Beside her Babe, who sweetly slept,
A widowed mother sat and wept
O’er years of love gone by;
And as the sobs thick-gathering came,
She murmured her dead husband’s name
‘Mid that sad lullaby.
Well might that lullaby be sad,
For not one single friend she had
On this cold-hearted earth;
The sea will not give back its prey-
And they were wrapt in foreign clay
Who gave the orphan birth.
Steadfastly as a star doth look
Upon a little murmuring brook,
She gazed upon the bosom
And fair brow of her sleeping son-
“O merciful Heaven! when I am gone
Thine is this earthly blossom!”
While thus she sat-a sunbeam broke
Into the room; the babe awoke,
And from his cradle smiled!
Ah me! what kindling smiles met there!
I know not whether was more fair,
The mother or her child!
With joy fresh-sprung from short alarms,
The smiler stretched his rosy arms,
And to her bosom leapt-
All tears at once were swept away,
And said a face as bright as day,-
“Forgive me that I wept!”
Sufferings there are from nature sprung,
Ear hath not heard, nor poet’s tongue
May venture to declare;
But this as Holy Writ is sure,
“The griefs she bids us here endure
She can herself repair!”
(John Wilson)
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Based on Topics: Love Poems, Sadness Poems, Faces Poems, Heaven Poems, Fairness Poems, Mothers Poems, Grief Poems, Birth PoemsBased on Keywords: cold-hearted, smiler, fresh-sprung