{
 "id": "robert-louis-stevenson/not-yet-my-soul-these-friendly-fields-desert",
 "title": "Not Yet, My Soul, These Friendly Fields Desert",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Robert Louis Stevenson",
 "poet_slug": "robert-louis-stevenson",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Underwoods",
 "book_slug": "underwoods",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 24,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1887,
  "venue": "Underwoods (1887)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/underwoods00stevrich"
  ]
 },
 "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": 38,
  "n_stanzas": 4,
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  "longest_line_chars": 51,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Not yet, my soul, these friendly fields desert,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where thou with grass, and rivers, and the breeze,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And the bright face of day, thy dalliance hadst;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where to thine ear first sang the enraptured birds;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where love and thou that lasting bargain made.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The ship rides trimmed, and from the eternal shore",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou hearest airy voices; but not yet",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Depart, my soul, not yet a while depart.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Freedom is far, rest far. Thou art with life",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Too closely woven, nerve with nerve entwined;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Service still craving service, love for love,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Love for dear love, still suppliant with tears.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Alas, not yet thy human task is done!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A bond at birth is forged; a debt doth lie",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Immortal on mortality. It grows⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "By vast rebound it grows, unceasing growth;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Gift upon gift, alms upon alms, upreared,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "From man, from God, from nature, till the soul",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "At that so huge indulgence stands amazed.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Leave not, my soul, the unfoughten field, nor leave",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy debts dishonoured, nor thy place desert",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Without due service rendered. For thy life,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Up, spirit, and defend that fort of clay,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy body, now beleaguered; whether soon",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Or late she fall; whether today thy friends",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bewail thee dead, or, after years, a man",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Grown old in honour and the friend of peace.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Contend, my soul, for moments and for hours;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Each is with service pregnant; each reclaimed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is as a kingdom conquered, where to reign.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "As when a captain rallies to the fight",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "His scattered legions, and beats ruin back,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "He, on the field, encamps, well pleased in mind.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet surely him shall fortune overtake,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Him smite in turn, headlong his ensigns drive;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And that dear land, now safe, tomorrow fall.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But he, unthinking, in the present good",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Solely delights, and all the camps rejoice.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}