children

your children are not your children.

they are the sons and the daughters of life's longing for itself.

they came through you but not from you.

and though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.

you maye 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.

you may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.

you are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.

let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness.

-kahlil gibran, the prophet