{
 "id": "voltairine-de-cleyre/the-wandering-jew",
 "title": "The Wandering Jew",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Voltairine de Cleyre",
 "poet_slug": "voltairine-de-cleyre",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Selected Works of Voltairine de Cleyre",
 "book_slug": "selected-works",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 20,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1914,
  "venue": "Selected Works of Voltairine de Cleyre (1914)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/selectedworksvo01havegoog",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/43098"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
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  "repo": "standardebooks/voltairine-de-cleyre_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
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   "https://archive.org/details/selectedworksvo01havegoog",
   "https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/voltairine-de-cleyre-collected-poems",
   "https://www.google.com/books/edition/Free_Thought_Magazine/KNOMrVNM4CgC",
   "https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Open_Court/711CAQAAMAAJ",
   "https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Open_Court/6qzQAAAAMAAJ",
   "https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Worm_Turns/wslHAQAAMAAJ",
   "https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/voltairine-de-cleyre-a-new-hope",
   "https://archive.org/details/BostonInvestigator_1893-03-15"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 30,
  "n_stanzas": 3,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 52,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Pale, ghostly Vision from the coffined years,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Planting the cross with thy world-wandering feet,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Stern Watcher through the centuries’ storm and beat,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "In those sad eyes, between those grooves of tears⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Those eyes like caves where sunlight never dwells",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And stars but dimly shine⁠—stand sentinels",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "That watch with patient hope, through weary days,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That somewhere, sometime, He indeed may “come,”",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And thou at last find thee a resting place,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Blast-driven leaf of Man, within the tomb.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Aye, they have cursed thee with the bitter curse,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And driven thee with scourges o’er the world;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Tyrants have crushed thee, Ignorance has hurled",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Its black anathema;⁠—but Death’s pale hearse,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That bore them graveward, passed them silently;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And vainly didst thou stretch thy hands and cry,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "“Take me instead”;⁠—not yet for thee the time,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Not yet⁠—not yet: thy bruised and mangled limbs",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Must still drag on, still feed the Vulture, Crime,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With bleeding flesh, till rust its steel beak dims.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Aye, “till He come,”⁠—He⁠—freedom, justice, peace⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Till then shalt thou cry warning through the earth,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Unheeding pain, untouched by death and birth,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Proclaiming “Woe, woe, woe,” till men shall cease",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To seek for Christ within the senseless skies,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And, joyous, find him in each other’s eyes.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Then shall be builded such a tomb for thee",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Shall beggar kings’ as diamonds outshine dew!",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The Universal Heart of Man shall be",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The sacred urn of “the accursed Jew.”",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}