The Mentor
“Why keep a dog
And bark yourself?”
My dad would ask,
As he would grin
And send us to some chore
For good of all.He trained us up,
And set us on a path –
Not perfect –
But a path which
Stood us each
Within some
Bound of
Normal
Life.“I’ll show you how,”
He’d say to us
Long years before
We understood
The import of his words –“I’ll show you how –
And someday
You’ll pass on
The words and wisdom
Which I teach.“Who knows to whom?
Perhaps your kids;
Or neighbors; friends;
Or maybe
Through some book,
Or song,
Or music sweet to hear –
Some stranger in the night.“For that is how
I came by all these things
Which I now say to you –“They’ve been passed on,
In lives lived out;
In mothers’ songs
Of lullaby;
In gentle touch
Of life on life;
As we walk out
Our days
Upon this
Globe.“And someday –
As you grow to adulthood,
You too will
Sift and sort
Through all the words
And gestures
You have heard
And felt –And let the older
Wisdom, which is better
Left unsaid,
Be quiet dropped
To form the solid base
On which to stand –“For where we’ve been,
And what has brought us here,
Is often not
The truth
Which takes
Us home.“We have our past,
But present, and a future here as well –
So you must sift
And sort
What I pass on to you.“But heed my words
This time, my child –
For they are mine –
This is my turn –
As yours
Will come
As well
Some day.”navigation