MY SONS

[Or yours?]

Dear Lord, when You sent me two sons
For me to shape their living,
How dared You trust so much to me,
Unfitted for such giving?
For I, dear Lord, don't know myself
What life is really sent for:
How could I teach to other souls
What purpose they were meant for?

I tried for each to shape his life
To cope with blow or blessing,
But did my very trying make
My care too cold, too stressing?
I'm flawed and faulted, Lord, my life
A muddled and lack-willed one:
How could I hope to get them right,
Those young days of my children?

Should I have shown more loving, Lord,
More soft and gentle guiding?
But, Lord, I sought to arm my boys
For this world's harsh abiding.
Did futile, fond anxiety
O'er shadow all my caring?
A coward mother, Lord, I feared -
And do still - for their faring.

And now, Lord, when they're grown and gone,
Forgive them for my errors.
In mercy, pardon them the faults
Engendered by my terrors.
Don't burden them for my mistakes:
They didn't choose their mother.
But thank You, Lord - You dared that risk.
You chose me, and none other.
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