There was a time when I was very small, <br />When my whole frame was but an ell in height; <br />Sweetly, as I recall it, tears do fall, <br />And therefore I recall it with delight. <br /> <br />I sported in my tender mother's arms, <br />And rode a-horseback on best father's knee; <br />Alike were sorrows, passions and alarms, <br />And gold, and Greek, and love, unknown to me, <br /> <br />Then seemed to me this world far less in size, <br />Likewise it seemed to me less wicked far; <br />Like points in heaven, I saw the stars arise, <br />And longed for wings that I might catch a star. <br /> <br />I saw the moon behind the island fade, <br />And thought, 'Oh, were I on that island there, <br />I could find out of what the moon is made, <br />Find out how large it is, how round, how fair!' <br /> <br />Wondering, I saw God's sun, through western skies, <br />Sink in the ocean's golden lap at night, <br />And yet upon the morrow early rise, <br />And paint the eastern heaven with crimson light; <br /> <br />And thought of God, the gracious Heavenly Father, <br />Who made me, and that lovely sun on high, <br />And all those pearls of heaven thick-strung together, <br />Dropped, clustering, from his hand o'er all the sky. <br /> <br />With childish reverence, my young lips did say <br />The prayer my pious mother taught to me: <br />'O gentle God! oh, let me strive alway <br />Still to be wise, and good, and follow Thee!' <br /> <br />So prayed I for my father and my mother, <br />And for my sister, and for all the town; <br />The king I knew not, and the beggar-brother, <br />Who, bent with age, went, sighing, up and down. <br /> <br />They perished, the blithe days of boyhood perished, <br />And all the gladness, all the peace I knew! <br />Now have I but their memory, fondly cherished;-- <br />God! may I never lose that too!<br /><br />Henry Wadsworth Longfellow<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/childhood-from-the-danish/
