Chapter XVII

If haply, dear, I may to thee attain,
And be, I too, a child in heaven with thee,[4]
Let me for evermore a child remain,
And where thou dwellest, let my dwelling be.

A childish-lowly seat, but next thine own;
If this, through perfect grace, should be my lot,
I would not climb to any loftier throne,
And loftier hopes I would remember not.

The elder life brought strife, not peace, on earth,
The growing years dismay and hate and feud;
To share for ever thy unconscious mirth—
This were my heaven and my beatitude;

And all the lore that saints and sages teach
Were foolishness beside thy prattling speech.

Footnote 4:

“I think we shall all be children to begin with, when we get to
heaven.”—_Tennyson._