{
 "id": "ring-lardner/nearly-a-sinecure",
 "title": "Nearly a Sinecure",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Ring Lardner",
 "poet_slug": "ring-lardner",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Bib Ballads",
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 "sequence": 25,
 "container": "Bib Ballads",
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1915,
  "venue": "Bib Ballads (1915)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
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   "https://archive.org/details/per_chicago-daily-tribune_1913-06-03_72_132",
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  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
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  [
   {
    "text": "“I’m going to the office.”",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "So says my youngster, and",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Gets on the train to take him there",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "(The train’s the sofa or a chair,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Whichever’s near at hand.)",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "“Now I am to the office.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I’m working now,” says he,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And just continues standing there",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "On that same lounge or that same chair,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As idle as can be.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Perhaps four seconds after",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He first got on his train,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "I see him getting off once more.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He steps or falls onto the floor",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And says, “I’m home again.”",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I don’t know what they pay him,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor where the office is.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The nature of the boy’s posish",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I’ve never learned⁠—but how I wish",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I had that job of his!",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}