A child speaks to an absent mother, remembering the years when they were together as light and fleeting as April flowers. Back then, watching the child grow made the mother laugh or cry. Now those cheerful years are gone, replaced by lonely ones that drift past like autumn leaves falling in rain. The mood is tender and quietly sorrowful, full of love but shadowed by separation and waiting.
The child’s central wish is simple and touching: when they meet the mother again, she wants to be as tall as her. That height is both literal growth and a sign of becoming the person the mother would be proud of. The poem suggests the mother may have died or gone far away, leaving the child measuring time by the changing seasons. Its brief lines carry a soft ache—grief expressed through a child’s hopeful, patient voice.