To A Child Embracing His Mother.

Love thy mother, little one!
Kiss and clasp her neck again, -
Hereafter she may have a son
Will kiss and clasp her neck in vain.
Love thy mother, little one!

Gaze upon her living eyes,
And mirror back her love for thee, -
Hereafter thou mayst shudder sighs
To meet them when they cannot see.
Gaze upon her living eyes!

Press her lips the while they glow
With love that they have often told, -
Hereafter thou mayst press in woe,
And kiss them till thine own are cold.
Press her lips the while they glow!

Oh, revere her raven hair!
Although it be not silver-gray;
Too early Death, led on by Care,
May snatch save one dear lock away.
Oh, revere her raven hair!

Pray for her at eve and morn,
That Heaven may long the stroke defer, -
For thou mayst live the hour forlorn
When thou wilt ask to die with her.
Pray for her at eve and morn!

Thomas Hood

Thomas Hood, born May 23, 1799, and passed away on May 3, 1845, was a British humorist and poet renowned for his comic verse and sharp satire. His most famous works include 'The Song of the Shirt' and 'The Bridge of Sighs,' which highlighted social issues and the plight of the poor. Hood's legacy is celebrated for blending humor with a deep empathy for human suffering, making his poetry both entertaining and thought-provoking.

Thomas Hood

Sonnet.

Thomas Hood, Simple Poetry

Sonnet. Death.

Thomas Hood, Simple Poetry

To Henrietta,[1] On Her Departure For Calais.

Thomas Hood, Simple Poetry

Ballad.

Thomas Hood, Simple Poetry

English

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My Mother's Kiss.

My mother's kiss, my mother's kiss,
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As in the bright and happy days
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You say it is a fancied thing
    Within my memory fraught;
To me it has a sacred place -
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Again, I feel her fingers glide
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I see the love-light in her eyes,
    When all my life was fair.

Again, I hear her gentle voice
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How precious was the faith that taught
    My soul of things above.

The music of her voice is stilled,
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    Until my latest breath.

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To My Mother.

With filial duty I address thee, Mother,
Thou dearest tie which this world's wealth possesses;
Endearing name! no language owns another
That half the tenderness and love expresses;
The very word itself breathes the affection,
Which heaves the bosom of a luckless child
To thank thee, for that care and that protection,
Which once, where fortune frowns, so sweetly smil'd.
Ah, oft fond memory leaves its pillow'd anguish,
To think when in thy arms my sleep was sound;
And now my startled tear oft views thee languish,
And fain would drop its honey in the wound:
But I am doom'd the sad reverse to see,
Where the worst pain I feel, is loss of helping thee.

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Maternal Hope

Lo! at the couch where infant beauty sleeps,
Her silent watch the mournful mother keeps:
She, while the lovely babe unconscious lies,
Smiles on her slumb'ring child with pensive eyes,
And weaves a song of melancholy joy:
"Sleep, image of thy father! sleep, my boy!
No ling'ring hour of sorrow shall be thine,
No sigh that rends thy father's heart and mine.
Bright, as his manly sire, the son shall be,
In form and soul; but, ah! more blest than he!
Thy fame, thy worth, thy filial love, at last,
Shall soothe his aching heart for all the past;
With many a smile my solitude repay,
And chase the world's ungenerous scorn away.

"And say, when summon'd from the world and thee
I lay my head beneath the willow-tree,
And soothe may parted spirit ling'ring near?
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The Shunamite.[A]

It was a sultry day of summer time.
The sun pour'd down upon the ripen'd grain
With quivering heat, and the suspended leaves
Hung motionless. The cattle on the hills
Stood still, and the divided flock were all
Laying their nostrils to the cooling roots,
And the sky look'd like silver, and it seem'd
As if the air had fainted, and the pulse
Of nature had run down, and ceas'd to beat.

'Haste thee, my child!' the Syrian mother said,
'Thy father is athirst' - and from the depths
Of the cool well under the leaning tree,
She drew refreshing water, and with thoughts
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She bless'd her beautiful boy, and to his way
Committed him. And he went lightly on,
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Stone vessel, ...

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To A Young Mother On The Birth Of Her First-Born Child.

Young mother! proudly throbs thine heart, and well may it rejoice,
Well may'st thou raise to Heaven above in grateful prayer thy voice:
A gift hath been bestowed on thee, a gift of priceless worth,
Far dearer to thy woman's heart than all the wealth of earth.

What store of deep and holy joy is opened to thy thought -
Glad, sunny dreams of future days, with bliss and rapture fraught;
Of hopes as varied, yet as bright, as beams of April sun,
And plans and wishes centred all within thy darling one!

While others seek in changing scenes earth's happiness to gain,
In fashion's halls to win a joy as dazzling as 'tis vain -
A bliss more holy far is thine, far sweeter and more deep,
To watch beside thine infant's couch and bend above his sleep.

What joy for thee to ling'...

Rosanna Eleanor Leprohon

To My Mother

No foreign tribute from a stranger-hand,
Mother, I bring thee, whom not Heaven's songs
Would as an alien reach.... Ah, but how far
From Heaven's least heavenly is the changing note
And changing fancy of these fitful cries!
Mother, forgive them, as the best of me
Has ever pleaded only for thy pardon,
Not for thy praise.
Mother, there is a love
Men give to wives and children, lovers, friends;
There is a love which some men give to God.
Ah! between this, I think, and that last love,
Last and too-late-discovered love of God,
There shines--and nearer to the love of God--
The love a man gives only to his mother,
Whose travail of dear thought has never end
Until the End. Oh that my mouth had words
Comfortable as thy kisses to the boy
Who loved while he forg...

John Frederick Freeman