham",
 "poet_slug": "mary-weston-fordham",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Magnolia Leaves",
 "book_slug": "magnolia-leaves",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 58,
 "container": "In Memoriam",
 "epigraph": "Almost whose last words were / “We shall meet beyond the River.”",
 "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": 24,
  "n_stanzas": 3,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 36,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Yes, my darling, when life’s shadows",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Over me do darkly fall,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Meet me surely at the river",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As I haste to obey the call.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Gladly through the darksome valley,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through its portals, grim and cold,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Will I hasten ’till my nestling",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Meets me at the “Gates of Gold.”",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Sadly do I miss my wee one,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "None can fill thy vacant place,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Only in my dreams I fold thee,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Only then behold thy face.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "See thee in thy childish beauty,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Clasp thy little hand in mine,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Ever will those moments chain me,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ever in my heart enshrined.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Little Heartsease, “bud of promise,”",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Broken off in early morn,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Now can sin no more pollute thee",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In the angels’ bosom borne.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "In that land no pain or anguish",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ever can my child enfold,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Then my darling meet thy mother",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Surely at the “Gates of Gold.”",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}