friendship

This is Friendship

I love you not for what you are
But for what I am when I'm with you;

I love you not only for what you have made
Of yourself but what you are making of me;

I love you for putting your hand into my
Heaped up heart and passing over all the
Foolish weak things you can't help dimly
Seeing there, and drawing out in the light
All the beautiful belongings that no one
Else had looked quite far enough to find;

I love you because you are helping me to
Make of the lumber of my life, not a tavern
But a temple, out of the work of my everyday
Life, not a reproach, but a song;

I love you because you have done more than
Any creed could have done to make me good
And more than any fate could have done to
Make me happy;

You have done it without a touch, without a
Word, without a sigh;

You have done it by being yourself.

Perhaps that is what being a friend means after all.

-Mary Carolyn Davies-