mother

Behold this little volume here inrolde:
'Tis the Almighty's present to the world:
Hearken earth's earth; each sencelesse thing can heare
His Maker's thunder, though it want an eare:
God's word is senior to his works, nay rather
If rightly weigh'd the world may call it father;
God spake, 'twas done; this great foundation
Is the Creator's Exhalation
Breath'd out in speaking. The best work of man
Is better than his word; but if wee scanne
God's word aright, his works far short doe fall;

To Mrs. E.C. Morrieson


’Twas not chance but deep design,
Tho’ of whom I can't divine
Made the courtly Valentine
(Corpulent saint and bishop)
Such a time with Bob to stay:-—
Let me now in bardish way
On your own St. David’s day
Toss you a simple dish up.

’Tis a tale we learnt at school,—
Oft we broke domestic rule,
Standing till our brows were cool
In the forbidden lobby.
There we talked and there we laughed,
Till the townsfolk thought us daft,

Can I see another's woe,
And not be in sorrow too?
Can I see another's grief,
And not seek for kind relief?

Can I see a falling tear,
And not feel my sorrow's share?
Can a father see his child
Weep, nor be with sorrow filled?

Can a mother sit and hear
An infant groan, an infant fear?
No, no! never can it be!
Never, never can it be!

And can He who smiles on all
Hear the wren with sorrows small,
Hear the small bird's grief and care,

The pale, the cold, and the moony smile
Which the meteor beam of a starless night
Sheds on a lonely and sea-girt isle,
Ere the dawning of morn's undoubted light,
Is the flame of life so fickle and wan
That flits round our steps till their strength is gone.

O man! hold thee on in courage of soul
Through the stormy shades of thy wordly way,
And the billows of clouds that around thee roll
Shall sleep in the light of a wondrous day,
Where hell and heaven shall leave thee free
To the universe of destiny.

To be an ape in little of the mountain-making mother
Like swarthy Cheops, but my own hands
For only slaves, is a far sweeter toil than to cut
Passions in verse for a sick people.
I'd liefer bed one boulder in the house-wall than be the time's
Archilochus: we name not Homer: who now
Can even imagine the fabulous dawn when bay-leaves (to a blind
Beggar) were not bitter in the teeth?


Submitted by Holt

We must have clamored for the same mother, hurried for
the same womb.
I know it now as I read that my birthday is his.
Since the first time I saw his picture, I sensed something—
and with a fierce bonding and animosity
began following his career.

Look where I am and look where he is!
There is a book documenting his every haircut
while all my image-building attempts go unnoticed, even
by my friends.
I'm too wimpy to just dye my curls red
or get them straightened. I, sickeningly moral,

I SAW where in the shroud did lurk
A curious frame of Nature's work;
A floweret crush'd in the bud,
A nameless piece of Babyhood,
Was in her cradle-coffin lying;
Extinct, with scarce the sense of dying:
So soon to exchange the imprisoning womb
For darker closets of the tomb!
She did but ope an eye, and put
A clear beam forth, then straight up shut
For the long dark: ne'er more to see
Through glasses of mortality.
   Riddle of destiny, who can show
What thy short visit meant, or know

Perfect little body, without fault or stain on thee,
With promise of strength and manhood full and fair!
Though cold and stark and bare,
The bloom and the charm of life doth awhile remain on thee.

Thy mother's treasure wert thou;—alas! no longer
To visit her heart with wondrous joy; to be
Thy father's pride:—ah, he
Must gather his faith together, and his strength make stronger.

To me, as I move thee now in the last duty,
Dost thou with a turn or gesture anon respond;
Startling my fancy fond

PERFECT little body, without fault or stain on thee,
   With promise of strength and manhood full and fair!
   Though cold and stark and bare,
The bloom and the charm of life doth awhile remain on thee.

Thy mother's treasure wert thou;--alas! no longer
   To visit her heart with wondrous joy; to be
   Thy father's pride:--ah, he
Must gather his faith together, and his strength make stronger.

To me, as I move thee now in the last duty,
Dost thou with a turn or gesture anon respond;

My mother's maids, when they did sew and spin,
They sang sometime a song of the field mouse,
That, for because her livelood was but thin,

Would needs go seek her townish sister's house.
She thought herself endurèd too much pain;
The stormy blasts her cave so sore did souse

That when the furrows swimmèd with the rain,
She must lie cold and wet in sorry plight;
And worse than that, bare meat there did remain

To comfort her when she her house had dight;