By Your Side Poem by Laurence Overmire

Watching you sleep
Your eyelids flickering in the lamplight of a dream
Your tiny hands clutching the blanket
The air passing so effortlessly
In and out of your lungs
I wonder who you are
And who you will be
How will you get from here to there?
Will you succeed where we have failed?
I see the obstacles that await
The things we do to the innocent child
Know there are no easy answers, but
Somehow you must survive.

What power I have is but
To give you my love
And a wish you might fulfill this life
That you've been granted
With hope and courage to overcome
The travails that surely will beset you.

As I tuck you in, brush your hair
I know
I shall always remember this moment
Treasure it as the first we truly shared
You and I
Quiet in its contemplation, serene in the
Acceptance of what must be.

But you will never know, sleeping as you are
What passed here between us.
Perhaps as you grow older
You will learn
That that is often the way of love—
Silences too deep for words to touch
Sometimes remote and unrecognized
Still, even when you doubt it most
It's there.

~ Laurence Overmire