These Houses

As I child, I longed for cousins on the Nyberg side. It was just my brother, sister and I for so long.

I remember being in my aunt's wedding, and counting down the very long days before a cousin would come. To a girl of seven, three years is an eternity!

Once Matthew came, the cousins started coming - thick and fast, you might say. Eight cousins in nine years - my siblings and I were in heaven.

Aren't they so cute? We spent so much time with them when they were little... then right about the time they were really growing up, I went to college, got a job, married and moved to Florida. Busy with my own life, I missed out on significant parts of their growing-up years, thus my cousins are much closer to my siblings than to me.

Still, I adore them. And now, as our family celebrates their marriages, births of their children, their engagements - not even the rapid growth of my own children makes me feel as old as these events.

Today's poem is for my dear Nyberg cousins: I love you. I am praying this for you as you stretch your wings, choose your life-long mate, raise your precious babes.

Prayer For This House

Louis Untermeyer

May nothing evil cross this door,

And may ill-fortune never pry

About these windows; may the roar

And rains go by.

Strengthened by faith, the rafters will

Withstand the battering of the storm.

This hearth, though all the world grow chill

Will keep you warm.

Peace shall walk softly through these rooms,

Touching your lips with holy wine,

Till every casual corner blooms

Into a shrine.

Laughter shall drown the raucous shout

And, though the sheltering walls are thin,

May they be strong to keep hate out

And hold love in.

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