THE GIFT

    I WANT to give you something, my child, for we are drifting in the stream of the world.

    Our lives will be carried apart, and our love forgotten.

    But I am not so foolish as to hope that I could buy your heart with my gifts.

    Young is your life, your path long, and you drink the love we bring you at one draught¹ and turn and run away from us.

    You have your play and your playmates. What harm is there if you have no time or thought for us.

    We, indeed, have leisure enough in old age to count the days that are past, to cherish in our hearts what our hands have lost for ever.

    The river runs swift with a song, breaking through all barriers. But the mountain stays and remembers, and follows her with his love.