Weekend Writing: Mother's Day Poems

Mothers are a true wonder. They're strong, kind, funny, smart, and they touch our hearts, no matter what they're doing. They impact us in real life and also in literature. Last year, I shared a list of the most memorable mothers in literature. They help fight crime, provide goodnight kisses, and moments of much-needed encouragement and advice--because let's be honest, moms always know just what to say to make everything better. It's what makes them special. 

Mothers have also been represented in poetry. Poets reflect on fond memories with their mothers. In return, some poets write about their memories of being mothers and raising children. Mothers should be celebrated in all forms, including in beautiful poems.

In honor of Mother's Day this weekend, I'm featuring five poems about mothers. Share these encouraging, heartwarming poems with the mothers in your life, especially if you're unable to celebrate the holiday with them this year. Share these words with them anyway and let them know you care. Happy Mother's Day! 

1. "To My Mother" - Christina Rossetti 

To-day's your natal day; 

   Sweet flowers I bring:

Mother, accept, I pray

   My offering. 

And may you happy live,

   And long us bless;

Receiving as you give 

   Great happiness. 

2. "To My Mother" - Robert Louis Stevenson 

You too, my mother, read my rhymes

For love of unforgotten times,

And you may chance to hear once more

The little feet along the floor. 

3. "Morning Song" - Sylvia Plath 

Love set you going like a fat gold watch.

The midwife slapped your footsoles, and your bald cry

Took its place among the elements. 

Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue. 

In a drafty museum, your nakedness

Shadows our safety. We stand round blankly as walls. 

I'm no more your mother

Than the cloud that distills a mirror to reflect its own slow

Effacement at the wind's hand. 

All night your moth-breath

Flickers among the flat pink roses. I wake to listen:

A far sea moves in my ear. 

One cry, and I stumble from bed, cow-heavy and floral

In my Victorian nightgown.

Your mother opens clean as a cat's. The window square

Whitens and swallows its dull stars. And now you try

Your handful of notes; 

The clear vowels rise like balloons.

4. "To My Mother" - Edgar Allan Poe 

Because I feel that, in the Heavens above, 

The angels, whispering to one another,

Can find, among their burning terms of love,

None so devotional as that of "Mother,"

Therefore by that dear name, I long have called you--

You who are more than mother unto me,

And fill my heart of hearts, where Death installed you

In setting my Virginia's spirit free.

My mother--my own mother, who died early, 

Was but the mother of myself; but you

Are mother to the one I loved so dearly,

And thus are dearer than the mother I knew 

By that infinity with which my wife

Was dearer to my soul than its soul-life. 

5. "Rock Me to Sleep" - Elizabeth Akers Allen 

Backward, turn backward, O Time, in your flight,

Make me a child again just for tonight! 

Mother, come back from the echoless shore,

Take me again to your heart as of yore;

Kiss from my forehead the furrows of care,

Smooth the few silver threads out of my hair; 

Over my slumbers your loving watch keep;--

Rock me to sleep, mother, -- rock me to sleep! 

Backward, flow backward, O tide of the years! 

I am so weary of toil and of tears,--

Toil without recompense, tears all in vain,--

Take them, and give me my childhood again! 

I have grown weary of dust and decay,--

Weary of sowing for others to reap;--

Rock me to sleep, mother -- rock me to sleep!

Tired of the hollow, the base, the untrue,

Mother, O mother, my heart calls for you!

Many a summer the grass has grown green,

Blossomed and faded, our faces between:

Yet, with strong yearning and passionate pain,

Long I tonight for your presence again.

Come from the silence so long and so deep;--

Rock me to sleep, mother, -- rock me to sleep! 

Over my heart, in the days that are flown,

No love like mother-love ever has shone;

No other worship abides and endures,--

Faithful, unselfish, and patient like yours: 

None like a mother can charm away pain

From the sick soul and the world-weary brain.

Slumber's soft calms o'er my heavy lids creep;--

Rock me to sleep, mother, -- rock me to sleep! 

Come, let your brown hair, just lighted with gold, 

Fall on your shoulders again as of old;

Let it drop over my forehead tonight,

Shading my faint eyes away from the light;

For with its sunny-edged shadows once more

Haply will throng the sweet visions of yore;

Loving, softly, its bright billows sweep;--

Rock me to sleep, mother, -- rock me to sleep!

Mother, dear mother, the years have been long

Since I last listened your lullaby song:

Sing, then, and unto my soul it shall seem

Womanhood's years have been only a dream.

Clasped to your heart in a loving embrace,

With your light lashes just sweeping my face, 

Never hereafter to wake or to weep;--

Rock me to sleep, mother, -- rock me to sleep!

---

I'll keep it simple: Happy Mother's Day! Have a lovely weekend, celebrating your mothers or motherly figures in your life. Mothers are special and they deserve to be celebrated! 

-KJL-