A Mother's Reasoning

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 21, 1902

A Mother's Reasoning

I miss the little laughing baby faces, The loving eyes that always turned to me; I miss the roguish ways and elfish graces Of little forms that clustered at my knee,

Of rosy lips that left such happy kisses Upon my ever-willing cheek and brow, And, O! the thousand nameless joys and blisses That once I had, but only dream of now!

And yet I know full well if Time could bear me Back to the days of proud young motherhood, I'd miss the gentle presence ever near me Of those who as my grown-up babies stood.

To be without my boy's strong reassurance, To be without my girl's sweet sympathy, Would go beyond my heart's most firm endurance, E'en though my babies clung again to me!

Well, mother-like, I miss the bonny tresses That lay upon my breast in tangled curl; Yet I would die to lose the love that blesses My whole life, in my grown-up boy and girl.

— New Orleans Times-Democrat.