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Show "IT IS NOT YOURS, O MOTHER." It Is not yours, O mother, to complain, NTot, mother, jour to weep. Though never more your son again Should to your ibosom creep, Though nevermore again you watch your baby sleep. Though In the greener paths of earth, Mother and child, no moro Wo wander; and no more tho birth Of mo whom once you bore. Seems still tho bravo reward that once It seemed of yore. Though as all passes, day and night, The seasons and the years, From you, O mother, this delight, This also disappears Some proQt yet Burvlvc.s of all your paaga and tears. The child, the seed, the grain of corn, The acorn on the hill. Each for some separate end Is born In season fit, and still Each must in strength arise to work the Almighty's will. So from the hearth the children flee, By that Almighty hand A Austerely led, so one by sea Goes forth, and ono by land; Nor aught of all man's sons escapes from that command. So from the sally each obeys The unseen Almighty nod, So till' the ending of all their ways Blindfolded loth havo trod: . .or knew their task at all, but were the tools of God. And as the fervent smith of yore Beat out the glowing blade, Nor wielded in the front of war Tho weapons that ho made. But In the tower at home still plied his ringing trado. So like the sworn the son shall roam On nobler missions sent; And as the smith remained at home In peaceful turret pent. So sits the while at homo the mother well content. Robert Louis Stevenson. OI |