My Son

From the Rock Island Argus, May 27, 1915. By Douglas Malloch.

I that had yearned for youth, my own, again,
    And mourned the wasteful hours of younger days,
I that had sighed for spring, for summer, when
    The snows of winter covered all my ways—
I that had prayed for years, for only one,
    Have found that prayer answered in my son.

He is myself again, with hopes of old,
    With old temptations and with old desires;
He is myself again—the clay to mold
    Into a man, and all the man aspires,
Who says that youth returns to us no more?
    He is as I was in the days of yore.

In my own days, in my own days of youth,
    Ah, how I wished a comrade and a friend!—
To help me keep the quiet path of truth
    And through temptation my own feet attend.
So shall I journey onward by his side,
    His father—yea, his comrade and his guide.

I that have failed shall shape success in him.
    I that have wandered point the proper path,
A signal when the signal lights are dim,
    A roof to fend him from the storms of wrath—
So we shall journey upward, I and he,
    And he shall be the man I meant to be.