MOTHER O' MINE1

IF I were hanged on the highest hill, Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine! I know whose love would follow me still, Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

If I were drowned in the deepest sea,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!
I know whose tears would come down to me,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

If I were damned of body and soul,
I know whose prayers would make me whole,
Mother o' mine, O mother o' mine!

Rudyard Kipling

AT BETHLEHEM

LONG, long before the Babe could speak,
When he would kiss his mother's cheek
And to her bosom press,

The brightest angels standing near
Would turn away to hide a tear
For they are motherless.

1 By permission of the author, Rudyard Kipling. From The Light that Failed, copyright, 1899, by Rudyard Kipling.

Where were ye, Birds, that bless His name,
When wingless to the world He came,
And wordless, though Himself the Word
That made the blossom and the bird?

John Banister Tabb

TO HIS MOTHER

He brought a Lily white,
That bowed its fragrant head
And blushed a rosy red

Before her fairer light.

He brought a rose; and, lo,
The crimson blossom saw
Her beauty, and in awe

Became as white as snow.

John Banister Tabb

THE SHEPHERDESS

SHE walks-the lady of my delight —

A shepherdess of sheep.

Her flocks are thoughts. She keeps them white;

She guards them from the steep.

She feeds them on the fragrant height,
And folds them in for sleep.

She roams maternal hills and bright,
Dark valleys safe and deep.

Into that tender breast at night

The chastest stars may peep.

She walks the lady of my delight—

A shepherdess of sheep.

She holds her little thoughts in sight,
Though gay they run and leap.

She is so circumspect and right;
She has her soul to keep.

She walks

the lady of my delight

A shepherdess of sheep.

Alice Meynell

MOTHERLESS

I WRITE. My mother was a Florentine, Whose rare blue eyes were shut from seeing

me

When scarcely I was four years old; my life,
A poor spark snatched up from a failing lamp
Which went out therefore. She was weak
and frail;

She could not bear the joy of giving life-
The mother's rapture slew her. If her kiss
Had left a longer weight upon my lips,
It might have steadied the uneasy breath,
And reconciled and fraternized my soul
With a new order. As it was, indeed,