A Mother Tells – Life Holds Pain As Well As Pleasure

 

 

A Mother Tells –

Life Brings pain As Well As Pleasure

 

There once was a lass from the Sion Side

Who battled the shackles of life with a smile

When I asked why she sang when others

Frowned and harangued

This refrain she replied

 

Smell the thorny roses’ scent

Life holds pain

As well as pleasure, she’d  remonstrate with me

 

When she was below the age of reason

Angels came and took her mammy to heaven

Then Mary, her sister became her mother

Taught her right from wrong

Instilled motherly way in her

 

Smell the thorny roses’ scent

Life holds pain

As well as pleasure, she’d remonstrate with me

 

This was a lesson

I came to learn

Back-chatting her got me a whack on the legs

Sent to bed supperless. Or scrub the table in the scullery

A job I hated vehemently

 

A mother I became

Understood things better, then

A bond of friendship cemented our lives

But still

‘Til the day she passed through Heaven’s gate

The last word would be hers

 

Smell the thorny roses’ scent

Life holds pain

As well as pleasure, she’d remonstrate with me

 

She reminisced over a brew of leaves

Of  bygone days

The old homestead

The home her father poor though he’d been, sustained

For her brothers, sisters and their old collie friend

 

Of Joe, a brother brave

Sending poetry home from Death’s Face

Packie in Lancashire – Frank with his

Wandering ways –

Hughie, her heart’s desire to see one time again before he’d pass away

 

Smell the thorny roses’ scent

Life hold pain

As well as pleasure she’d remonstrate with me

 

And sisters – Bridget, Mary, both deceased

Theresa, friend, their daily lives collectively shared

Ellen visits from Antrim’s Glens – anticipated fun and delightful chortling

My father, she’d repeat

Poor though he’d been

Kept us all together in the same dwelling place

 

Sadness oft befell her singing trill

Then come Sunday the phone would shrill

Brothers and sisters chatter, recall

Old now, but bound tightly

To each other still

 

 

What I’d give this Mother’s Day

To hear her tell

Those tales anew

See her heap coal on the fire

Hear the kettle sing at boil

 

The church kept people barefoot

And pregnant I’d rave

Too many children

Too many mouths to feed

Oh to take those words back again

 

She’d gaze at me with unwavering stare

Which one of you, my family

Should I have not conceived?

Which one of my brothers or sisters should my father, Patrick?

Have given to the State to rear?

 

Good answer I say with the hindsight of life

 

Smell the roses scent, Mammy, I say

Yellow one’s for you – your favourite

This Mothering Sunday

Relieved of the thorns of life

Enjoy the Heavenly scent of the roses bright