This week’s choice is in honour of my granddaughter Rosie, born this week. I wish her and her parents Tom and Charl a lifetime of love and happiness.
May your laughter ring like fountains,
Felix Dennis (1947—2014)
May your heart be wild and free,
May you walk among the mountains
But live beside the sea.
Poem 411. Song for a Child, Newly Born
May your thoughts be with the living,
May your hand and eye be swift,
May your thanks be with the giving
And never with the gift.
May your kindness be unfailing,
May your ship glide by each shoal,
May the helmsman of each sailing
Be the captain of your soul.
May you pass through all life’s dangers,
May your lovers all be true,
May you learn that this world’s strangers
Were friends you never knew.
May your laughter ring like fountains,
May your heart be wild and free,
May you walk among the mountains
But live beside the sea.
I found this poem when I was researching Felix Dennis’s poetry a few weeks ago and bookmarked it for Rosie’s birth. It reminds me of the traditional Irish blessing that begins:
May the road rise up to meet you.
Traditional Irish blessing
May the wind be always at your back.
May the sun shine warm upon your face;
the rains fall soft upon your fields
and until we meet again,
may God hold you in the palm of His hand.
The poem expresses all the things we might wish for our children, or our childrens’ children.
I think we’d all hope they grow into someone who is modest, kind and generous with a quick eye for the important, capable hands, and the will and kindness to understand the needs of others and do what is necessary to help them.
We wish that their life will bypass difficulties just as a ship passes by a potentially lethal shoal and we pray that they will set a course through life (pursuing the maritime metaphor) that brings their soul contentment and peace.
We hope that danger will touch them lightly if at all and that they find a faithful soulmate; we want them to be able to make good friends easily.
And like Dennis, we wish them an untamed heart filled with laughter and we hope that they will live easily (on the shoreline) even as they seek the high life.
I like this poem because it expresses perfectly the things we wish for when our children are born and then their children after them.
I wish my granddaughter Rosie all the above and more. I hope she brings joy to all around her and that her grandma’s spirit of generosity, kindness and love lives on in her. My blessing on her, and on her parents Tom and Charl. This week’s poem is dedicated to them all.
There are no performances of this poem on YouTube.