Poems (Dorr)/Peradventure

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PERADVENTURE
I am thinking to-night of the little child That lay on my breast three summer days,Then swiftly, silently, dropped from sight, While my soul cried out in sore amaze.
It is fifteen years ago to-night; Somewhere, I know, he has lived them through,Perhaps with never a thought or dream Of the mother-heart he never knew!
Is he yet but a babe? or has he grown To be like his brothers, fair and tall,With a clear, bright eye, and a springing step, And a voice that rings like a bugle call?
I loved him. The rose in his waxen hand Was wet with the dew of my falling tears;I have kept the thought of my baby's grave Through all the length of these changeful years.
Yet the love I gave him was not like that I give to-day to my other boys,Who have grown beside me, and turned to me In all their griefs and in all their joys.
Do you think he knows it? I wonder much If the dead are passionless, cold, and dumb;If into the calm of the deathless years No thrill of a human love may come!
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Perhaps sometimes from the upper air He has seen me walk with his brothers threeOr felt in the tender twilight hour The breath of the kisses they gave to me!
Over his birthright, lost so soon, Perhaps he has sighed as the swift years flew;O child of my heart! you shall find somewhere The love that on earth you never knew!
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