So docile was my dear, so wise to know
And love the tender rule he should obey,
So childly tractable, withal so slow
To childish wrath, so clean from passion’s sway,
The momentary doubt would sometimes rise
If in the patient child reposed the will
The man would need, the force, the enterprise
To face the strife, to grapple with the ill.
I know not, but I know that manhood’s crown
Was ever meekness, since the children’s friend
Rode humbly royal through the palm-strewn town
Unto a stern retributory end.
I see foreshadowed in that seven-years’ span
The fulness of the stature of a man.