“Son,” said my mother,
When I was knee-high,“You’ve need of clothes to cover you,
And not a rag have I.“There’s nothing in the
To make a boy breeches,
Nor shears to cut a cloth with,
Nor thread to take stitches.“There’s nothing in the
But a loaf-end of rye,
And a harp with a woman’s
Nobody will buy,”And she began to cry.
That was in the early fall.
When came the late fall,“Son,” she said, “the sight of
Makes your mother’s blood crawl,—“Little skinny shoulder
Sticking through your clothes!
And where you’ll get a jacket
God above knows.“It’s lucky for me, lad,
Your daddy’s in the ground,
And can’t see the way I
His son go around!”And she made a queer sound.
That was in the late fall.
When the winter came,
I’d not a pair of
Nor a shirt to my name.
I couldn’t go to school,
Or out of doors to play.
And all the other little
Passed our way.“Son,” said my mother,“Come, climb into my lap,
And I’ll chafe your little
While you take a nap.”And, oh, but we were
For half an hour or more,
Me with my long
Dragging on the floor,
To a Mother Goose rhyme!
Oh, but we were
For half an hour’s time!
But there was I, a great boy,
And what would folks
To hear my mother singing
To sleep all day,
In such a daft way?
Men say the
Was bad that year;
Fuel was scarce,
And food was dear.
A wind with a wolf’s
Howled about our door,
And we burned up the
And sat upon the floor.
All that was left
Was a chair we couldn’t break,
And the harp with a woman’s
Nobody would take,
For song or pity’s sake.
The night before ChristmasI cried with the cold,
I cried myself to
Like a two-year-old.
And in the deep nightI felt my mother rise,
And stare down upon
With love in her eyes.
I saw my mother
On the one good chair,
A light falling on
From I couldn’t tell where,
Looking nineteen,
And not a day older,
And the harp with a woman’s
Leaned against her shoulder.
Her thin fingers,
In the thin, tall strings,
Were
Wonderful things.
Many bright threads,
From where I couldn’t see,
Were running through the harp
Rapidly,
And gold threads
Through my mother’s hand.
I saw the web grow,
And the pattern expand.
She wove a child’s jacket,
And when it was
She laid it on the
And wove another one.
She wove a red
So regal to see,“She’s made it for a king’s son,”I said, “and not for me.”But I knew it was for me.
She wove a pair of
Quicker than that!
She wove a pair of
And a little cocked hat.
She wove a pair of mittens,
She wove a little blouse,
She wove all
In the still, cold house.
She sang as she worked,
And the harp strings spoke;
Her voice never faltered,
And the thread never broke.
And when I awoke,—There sat my
With the harp against her shoulder,
Looking nineteen,
And not a day older,
A smile about her lips,
And a light about her head,
And her hands in the harp
Frozen dead.
And piled up beside
And toppling to the skies,
Were the clothes of a king’s son,
Just my size.
