MOTHER AND MATE
Lightly she slept, that splendid mother mine
Who faced death, undismayed, two hopeless years....
(“Think of me sometimes, son, but not with tears
Lest my soul grieve,” she writes. Oh, this divine
Unselfishness!) ...
Her favourite print smiled down—
The stippled Cupid, Bartolozzi-brown—
Upon my sorrow. Fire-gleams, fitful, played
Among her playthings—Toby mugs and jade....
And then I dreamed that—suddenly, strangely clear—
A voice I knew not, faltered at my ear:
“Courage!” ... Your own dear voice, loved since, and known!
And now that she sleeps well, come times her voice
Whispers in day-dreams: “Courage, son! Rejoice
That, leaving you, I left you not alone.”