I Love You

    I love you for what you are, but I
love you yet more for what you are
going to be.
    I love you not so much for your
realities as for your ideals. I pray for
your desires that they may be great,
rather than for your satisfactions,
which may be hazardously little.
    A satisfied flower is one whose pet-
als are about to fall. The most beauti-
ful rose is one hardly more than a bud
wherein the pangs and ecstasies of de-
sire are working for larger and finer
growth.
    Not always shall you be what you
are now.
    You are going forward toward some-
thing great. I am on the way with you
and therefore I love you.
                          ~ Carl Sandburg