{
 "id": "robert-louis-stevenson/death",
 "title": "Death",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Robert Louis Stevenson",
 "poet_slug": "robert-louis-stevenson",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Poems by Robert Louis Stevenson (Hitherto Unpublished)",
 "book_slug": "poems-hitherto-unpublished",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 6,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1921,
  "venue": "Poems by Robert Louis Stevenson (Hitherto Unpublished) (1921)",
  "note": "The volume's title page states that these poems were hitherto unpublished, and no earlier printing of them has been established. The 1921 date is the year of first printing, but not necessarily of this exact copy: the volume states that it is a complimentary edition struck from the same type forms as the Bibliophile Society's edition of the same year.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poemshithertounp00stevrich"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/robert-louis-stevenson_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://archive.org/details/worksofrobertlvol28stev",
   "https://archive.org/details/worksofrobertlou14stev",
   "https://archive.org/details/newpoemsandvaria00stevuoft",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemshithertounp00stevrich",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31291",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30659",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/441",
   "https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Poems,_by_Robert_Louis_Stevenson,_hitherto_unpublished"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 32,
  "n_stanzas": 8,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 45,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "We are as maidens one and all,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In some shut convent place,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Pleased with the flowers, the service bells,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The cloister’s shady grace,",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "That whiles, with fearful, fluttering hearts,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Look outward thro the grate",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And down the long white road, up which,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Some morning, soon or late,",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Shall canter ort his great grey horse",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That splendid acred Lord",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Who comes to lead us forth⁠—his wife,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But half with our accord.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "With fearful fluttered hearts we wait⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We meet him, bathed in tears;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "We are so loath to leave behind",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Those tranquil convent years;",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So loath to meet the pang, to take",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "(On some poor chance of bliss)",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Life’s labour on the windy sea",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For a bower as still as this.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Weeping we mount the crowded aisle,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And weeping after us",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The bridesmaids follow⁠—Come to me!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I will not meet you thus,",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Pale rider to the convent gate.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Come, O rough bridegroom, Death,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Where, bashful bride, I wait you, veiled,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Flush-faced, with shaken breath;",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I do not fear your kiss. I dream",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "New days, secure from strife,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And, bride-like, in the future hope⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A quiet household life.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}