{
 "id": "william-carlos-williams/the-widows-lament-in-springtime",
 "title": "The Widow’s Lament in Springtime",
 "poet": "William Carlos Williams",
 "poet_slug": "william-carlos-williams",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Sour Grapes: A Book of Poems",
 "book_slug": "sour-grapes",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 49,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1921,
  "venue": "Sour Grapes (1921)",
  "note": "First located printing; an earlier periodical printing has not been ruled out.",
  "uncertain": true,
  "sources": [
   "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sour_Grapes_(poetry_collection)"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/william-carlos-williams_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31878",
   "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": {
  "n_lines": 28,
  "n_stanzas": 1,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 34,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Sorrow is my own yard",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "where the new grass",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "flames as it has flamed",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "often before but not",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "with the cold fire",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "that closes round me this year.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thirtyfive years",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I lived with my husband.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The plumtree is white today",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "with masses of flowers.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Masses of flowers",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "load the cherry branches",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "and color some bushes",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "yellow and some red",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "but the grief in my heart",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "is stronger than they",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "for though they were my joy",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "formerly, today I notice them",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "and turn away forgetting.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Today my son told me",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "that in the meadows,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "at the edge of the heavy woods",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "in the distance, he saw",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "trees of white flowers.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I feel that I would like",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "to go there",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "and fall into those flowers",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "and sink into the marsh near them.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}