When evening comes
And I'm in bed
And mother sits and sings
And holds my hand
And strokes my head,
I think of all the things
That I have heard —
Can they be true? —
That children just like me
Are cold and lost and hungry too
In lands across the Sea?

They say they wander in their fright
All dumb with cold and dread;
And when I think of them at night
I want to hide my head
Upon my mother's gentle arm
That holds me close and still,
And seems to promise that no harm
Can ever come, or ill.
And then I hear my mother's voice
So tender in a prayer,
" Dear God, may all the girls and boys
Who wander " Over there"
Be brought for kindly sheltering
To those who crave to give,
And they who mourn shall learn to sing
And they who die shall live. "

And when the prayer is done I sleep
So still without a sound,
And dream no little child shall weep
And all the lost are found!