Saturday, November 21, 2015

The Toy-Strewn Home


                                  Children's Pasttimes 1912 by Frederick Clement Gad


This is a reminder to let your children be children, and do not rush them into being all grown-up. Comfort them when they are hurt and let them cry. Let them have uninterrupted play, because their minds are growing and their thinking is forming. To be often interrupted and channeled into other activities makes it harder to develop a thought process. Simple playing is one way to develop contentment.
  
Give me a house where the toys are strewn,
Where the dolls are asleep in the chairs,
Where the building blocks and the toy balloon
And the soldiers guard the stairs. 

Let me step in a house where the tiny cart
With the horses rules the floor,
And rest comes into my weary heart,
For I am at home once more. 

Give me the house with the toys about,
With the battered old train of cars,
The box of paints and the books left out,
And the ship with her broken spars. 

Let me step in a house at the close of day
That is littered with children’s toys,
And dwell once more in the haunts of play,
With the echoes of by-gone noise. 

Give me the house where the toys are seen,
The house where the children romp,
And I’ll happier be than man has been
‘Neath the gilded dome of pomp. 

Let me see the litter of bright-eyed play
Strewn over the parlor floor,
And the joys I knew in a far-off day
Will gladden my heart once more. 

Whoever has lived in a toy-strewn home.
Though feeble he be and gray,
Will yearn, no matter how far he roam,
For the glorious disarray 

Of the little home with its littered floor
That was his in the by-gone days ;
And his heart will throb as it throbbed before,
When he rests where a baby plays.
Edgar A. Guest

8 comments:

Rightthinker said...

Oh how I adore this poem..it's so beautiful! Thank you for posting!

Laura Jeanne said...

What a sweet poem...it made me cry. Thank you. :)

Unknown said...

Exactly! How fast they grow up. I am fond of Edgar Guests poetry. Thanks for sharing! Christina

April said...

As I sit here on the couch with my daughter's toys strewn across the floor from yesterday, this poem reminded me to be thankful. Thank you for sharing.

Jennifer Williams said...

I love Edgar Guest's poetry, and this is especially appropriate for my life. :-) Thank you for posting it today! It made me laugh and want to cry at the same time.

anonymous said...

Oh how I remember those days and I don't have far to go to be reminded of them these days. We have grand and great-grand babies now.

I do still remember getting up in the night to feed or check on a baby and stepping on a sharp Star Wars character or some squeaky toy the older sibbling threw on the floor after being put to bed for the night.

Janet.

Anonymous said...

My sons loved Legos and I kept a bin at the ready, in the living room, for the times when inspiration struck :0) We cleaned or put back in bins after the day was done. Since I home schooled, my children enjoyed letting their imagination run wild :0) mari

living from glory to glory said...

Well, this just made me smile and a tear in my eye, it is good to be reminded of how precious childhood really is. And it is also important to allow ourselves and our children to cry and grieve and process our emotions and to not be told do not cry or get back to doing chores to the point, they never are allowed to be just children. Yes, we must prepare them for the future. But not at the cost of loosing our children too soon.
Happy Thanksgiving to you and Yours!
Always, Roxy