Father

Father

by S. E. Kiser

When all my other debts are paid

My greatest debt will yet be due

For sacrifices you have made

And cares that I have brought to you.

I have been slow to understand

The patience and the love and pride

With which for my sake you have planned,

Your own ambitions put aside.

When others have withheld from me

The praise that I have longed to hear,

You, Father, have been quick to see

And glad to speak the word of cheer.

With eager efforts you have sought

To smooth my paths and make them fair,

Unselfishly expecting naught

In payment for your tender care.

I have been slow to learn, but now,

With recollections that are sweet,

I braid a laurel for your brow

And lay my tribute at your feet.

My Father's Voice in Prayer

My Father's Voice in Prayer 

by May Hastings Nottage

In the silence that falls on my spirit

When the clamor of life loudest seems,

Comes a voice that floats in tremulous notes

Far over my sea of dreams.

I remember the dim old vestry

And my father kneeling there;

And the old hymns thrill with the memory still

Of my father's voice in prayer.

I can see his glance of approval

As my part in the hymn I took;

I remember the grace of my mother's face,

And the tenderness of her look;

And I knew that a gracious memory

Cast its light on that face so fair

As her cheek flushed faint--O mother, my saint!--

At my father's voice in prayer.

"Neath the stress of that marvelous pleading

All childish dissensions died:

Each rebellious will sank conquered and still

In a passion of love and pride.

Ah, the years have held exquisite voices,

And melodies tender and rare;

But tenderest seems the voice of my dreams--

My father's voice in prayer.