To Mothers

For Mother's Day

Who is there when you are lost in the cold,
Or when you are alone in the night?
Who beats back with flame the monstrous fright
And tells you the tales, the ages old?
Who is there when you are wounded at your play
And knew you at the moment of your birth?
Who cares for home and hearth, the fenced in turf,
And walks before you, leading in the way?

When the clouds in the sky first burnish gold;
She rises to song and to dawn’s first light,
She rouses the flame for to face the day,
And hers is the anger and the gay mirth.
Standing before the fire, she is seen—
Truly as mother, and lover, and Queen.