{
 "id": "william-carlos-williams/postlude",
 "title": "Postlude",
 "poet": "William Carlos Williams",
 "poet_slug": "william-carlos-williams",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "The Tempers",
 "book_slug": "the-tempers",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 2,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1913,
  "venue": "The Tempers (1913)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/temperscarlos00willrich",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31878"
  ]
 },
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  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
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   "https://archive.org/details/temperscarlos00willrich",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/51997",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/006060238",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35667",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/007676947"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-12"
 },
 "stats": {
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  "n_stanzas": 3,
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  "longest_line_chars": 39,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Now that I have cooled to you",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Let there be gold of tarnished masonry,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Temples soothed by the sun to ruin",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "That sleep utterly.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Give me hand for the dances,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ripples at Philae, in and out,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And lips, my Lesbian,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Wall flowers that once were flame.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Your hair is my Carthage",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And my arms the bow,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And our words arrows",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To shoot the stars",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who from that misty sea",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Swarm to destroy us.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "But you there beside me⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Oh how shall I defy you,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Who wound me in the night",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With breasts shining",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like Venus and like Mars?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The night that is shouting Jason",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "When the loud eaves rattle",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As with waves above me",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Blue at the prow of my desire.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}