Your children are not your children…
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children
as living arrows are sent forth.