“Footprints,” also known as “Footprints in the Sand,” is a popular modern allegorical Christian poem. It describes a person who sees two pairs of footprints in the sand, one of which belonged to God and another to themselves. At some points the two pairs of footprints dwindle to one; it is explained that this is where God carried the protagonist.
The authorship of the poem is disputed, with a number of people claiming to have written it. In 2008, Rachel Aviv, in a Poetry Foundation article, discusses the claims of Burrell Webb, Mary Stevenson, Margaret Fishback Powers, and Carolyn Joyce Carty. Later that year, The Washington Post, covering a lawsuit between the claims of Stevenson, Powers, and Carty, said that “At least a dozen people” had claimed credit for the poem.
The three authors who have most strenuously promoted their authorship are Margaret Powers (née Fishback), Carolyn Carty, and Mary Stevenson. Powers says she wrote the poem on Canadian Thanksgiving weekend, in mid-October, 1964. Powers is among the contenders who have resorted to litigation in hopes of establishing a claim. She is occasionally confused with American writer Margaret Fishback. Powers published an autobiography in 1993.
Carolyn Carty also claims to have written the poem in 1963 when she was six years old based on an earlier work by her great-great aunt, a Sunday school teacher. Mary Stevenson is also a purported author of the poem circa 1936. A Stevenson biography was published in 1995.
FOOTPRINTS
One night I dreamed I was walking along the beach with
the Lord. Scenes from my life flashed across the sky. In
each, I noticed footprints in the sand. Sometimes there were
two sets of footprints; other times there was only one.
During the low periods of my life I could see only one set of
footprints, so I said, “You promised me, Lord, that you would
walk with me always. Why, when I have needed you most,
have you not been there for me?”
The Lord replied, “The times when you have seen only one set
of footprints, my child, is when I carried you.”
— Unknown author