A father leans over his sleeping child’s crib late at night, convinced he has heard a sigh. He kisses the small brow with a fierce, aching tenderness, then whispers a kind of promise: you cannot understand this love now, but someday you will. The poem then shifts forward to a future scene — the child, now grown, standing beside the father’s still face in death. In that quiet, tearful room, the same kiss and the same love will finally be felt in full. The final stanza brings us back to the present, with the speaker writing through tears and asking the child to remember this night years from now. The mood is intimate and deeply melancholy, shaped by a parent’s awareness that his devotion will only be fully understood when he is gone. It is a lullaby tinged with loss, holding both gratitude and gentle sadness in the space between now and some distant tomorrow.
Some time — Summary
Last night, my darling, as you slept, I thought I heard you sigh, And to your little crib I crept, And watched a space thereby; And then I stooped and kissed your brow, For oh! I love you so-- You are too young to know it now, But some time you shall know!
Some time when, in a darkened place Where others come to weep, Your eyes shall look upon a face Calm in eternal sleep, The voiceless lips, the wrinkled brow, The patient smile shall show-- You are too young to know it now, But some time you may know!
Look backward, then, into the years, And see me here to-night-- See, O my darling! how my tears Are falling as I write; And feel once more upon your brow The kiss of long ago-- You are too young to know it now, But some time you shall know.