A Mother's Year Book

by Unknown

I, a woman, wife and mother,

What have I to do with art?

Are ye not my noblest pictures,

Portraits painted from my heart?

Margaret J. Preston

SEPTEMBER TWENTIETH

It was a little Child who swung

Wide back that city's portals

Where hearts remain forever young;

And all things good and pure among,

Shall childhood be immortal.

Lucy Larcom

SEPTEMBER TWENTY-FIRST

The mother, with sweet pious face,

Turns toward her little children from her seat,

Gives one a kiss, another an embrace,

Takes this upon her knees, that upon her feet:

And, while from actions, looks, complaints, pretences,

She learns their feelings and their various will,

To this a look, to that a word dispenses,

And, whether stern or smiling, loves them still.

Filicaia

SEPTEMBER TWENTY-SECOND

A living book is mine—

In age three years: in it I read no lies,

In it to myriad truths I find the clue—

A tender little child; but I divine

Thoughts high as Dante's in her clear blue eyes.

Maurice Francis Egan

SEPTEMBER TWENTY-THIRD

That pure shrine

Of childhood, though my love be true

Is hidden from my dim confine.

Author unknown

SEPTEMBER TWENTY-FOURTH