Address to My Infant Daughter, Dora

--Hast thou then survived--Mild Offspring of infirm humanity,Meek Infant! among all forlornest thingsThe most forlorn--one life of that bright star,The second glory of the Heavens?--Thou hast;Already hast survived that great decay,That transformation through the wide earth felt,And by all nations. In that Being's sightFrom whom the Race of human kind proceed,A thousand years are but as yesterday;And one day's narrow circuit is to HimNot less capacious than a thousand years.But what is time? What outward glory? neitherA measure is of Thee, whose claims extendThrough "heaven's eternal year." --Yet hail to Thee,Frail, feeble, Monthling!--by that name, methinks,Thy scanty breathing-time is portioned outNot idly.--Hadst thou been of Indian birth,Couched on a casual bed of moss and leaves,And rudely canopied by leafy boughs,Or to the churlish elements exposedOn the blank plains,--the coldness of the night,Or the night's darkness, or its cheerful faceOf beauty, by the changing moon adorned,Would, with imperious admonition, thenHave scored thine age, and punctually timedThine infant history, on the minds of thoseWho might have wandered with thee.--Mother's love,Nor less than mother's love in other breasts,Will, among us warm-clad and warmly housed,Do for thee what the finger of the heavensDoth all too often harshly executeFor thy unblest coevals, amid wildsWhere fancy hath small liberty to graceThe affections, to exalt them or refine;And the maternal sympathy itself,Though strong, is, in the main, a joyless tieOf naked instinct, wound about the heart.Happier, far happier is thy lot and ours!Even now--to solemnise thy helpless state,And to enliven in the mind's regardThy passive beauty--parallels have risen,Resemblances, or contrasts, that connect,Within the region of a father's thoughts,Thee and thy mate and sister of the sky.And first;--thy sinless progress, through a worldBy sorrow darkened and by care disturbed,Apt likeness bears to hers, through gathered clouds,Moving untouched in silver purity,And cheering oft-times their reluctant gloom.Fair are ye both, and both are free from stain:But thou, how leisurely thou fill'st thy hornWith brightness! leaving her to post along,And range about, disquieted in change,And still impatient of the shape she wears.Once up, once down the hill, one journey, BabeThat will suffice thee; and it seems that nowThou hast fore-knowledge that such task is thine;Thou travellest so contentedly, and sleep'stIn such a heedless peace. Alas! full soonHath this conception, grateful to behold,Changed countenance, like an object sullied o'erBy breathing mist; and thine appears to beA mournful labour, while to her is givenHope, and a renovation without end.--That smile forbids the thought; for on thy faceSmiles are beginning, like the beams of dawn,To shoot and circulate; smiles have there been seen;Tranquil assurances that Heaven supportsThe feeble motions of thy life, and cheersThy loneliness: or shall those smiles be calledFeelers of love, put forth as if to exploreThis untried world, and to prepare thy wayThrough a strait passage intricate and dim?Such are they; and the same are tokens, signs,Which, when the appointed season hath arrived,Joy, as her holiest language, shall adopt;And Reason's godlike Power be proud to own.