Not Your Children

  

HAPPPY 50TH BIRTHDAY MY SON

May 10, 1971

"Your children are not your children.

They are sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.

They come through you but not from you.

And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You give them your love but not your thoughts,

For they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their souls,

For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,

Which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams."

Khalil Gibran

THE PROPHET