"The hand that rocks the cradle"--but there is no such hand.
It is bad to rock the baby, they would have us understand;
So the cradle's but a relic of the former foolish days,
When mothers reared their children in unscientific ways;
When they jounced them and they bounced them, those poor dwarfs
of long ago--
The Washingtons and Jeffersons, you know.
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Suck, baby! suck! mother's love grows by giving:
Drain the sweet founts that only thrive by wasting!
read more
Suck, baby! suck! mother's love grows by giving:
Drain the sweet founts that only thrive by wasting!
Black manhood comes when riotous guilty living
Hands thee the cup that shall be death in tasting.
O child! O new-born denizen
Of life's great city! on thy head
The glory of morn is read more
O child! O new-born denizen
Of life's great city! on thy head
The glory of morn is shed,
Like a celestial benison!
Here at the portal thou dost stand,
And with thy little hand
Thou openest the mysterious gate
Into the future's undiscovered land.
What is the little one thinking about?
Very wonderful things, no doubt;
Unwritten history!
read more
What is the little one thinking about?
Very wonderful things, no doubt;
Unwritten history!
Unfathomed mystery!
Yet he laughs and cries, and eats and drinks,
And chuckles and crows, and nods and winks,
As if his head were as full of kinks
And curious riddles as any sphinx!
- Josiah Gilbert Holland (used pseudonym Timothy Titcomb),
There came to port last Sunday night
The queerest little craft,
Without an inch of rigging on;
read more
There came to port last Sunday night
The queerest little craft,
Without an inch of rigging on;
I looked and looked--and laughed.
It seemed so curious that she
Should cross the unknown water,
And moor herself within my room--
My daughter! O my daughter!
How lovely he appears! his little cheeks
In their pure incarnation, vying with
The rose leaves strewn read more
How lovely he appears! his little cheeks
In their pure incarnation, vying with
The rose leaves strewn beneath them.
And his lips, too,
How beautifully parted! No; you shall not
Kiss him; at least not now; he will wake soon--
His hour of midday rest is nearly over.
Sweet babe, in thy face
Soft desires I can trace,
Secret joys and secret smiles,
read more
Sweet babe, in thy face
Soft desires I can trace,
Secret joys and secret smiles,
Little pretty infant wiles.
Lo! at the couch where infant beauty sleeps;
Her silent watch the mournful mother keeps;
She, while read more
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 slumbering child with pensive eyes.
Sweet is the infant's waking smile,
And sweet the old man's rest--
But middle age by no read more
Sweet is the infant's waking smile,
And sweet the old man's rest--
But middle age by no fond wile,
No soothing calm is blest.
Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained
strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest read more
Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained
strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the
enemy and the avenger.
