The Parent Prayer.

I bend above the little heads beyond the blanket's edge -
Wee polls of tangled gold-brown hair like wind-blown wisps of sedge
Then oh, the yearning that I know, compared with once when I
Longed but for my own pleasure in the time called by-and-by.
Yet now - what, as one's own begot, one's selfishness may cure?
'Lord keep my children happy, and my happiness is sure.'

And now I know (as once I could not dream or even care)
What as my parents bent o'er me at bedtime, was their prayer
The loyalty, all latent then, wells up intensified -
The pent up love of childhood and of riper years beside.
When I, their child, was tombed within the night's sweet sepulture,
They prayed, 'God make her happy, and our joy will be secure'.


('Girl's Own Annual' - Strickland W.Gillilan.)