Requiem
Under the wide and starry sky
Dig the grave and let me lie:
Glad did I live and gladly die,
And I laid me down with a will.
This be the verse you 'grave for me:
Here he lies where he long'd to be;
Home is the sailor, home from the sea,
And the hunter home from the hill.
Robert Louis Stevenson
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TO ALL PARENTS
I'll lend you for a little time a child of mine,
He said,
For you to love while he lives and mourn
for when he's dead.
It may be six years or seven years, or
twenty-two or three,
But will you, ''til I call him back, take
care of him for Me?
He'll bring his charms to gladden you, and
should his stay be brief,
You'll have his lovely memories as solace
for your grief.
I cannot promise he will stay, since all
from Earth return,
For there are lessons taught down there I
want this child to learn.
I've looked the wide world over, in My
search for teachers true
And from the throng that crowd Life's lives,
I have selected you.
Now, will you give him all your love, not
think the labor vain,
Nor hate me when I come to call him
back again?
I fancied that I heard them say, Dear
Lord, Thy will be done,
For all the joy Thy child shall bring, the
risk of grief we'll run.
We'll shelter him with tenderness, we'll
love him while we may,
And for the happiness we've known, forever
grateful stay.
But shall the angels call him much
sooner than we've planned,
We'll brave the bitter grief that comes, and
try to understand.
-by Edgar Guest
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