{
 "id": "mina-loy/apology-of-genius",
 "title": "Apology of Genius",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Mina Loy",
 "poet_slug": "mina-loy",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Poetry",
 "book_slug": null,
 "book_kind": "compilation",
 "sequence": null,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1922,
  "venue": "The Dial, vol. LXXIII (July 1922), p. 7",
  "note": "Read on the page: the poem stands under the heading APOLOGY OF GENIUS over the byline BY MINA LOY in the July 1922 number, and the volume index for vol. LXXIII lists it under Loy, Mina in the verse index at page 7. The text held here follows the 1923 Lunar Baedecker printing, not this one.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_dial_1922-07_73"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/mina-loy_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uva.x002129491?urlappend=%3Bseq=396",
   "https://collections.library.yale.edu/catalog/17374476",
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_others-a-magazine-of-the-new-verse_1916-07_3_1/page/27",
   "https://collections.library.yale.edu/catalog/17390662",
   "https://archive.org/details/othersanantholo01kreygoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/cu31924022030351",
   "https://archive.org/details/littlereview07mcke/page/n199",
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_others-a-magazine-of-the-new-verse_1917-04_3_6",
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_dial_1921-06_70/page/672",
   "https://archive.org/details/sim_dial_1921-08_71/page/n15",
   "https://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.32106010168349",
   "https://archive.org/details/contact-collection-of-contemporary-writers/page/137",
   "https://personal.colby.edu/~isadoff/map/loy.doc",
   "https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/11/digital_objects/211477",
   "https://digitalcommons.whitworth.edu/transatlantic/1/"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-12"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 38,
  "n_stanzas": 9,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 45,
  "max_indent": 3
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Ostracized as we are with God⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The watchers of the civilized wastes",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "reverse their signals on our track",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Lepers of the moon",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "all magically diseased",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "we come among you",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "innocent",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "of our luminous sores",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "unknowing",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "how perturbing lights",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "our spirit",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "on the passion of Man",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "until you turn on us your smooth fools’ faces",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "like buttocks bared in aboriginal mockeries",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "We are the sacerdotal clowns",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "who feed upon the wind and stars",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "and pulverous pastures of poverty",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Our wills are formed",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "by curious disciplines",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "beyond your laws",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "You may give birth to us",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "or marry us",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "the chances of your flesh",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "are not our destiny⁠—",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The cuirass of the soul",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "still shines⁠—",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "And we are unaware",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "if you confuse",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "such brief",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "corrosion with possession",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "In the raw caverns of the Increate",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "we forge the dusk of Chaos",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "to that imperious jewelry of the Universe",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "—the Beautiful⁠—",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "While to your eyes",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "A delicate crop",
    "indent": 3
   },
   {
    "text": "of criminal mystic immortelles",
    "indent": 2
   },
   {
    "text": "stands to the censor’s scythe.",
    "indent": 2
   }
  ]
 ]
}