My mother did not die of old age,
nor did any illness lay her low in bed.
Her worries for us, the fugitives,
broke her heart,
and one day she decided
to not breathe anymore.
Her last breath became wind,
and it’s blowing wild
on this November day,
whistling and singing to my ears,
sometimes as a lullaby,
other times a lament.
And very often the wind
says to me:
‘Why so late my son?’
Mom’s goal was to graduate college
but dad’s goal was mom.
Here I hear a footstep,
Its voice is grey and soft:
Is it that of a forgotten ghost ?
So, a rain-drop drops, ....
Yes, one, two, three.
Up in the sky there is a cloud,
Its sight is old as Earth :
Who says it is the passing soul ?
At my feet I see a falling leaf,
And the cloud is gone.
After the night wind blows
My soul follows to seek Rest :
Is the wind my mother lost ?
Under the robe of darkness and love
My heart throbs happily with bliss.
The lovely years went lightly by
As April flowers go,
And often you would laugh or cry
To see how I could grow.
The lonely years drift by in rain,
As leaves in autumn do.
I long, when we shall meet again,
To be as tall as you.
With tears and a faithful heart and brave mirth,
Once on a time you watched to welcome me.
Waiting and weariness and agony
Until the last were what you thought me worth.
But wearier than the months that wait for birth
Are those that wait for death— How shall I be
Still while you are so still? How shall I see
Unbrokenhearted your slow steps from earth?
So the white watchers gather near to hark
The soul's approach, the heralding of the horn,
And so they strain and listen for the tread
Of the free soul retreating down the dark —
Mothers who wait for children to be born,
Children who wait for mothers to be dead.
As Ann came in one summer's day,
She felt that she must creep,
So silent was the clear cool house,
It seemed a house of sleep.
And sure, when she pushed open the door,
Rapt in the stillness there,
Her mother sat, with stooping head,
Asleep upon a chair;
Fast--fast asleep; her two hands laid
Loose-folded on her knee,
So that her small unconscious face
Looked half unreal to be:
So calmly lit with sleep's pale light
Each feature was; so fair
Her forehead--every trouble was
Smooth'd out beneath her hair.
I do not know his grace the Duke,
Outside whose gilded gate there died
Of want a feeble, poor old man,
With but his shadow at his side.
I do not know his Lady fair,
Who in a bath of milk doth lie;
More milk than could feed fifty babes,
That for the want of it must die.
But well I know the mother poor,
Three pounds of flesh wrapped in her shawl:
A puny babe that, stripped at home,
Looks like a rabbit skinned, so small.
And well I know the homeless waif,
Fed by the poorest of the poor;
Since I have seen that child alone,
Crying against a bolted door.
My mother dandled me and sang,
'How young it is, how young!'
And made a golden cradle
That on a willow swung.
'He went away,' my mother sang,
'When I was brought to bed,'
And all the while her needle pulled
The gold and silver thread.
She pulled the thread and bit the thread
And made a golden gown,
And wept because she had dreamt that I
Was born to wear a crown.
'When she was got,' my mother sang,
'I heard a sea-mew cry,
And saw a flake of the yellow foam
That dropped upon my thigh.'
I watch the great clear twilight
Veiling the ice-bowed trees;
Their branches tinkle faintly
With crystal melodies.
The larches bend their silver
Over the hush of snow;
One star is lighted in the west,
Two in the zenith glow.
For a moment I have forgotten
Wars and women who mourn--
I think of the mother who bore me
And thank her that I was born.
The pansy makes such weird grimaces,
And imitates all bestial faces —
But there's a thing it couldn't do,
And that is, make a face like you.
I'm sure I've never seen another.
And that you got it from your mother.
Old Jock and Marie Anne could never find
Raspberries of the glowing amber kind
To fill the “ancient porcelain bowl.” (’Twas lined
With amber glaze; outside a gold vine wound
In such a graceful pattern round and round.)
But if my Mother looked she always found
Enough to fill the bowl. That day we’d three
Distinguished guests. I loved to have them see
My lovely Mother as she looked at tea....
Her gown of creamy lace--her shining hair,
Her beads of old carved amber ... all her rare
Fragile soft richness, like the berries there
With their pale amber bloom. I loved her so....
I wished that every body there could know....
“Why don’t you eat your berries, Child?” ... then low
Your love was like moonlight
turning harsh things to beauty,
so that little wry souls
reflecting each other obliquely
as in cracked mirrors...
beheld in your luminous spirit
their own reflection,
transfigured as in a shining stream,
and loved you for what they are not.
You are less an image in my mind
than a luster
I see you in gleams
pale as star-light on a gray wall...
evanescent as the reflection of a white swan
shimmering in broken water.